The Bible Nerd

Let’s see… how many slightly lame Trinity illustrations have I heard now?  My favorites are probably water or the apple.  The Trinity is like water, steam, and ice.  So we can use God to make our drink cool, help quench our thirst, or iron our shirt.  The Trinity is like an apple core, the apple skin, and the juicy part of the apple (what do you call that part anyway?).  So we can eat God on a stick covered in caramel, peel him off, or make applesauce out of Him.  Are you ready for the egg illustration now?  would you like God scrambled or over easy?

Now, I understand why Bible teachers have tried different illustrations, as the concept of the Trinity is so difficult to understand.  In our current series of posts, we continue now with our second “apparent” paradox in Scripture.  The Bible is quite clear that God is one.  We aren’t like the “nations” who worship many “so-called” gods.  However, the Bible is also clear (particularly in the New Testament) that there are three, distinct “persons” that we call God.  Wow, even right there, I immediately didn’t like using the word “persons”, but am at a loss at what other word to use that wouldn’t also be loaded with theological implications.

My own personal struggle with the doctrine of the Trinity started over 10 years ago when I was working with a missions program.  One of the young men in my small group was a recent convert to Christianity from the nation of Thailand.  This young man grew up worshiping many gods, and there was nothing inherently wrong to him about the concept of polytheism.  He was really confused though, because Christians kept telling him that Christianity is unique because we only worship one God (monotheists).  Based on this, he kept asking why we say that, when we worship three Gods based on the Bible.  Of course, I tried the previously discussed illustrations and only ended up making me question what I believed about the Trinity.  Poor guy was pretty much on his own after that, as I was left without anything to say (which my past students will say is quite rare for me).

For those of you like me who were reared in a Christian home, you probably have never seriously thought through the Trinity.  You just sang the good old doxology like me, “praise Father, Son, and Holy Ghost” and were thankful the singing was over due to that old lady behind you determined to shatter glass (or just your eardrums).  Why should we care now?  Because there is a world full of guys like my student from Thailand.  They are thinking about becoming Christians, but need a solid answer to this question, “Are Christians just closet polytheists?”  I don’t know about you, but I would like to see as many people in heaven as I can.

So, the following posts will discuss the Trinity, starting with the Scriptures placing us solidly on monotheistic ground.  Then, we will look at the statements Jesus makes as to His identity.  The Gospel of John will give us a gold mine on this topic, especially when we talk about the Holy Spirit.  Finally, we will try to put this all together into a paradigm to understand this and talk about the extreme views that Christians have had over the years.  Until then, just hum the tune to “Holy, holy, holy.. something, something, something, God in three Persons, blessed Trinity.”