The Bible Nerd

Don’t get me wrong, the method of scientific observation, logical reasoning, and detailed analysis are all good things.  I for one am quite glad not to have doctors using leeches on me, or still being afraid of dropping off the edge of the world (since it is flat of course).  Sometimes though, I get the feeling that we get so detailed and logical about a Biblical issue, that we completely miss the point.  Like God is yelling at us, “Hello, hello??!!!  Step back from thinking you are that smart and appreciate the big picture of this thing!”  Our next paradigm for understanding the Trinity forces us to step back and try to see the overall picture being conveyed to us.

Could it be that the way God revealed Himself as the Trinity has more to do with expressing His character and nature than trying show us HOW He can be three in one?  In turn then, as He reveals Himself to us, He also reveals more about who we are, since we are made in His image.  In this view, God’s intent was never for us to discover a perfect way to express the Trinity logically in our theology.  He knew that was impossible as it is an “apparent paradox” due to our limited brainpower as man.  Just like Paul had no problem with accepting the mystery of God’s sovereignty and man’s free will in Romans 9, we should also be willing to bow at the throne of God in humility about the Trinity.  God is still the potter, and we are the clay.  That doesn’t mean we don’t think deeply about it, just that we spend our time on the things we can clearly understand.

The first thing that the Trinity teaches us then is about relationship and fellowship.  Relationship and fellowship are so intrinsically part of God’s character and nature, that even though He is one, He has fellowship and relationship within Himself.  No, God wasn’t incomplete without us.  He wasn’t lonely and decided he needed to create us.  Even if he was lonely, cats would have been way easier. (saying this does not infer in ANY way that I am a cat person!)  God had fellowship already, and created us out of love, wanting to share that relationship with His creation.  Though relationships can often bring us pain as humans, it is just as intrinsically part of who we are since we are made in His image.

The Trinity also teaches us that roles and authority don’t carry value statements or inequalities within them.  The Trinity each plays a separate role in the redemptive history as told in the Bible.  Of course, they are united in this purpose and plan, but only Jesus was incarnated.  Only the Holy Spirit came down on the day of Pentecost and empowered the disciples.  Is Jesus more important since He died on the cross?  No, since God is one, none of them are more important than the other because of what they do.  As Jesus said in John 5:19-20, “whatever the Father does, the Son does likewise”.  It is the same with us as Paul described in 1 Corinthians 12:12-26.  We are all “one body” in the church and as such, no part is more important than another.  The pastor isn’t more important that the guy who cleans the church bathrooms.

Not only do roles not mean value, but authority doesn’t connote inequity either.  As the Father “sends the Spirit” and the Son “obeys the will of the Father”, the presence of authority doesn’t make God the Father more valuable.  Even if we say that the submission of Jesus to the Father was only during the incarnation, it was still for that time period.  Within that time, Jesus lived in submission to God, but it didn’t mean that God was in any way “better”.  In the same way, God has instituted the role of government and authority here on earth for man.  God explains to us that He puts governments in place, and there is a clear authority structure used in the church.  We can discuss the implications for husband / wife relationships in another post, but many see another application of authority here.  Regardless,  an elder isn’t more “important” than the guy who cuts the grass just because he decides what color to paint the church.

The bottom line is that we just need to step back from debating the word “person”, “begotten”, or “economic Trinity”, and try to appreciate the beautiful picture of God’s character and nature expressed through the Bible in the Trinity.  Then, we will come away with far more powerful application for ourselves, since we are made in His image.  But if we did this, what would Bible nerds like me sit around and blog about?

So now, it seems like we are right back where we started with the discussion on the Trinity.  Thanks a lot Sean!  We have affirmed the distinction that the Bible makes on God the Father, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit.  Not only are they spoken of separately, but their roles are different and there appears to be even an authority structure within the Godhead.  However, we also have clear evidence that God is one from the Old to the New Testament.  God is three in one.  How in the world can we explain this not only to ourselves, but to people in polytheistic religions that we are preaching the Gospel to?

