geoffm, according to John 14, who do you see is the Holy Spirit?

Sorry Kland, I did not notice your question till this morning.

John 14:16 "And I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you for ever;
14:17 [Even] the Spirit of truth; whom the world cannot receive, because it seeth him not, neither knoweth him: but ye know him; for he dwelleth with you, and shall be in you.
14:18 I will not leave you comfortless: I will come to you."

Who did they know who had dwelt with them and was going to be in them?

Rev. 3:20 "Behold, I stand at the door, and knock: if any man hear my voice, and open the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with me."
Col. 1:27 "To whom God would make known what [is] the riches of the glory of this mystery among the Gentiles; which is Christ in you, the hope of glory:"

"As by faith we look to Jesus, our faith pierces the shadow, and we adore God for His wondrous love in giving us Jesus the Comforter. . . ." {OFC 26.6}

"The reason why the churches are weak and sickly and ready to die is that the enemy has brought influences of a discouraging nature to bear upon trembling souls. He has sought to shut Jesus from their view as the Comforter, as one who reproves, who warns, who admonishes them, saying, "This is the way, walk ye in it." RC 21. That is exactly what the doctrine of the Trinity does. The Comforter is not Jesus in an invisible form, but someone else.

"Let them study the seventeenth of John, and learn how to pray and how to live the prayer of Christ. He is the Comforter. He will abide in their hearts, making their joy full." RC 200.

That is consistent with; 2 Cor. 3:17 "Now the Lord is that Spirit: and where the Spirit of the Lord [is], there [is] liberty."

"Soon He must leave them to face the world without the comfort of His visible presence. He knew how bitter hate and unbelief would persecute them, and He desired to prepare them for their trials." {DA 410.3} But He has promised that He will never leave us or forsake us. So we will not have the comfort of His visible presence, but we will most certainly have the comfort of His invisible presence.

I see the Comforter of John 14 as both the Father and Jesus dwelling in us.

"As for Christ's sonship, it began at His birth in Bethlehem."

I am puzzled by this comment that seems to be at odds with the evidence of Scripture and S of P.
John 3:17 "For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through him might be saved."
It does not say He sent a co-worker who became a Son. To be able to send His Son into the world, He must already have a Son.

"While the Son of a human being, He became the Son of God in a new sense. Thus He stood in our world--the Son of God, yet allied by birth to the human race." {1SM 226.2}
He could not become the Son of God in a new sense if He was not already the Son of God.

"Let us group together the blessed assurances of His love as precious treasures, that we may look upon them continually. The Son of God leaving His Father's throne, clothing His divinity with humanity, that He might rescue man from the power of Satan; His triumph in our behalf,... --these are the pictures with which God bids us gladden the chambers of the soul. {LHU 251.5}

"Angels were expelled from heaven because they would not work in harmony with God. They fell from their high estate because they wanted to be exalted. They had come to exalt themselves, and they forgot that their beauty of person and of character came from the Lord Jesus. This fact the [fallen] angels would obscure, that Christ was the only begotten Son of God, and they came to consider that they were not to consult Christ." {TDG 128.2}
This was a long time before the incarnation. It is also very interesting that it says, "This fact the [fallen] angels would obscure, that Christ was the only begotten Son of God."
Who is trying to obscure this fact? Very similar to the following.
"The reason why the churches are weak and sickly and ready to die is that the enemy has brought influences of a discouraging nature to bear upon trembling souls. He has sought to shut Jesus from their view as the Comforter,..." {RC 21.3}

These facts [Jesus being the Son of God before the incarnation, and Jesus being the Comforter] are both obscured by the Trinity doctrine. No wonder the pioneers saw the Trinity doctrine as papal error that needed to be given up.

"The greatness of God is to us incomprehensible. "The Lord's throne is in heaven" (Psalm 11:4); yet by His Spirit He is everywhere present. He has an intimate knowledge of, and a personal interest in, all the works of His hand. . . ." {FLB 54.2}

That is why the HS is just as much a person as God is a person, because it is His personal but invisible presence, not some impersonal force or influence.

Incidently, would we say that the Father is not omnipresent because He is only present by the means of His Spirit? Only if you take the trinitarian view that the HS is a different distinct person from the Father and the Son. If the Holy Spirit were a seperate distinct individual, then neither the Father nor the Son could be called omni-present, but only the Holy Spirit
would fit that.

I should include the following.
“Lo, I am with you alway;” [Mark 16:15; Matthew 28:20.] when on the day of Pentecost the promised Comforter descended, and the power from on high was given, and the souls of the believers thrilled with the conscious presence of their ascended Lord,..."
GC 350.
Just one of many quotes where the Comforter is spoken of interchangeably with Christ, because it is His invisible presence.
That is why the HS can be described as the third person of the Godhead, because we do not have just a Father and a Son, but we have their invisible Spirit, by which they are everywhere personally present. That is the pioneer understanding of one of the fundamentals of our faith, from which we were warned numerous times not to depart from.

Sounds as though you are qualifying the person of the Holy Spirit to simply be the presence of Christ Himself. In such a setup, Christ, who Mrs. White tells us cannot be everywhere at once (i.e. He is not "omnipresent"), you would introduce a contradiction, for certainly the Holy Spirit is omnipresent. Mrs. White says "Cumbered with humanity, Christ could not be in every place personally." Therefore, if the Holy Spirit is Christ's "personal presence" as you have indicated, one would nearly be forced to conclude that the Holy Spirit cannot be omnipresent.

You cannot have it both ways. As for me, the logical conclusion is to accept that the Holy Spirit is His own person, separate and distinct from the persons of either the Father or the Son.

Blessings,

Green Cochoa.

Let me ask you: When was Christ "begotten?" Was He begotten TWICE?

Indeed He did. At the point in time when this text was written, Jesus had been already incarnated among us.

Good point. He was already a "promised Son." When He came to earth, His Sonship materialized into actual fact. The promise of His coming pre-existed Adam and Eve.

Within the above statement is a big contextual clue as to Mrs. White's intent in writing that passage. The clue is the other title Ellen White uses: "Christ." When did Jesus become called "Christ?" You see, both of those terms are New Testament terms, which arose post-incarnation. How then would she refer to "Christ" for that period of history? It is not that Mrs. White is trying to make a point of Jesus having already become Christ or the "only begotten Son of God." It is rather that the angels were not accepting Jesus' true position as a member of the Godhead.

We all know that the "Son of God" intones a divine being who is equal with God. Mrs. White uses the term to emphasize that position which Christ held.

Jesus said:

Notice what Jesus says here: "another Comforter."

Notice, too, what Jesus does NOT say here: "that _I_ may abide with you for ever."

Both of those points help us to understand the position of the Comforter. Jesus was a Comforter, certainly. Yet He was not the only one.

Blessings,

Green Cochoa.

Firstly, I agree with geoffm. Secondly, kland makes a good point about Jn 14.

As for this, GC, I must differ (see below).

Here's the full original, or as much as we need.

His humanity cumbered him from omnipresence only on earth, but not in heaven. He appeared and disappeared from meeting rooms, remember. just not able to be present in more than one place.

Don't miss the point, here! She says that it was good to go his Father, who would send the Holy Spirit for them - him and his Father - to be present, together - remember Jn 14:23! - with his people.

As for the Spirit, in this Manuscript Release, one has to look very closely. The Holy Spirit is Jesus himself personally present with each of us, together in fact with his Father among us. You quote Jn 14:16, but note v.18-23. The divine family is busy, in our behalf, and with & within us!

As for references to the only begotten Son in the SOP, she is saying that it's true since before creation began; any other reading has to reinterpret her plain language, not so.