Believing that Jesus Christ is the Son of God is crucial to becoming a child of God. Oneness Pentecostalism makes it tricky. A Father - Son relationship does not fit well with a concept of one singular divine nature with three manifestations. Moreover, the Oneness statement that "Jesus is the Father" is a clear and important expression of Oneness theology, but can hinder faith that Jesus is the Son. Trinity makes it tricky too. The term ”God the Son” easily hinders the faith that Jesus is Son of God. Like in Oneness, a Father - Son relationship does not fit well with a concept of one shared divine nature with three personas, and when the title ’God‘ is typically attached to the shared divine essence, rather than to the Father persona. It leads to confusion as to whether Jesus is God or Son of God, since it begs the corollary of him being Son of himself, which somehow has to be discounted. In reality it makes better sense to “put aside all that hinders and run the race with perseverance”, recognising that becoming a child of God is a pearl of great price, exceeding prestiges of being able to claim a thorough conformance to Oneness or Trinity dogma. If we start with the important faith, Jesus is the Son of God, and Jesus is the Son of the Father, sent by the Father, to give light to this dark world; then we can build ourselves up from there in the most holy faith. Like Peter we can be a rock.