One approach has been to say that protecting our monotheism is not only the most important thing, but also the Bible itself sets this as the foundational character of God (His “oneness”).  To do this, scholars have emphasized that oneness by finding alternatives to using the word “person”.  In the classic doctrine, God is of one “substance”, therefore  all three are equal in power, thought, and existence.  Building on this to protect monotheism, some say that God then “appears” or “manifests” Himself in these three ways to man out of that one substance.  God “appeared/manifested” as Jesus in the incarnation.  Jesus is how the Bible and God describe God appearing to man as God/man.  The Holy Spirit is how God “appears/manifests” in His working power through the church today and throughout history in various ways like the prophets and Creation.  By using “manifests” or “appears” the issue of looking like polytheists is avoided when the term “person” is used.

The problem is that this theological approach is called “modalism” (or Sabellianism) and has been around for a long time.  So why is that a problem? The church as a majority has rejected this view as heresy.  Bummer for those of you who were thinking, “Hey, this sounds pretty good Sean, keep going!”  Unless you are going for that whole rebel, heretic vibe.  This is not to be confused with Unitarianism, which denies Jesus’ divinity.  Modalists say Jesus was God and man, but that God doesn’t have there persons, rather three “modes” or “aspects” that He appears to man as.

Here is the part of the blog where I am completely honest with you (whereas for most of the blog, I am only partly honest???)  If it weren’t for the fact that so many in church history has condemned modalism as heresy, I would probably be closer to their view on the Trinity than the classic view.  There, I said it.  If I weren’t already on a heresy watch list, I am probably on it now.  I have to agree with the modalists, that “persons” isn’t the best choice for describing the Trinity.  The problem is I just can’t come up with a better one.  I also respect the great minds that have come before me, and don’t take it lightly when most of them view something as false doctrine.

Attempt to explain the Trinity number 1, strike one!  Though some part of the modalist thought might come in handy later, as a whole system, it is not advisable.  Maybe we really will end up with the egg or water illustration… No, I refuse to go down that road!  Help me!

I realize that the English language has changed, but Holy “Ghost”???  Are you kidding me?  Were we trying to scare people away from God?  It seems like there should have been way better options than that.  I don’t think that keeping this name waaaaaay too long was smart either.  I know that no one wanted to reprint all those church creeds, hymnals, and daily prayer guides, but at some point the pews with the built in holders for communion cups have to go.

Back to the main point, the New Testament is where the true distinction of the Holy Spirit in the Godhead becomes clear.  John 13 – 16 contains what appears to be the main teaching Jesus gave His disciples shortly before the crucifixion.  It contains foundational concepts that they will need as they build the church after the ascension.  He wants them to know that even though He will be gone (in bodily form) from them, they will not be alone.  God is going to still help them accomplish the expansion of His kingdom.  John 14:16-17 says, “And I will ask the Father, and He will give you another helper, to be with you forever, even the Spirit of truth”, who is further named in verse 26, “But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name…”  Not only is this name used in the New Testament without the possessives we saw in the Old Testament, but the distinction is clear in defined roles.

There has been discussion in church history about the “Father will give/send” part, just like all the debate over describing Jesus as the “firstborn” or “only begotten Son”.  Whole church creeds have risen and fallen based on how to define these terms.  With the Holy Spirit, Jesus’ teaching in John can give you the impression that God is “ordering” the Spirit around like an angel.  This has led some to view the Holy Spirit as not equal in the Trinity, or not part of the Godhead at all.  However, based on this reasoning, we would lose Jesus as well.  In the last post, we discussed the issue of subordination and can find many passages which show Jesus following “God’s will” in His actions.  Eventually, when we bring all the Trinity stuff together, we will discuss roles vs. authority vs. value.  For now, my view is that roles and authority in the Trinity have nothing to do with value or equality.

Even though we don’t have the incarnation with the Holy Spirit, there is still ample evidence for the “personhood” of the Holy Spirit.  This can be attested with passages showing will, decision making, specialization of role and actual outworking of this, and emotion.  For will and decisions, 1 Corinthians 12:11 speaking of spiritual gifts says, “All these are empowered by the one and same Spirit, who apportions to each one individually as he wills.”  The Holy Spirit decides and chooses when and who to give spiritual gifts to in the church.  There are many passages which show the role of the Spirit, and Acts lets us witness those roles in action.  Acts 16:6, “having been forbidden by the Holy Spirit to speak the word in Asia.”  The Holy Spirit empowers and guides the apostles in Acts.  Finally to see emotion, Ephesians 4:30, “And do not grieve the Holy Spirit…”.  We can’t grieve the Spirit unless He is capable of emotion.

There goes my millions of dollars for my new, best selling book titled, “The Two-ity Driven Life”.  (actually, there is a long, complicated name for those who only believe in two persons of the Trinity- binitarianism…not nearly as cool as mine)  While I totally understand how people struggle, and have questioned it myself, the Bible does teach the Holy Spirit as the third “person” of the Trinity.  Stay tuned for the next post where we try to pull all of this together…somehow.

I am convinced, well sort of, all right, I am not totally sure, but you have to start with a bold statement to get attention, so here it goes.  If it wasn’t for Jesus’ teaching on the Holy Spirit in John 14-16 and Paul’s in 1 Corinthians 12 – 14, I don’t think we would have the doctrine of the Trinity.  It would be the doctrine of the Two-ity (isn’t there a cooler way to say that?).  Before you throw me under the bus, hear me out.  The Old Testament presents the Holy Spirit in a similar way to how it presents a person and his spirit.  What I mean is that the Spirit of the OT doesn’t seem to be a separate entity, as much as a way to describe how God does things (He pours out His Spirit, He sends His Spirit to…).  In the New Testament, many passages could be read in this exact same way.  Sure, you can look at them with the benefit of John and Corinthians and say, “this totally points to the Trinity and the Spirit being separate.”

At this point, there is a smartypants out there who would say, “What about the book of Acts? huh?”.  It is true, that Acts belongs in the list with John and 1 Corinthians in being the best source of teaching the Bible gives on the Holy Spirit.  However, since it is narrative, I think you could still make the argument that it is merely talking about God’s Spirit at work, and not a separate “person” in the Godhead.  It is this lack of teaching on the Holy Spirit that can lead many to wonder whether the Holy Spirit should be discussed as part of the “Trinity”.  I can still remember speaking with a fellow Bible school staff about 6 years ago about his struggles with the Spirit in the Trinity.  It was like he was confessing some deep, dark secret or something.  I think he felt hesitant to voice he feelings that he was doubting the Trinity in favor of the Two-ity.  Are there any other closet Holy Spirit Trinity doubters out there right now?  Another reason so many struggle with this is that the “separateness” of Jesus and God seems much clearer due to the incarnation.  You have one in the flesh, and the other maintaining “spirit” only form.  We can connect with Jesus easier and see the distinction.  Add to this the lack of passages with direct teaching as I mentioned before, and we have the recipe for doubt.

Consider all the passages in the Old Testament that connect the Spirit to God in a possessive fashion.  From the very beginning, Genesis 1:2 states, “the Spirit OF God was hovering over the waters.”  David’s famous plea in Psalm 51:11 says, “take not YOUR Holy Spirit from me”.  David doesn’t say, “take not THE Holy Spirit from me.”  Isaiah 63:10 says, “But they rebelled and grieved HIS Holy Spirit” not “the Holy Spirit”.  This possessive phrase can be found in at least 14 more Old Testament passages, all using “of” and not “the”.  There are a few passages in the Old Testament like Ezekiel 8:3, “the Spirit lifted me between earth and heaven.”  However, just a few chapters later in 11:24, he uses “Spirit of God” (he also uses “My Spirit” 3 times as well).  In fact, finding a “the Spirit” in the Old Testament without “the Lord’s”, “of God”, “Your”, or “His” are few and far between.  This is why I said earlier that with only the Old Testament, we don’t see a firm separation of “The Holy Spirit”, but rather would view it as  “God’s Spirit”.

We already discussed the strong monotheism of the Jews in Old Testament times.  No serious rabbinic literature teaches the Holy Spirit as a “separate person” from God.  Deuteronomy 6, “The Lord is one” rules out to them any possibility of viewing the Spirit in the Old Testament as “The Spirit”.  Even after Jesus’ teaching, I wonder if many of the disciples would have agreed with assigning a separation of the Spirit.  They were having a hard enough time understanding the relationship between Jesus and God!  It’s a good thing that we do have the New Testament, and next time, we will piece together whether it fully affirms the “personhood” of the Holy Spirit.  Until then, if you are doubting the Trinity doctrine, just keep it to yourself.  You never know when your friend will start a Bible blog and use you as the example.  Just kidding!  Sort of…. maybe…

Who is in control?  As humans, we are often consumed by this question.  We rebel against authority, desperately trying to become our own authority.  Rebels without a clue I guess you might say.  The whole concept that the leader or boss is more valuable or special than everyone else saturates our culture.  Does this affect how we view the issue of authority in the Trinity?  You bet it does.

We left off last time promising to discuss the issue of subordination in the Trinity.  A few select passages of Scripture will be awfully tough to dismiss on this.  First, consider 1 Corinthians 11:3, “But I want you to understand that the head of every man is Christ, the head of the wife is her husband, and the head of Christ is God.”  Now, I am not touching the man/woman part in this blog and perhaps not in this lifetime as I highly value self preservation.  Anywho, “the head of Christ is God” means what exactly?  I am glad you asked.  “Head” is obviously figurative, and most of the time that Paul uses this illustration, it carries the connotation of authority (like the head of a company).

I get that this is a powderkeg because of the “husband/wife” connection.  If we say head means authority, what are the implications for a Christian marriage?  Unfortunately, we can’t just ignore evidence because of implications for other issues.  It is true that “head” can also be used figuratively for “source” (like the head of a river).  You can find lots of amazing articles and arguments on the authority/source discussion, but for now, I personally see 1 Corinthians 11 speaking of authority not source.  Even if we go with the “source” option, we will find other passages to discuss this.

1 Corinthians 15:28 says, “When all things are subjected to him (God), then the Son himself will also be subjected to him who put all things in subjection under him, that God may be all in all.”  The context here is discussing the 2nd coming and the final judgment of God.  Not only then does the New Testament speak of God and Jesus separately, having different “roles”, but it also speaks of an authority structure within the Trinity.  How can Jesus be God but be under God?  How can God be His own “head”?  This is really getting confusing now!

There are two main options I can give you to understand this.  The first is called incarnational subordination (you think I am making that up right?  I wish…).  This means that during His incarnation, Jesus voluntarily placed Himself under the authority of God the Father.  After His resurrection, He was exalted back to His rightful place of equality with God as seen in  Philippians 2:9-11.  This explanation fits well with the view that much of what Christ in His incarnation serves as a model for us in our relationship to God.  Jesus shows us how even He can submit to the will of the Father with words like, “Not my will, but yours be done” right before His arrest and crucifixion (Luke 22:42).

The other explanation is our whole was of looking at the Trinity needs a serious overhaul.  Perhaps the whole way that God revealed the Trinity to us as man says more about Him than it does about “modeling” a righteous life.  The Trinity shows us that relationship. love, and unity is an intrinsic part of God’s character and nature.  Even without us humans, God has these things within Himself as Father, Son, and Spirit.  Authority does not have anything to do with value.  Within the Trinity, we are shown that different roles and subordination are not negative things but how God works together within the Trinity to perfection.

We can’t really finish these last thoughts until we discuss the Holy Spirit.  Whew!  Finally, we are to a part of the Trinity that no one in the church ever argues about… the Holy Spirit, right?

There are a few passages in Scripture that I just know God put in there to torment me.  I can just hear God saying, “You know, that Sean Ellis isn’t as smart as he thinks he is.  Let’s throw this one in to make sure he knows he is an intellectual flea in this universe.”  Mark 13:32 is one of those passages, and I will explain in a minute why.  One of the things that is difficult to explain in the doctrine of the Trinity (one of many as you have seen so far), is the relationship of Jesus to God when it comes to His time incarnated in the flesh.

Two big questions arise from the way the Bible talks about this time: 1) did Jesus “give up” any of His divine power, or right to use it, for the purpose of wanting to model complete dependance on the Father?  did Jesus have to pray and ask the Father for miracles or could He do them on His own?  2) was Jesus subordinate to the Father while He was in the flesh?  did He take “orders” from God?  what about after His ascension?  are they “equal” in authority again?  These two questions speak directly into the trouble we have been having with seeing Jesus and God as “one God” but separate somehow.  It is time to wade into the murky theological waters.

In Mark 13, Jesus has been explaining to the disciples that the temple in Jerusalem will eventually be destroyed (which happens in 70 AD).  In the classic role of a prophet, Jesus telescopes from this prediction to a far prediction of His return to Earth in the 2nd coming.  In 13:32, Jesus wants the disciples to understand the “surprise” element of the 2nd coming, which the Jehovah’s Witnesses seem to have overlooked (don’t give up guys, I am sure you will predict the 2nd coming this time!).  Jesus says, “But about that day or hour, no one knows, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father”.  Say what???  How can God know something that Jesus doesn’t know?  How can they be equal and Jesus fully divine and man, and there is part of the future that He is unaware of?

Of course, there are a lot of fancy explanations out there that sound much better than my answer, which is “I have no idea how to make sense of this passage.”  I am usually game for giving it a shot, as you can tell already by reading this blog.  For a while, I was satisfied with the “incarnational” response.  According to the Philippians 2 passage we looked at in the last post, Jesus “emptied Himself” (other translations read “made Himself nothing”).  We realize that Jesus sacrificed perfection and peace in heaven with God in order to become a man and suffer on the cross.  Perhaps one of the things He “gave up” or sacrificed His right to was knowledge of the future, even if for only this one event. I am not so satisfied with this answer anymore.  Other passages in the Gospel seem to me like Jesus knows what people are thinking (John 2:25) and knows the future (Mark 10:32-34 ).  How can He not know this one thing?

When we have a difficult passage, the best thing to do is to not build our whole doctrine based upon it.  The clear passages of the Bible should interpret the unclear.  The Gospels and the New Testament letters are clear in Jesus divinity, with the book of Colossians directly addressing the false teaching that He was not.  Even though I haven’t found or thought of a rational way to explain this verse, I believe the problem is with us, not the Bible.  I assume that there is something we don’t understand about the Greek used, or what Jesus was meaning here.  To try to build a whole teaching on Jesus basically giving up all His power so that He would be fully like us and dependent on God is standing on shaky ground if you ask me (and since you are reading my blog, you did!).

Now, I will do a classic teacher move.  You know, when a teacher promises he will cover something in the next class, but blabs way too long, and runs out of time.  Well, I blabbed too long, so we will look next at the issue of subordination in the Trinity.  Drawing a conclusion here first, elements of the incarnation will always remain mysterious to us.  How can Jesus be fully God and fully man at the same time?  We should be extremely cautious though, when we start putting Scriptures together that make Jesus less than divine.  John’s Gospel presents a clear view of Jesus as the “Son of God”, fully divine within His humanity.  I am not taking away from His humanity.  He did hunger, thirst, and suffer.  Let’s just say I am not going to make any bets against Jesus not knowing stuff.  He seems on top of it to me.

The Jews were expecting the Messiah to be a man, much like King David.  If they read Daniel 7, perhaps they would have seen “The Son of Man” as an archangel, perhaps a divine judge of God.  Even if they read Isaiah 53 and cried out like John did, “there goes the lamb of God”, I still don’t think any of them thought that the Messiah would be God.  Two thousand years later, we still seem to struggle with this issue.  The historical Jesus movement tried hard to strip divinity away from Jesus, and the Jehovah’s witnesses and Mormons have also attacked this doctrine.

No discussion of Jesus’ divinity should begin anywhere other than John 1:1.  Actually the whole Gospel of John reads like a textbook on the Trinity at times.  “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God”.  From the whole passage, it is clear that John is referring to Jesus as the Word, a concept and a name from the Greek Logos.  Jesus is preexistent and equated with God.  A Jehovah’s Witness tried to explain to me one time how this isn’t saying Jesus is God.  Lame!   Note that though Jesus is God here, God and Jesus are discussed separately. God is Himself and is with Himself.  Right.

Just as the passage in John moves on to the incarnation of Jesus (1:14 “Word became flesh”), so does the passage in Paul’s Hymn of Christ in Philippians 2. Here we are told in 2:6, “Who (Jesus)  though He was in the form of God,  did not regard equality with God as something to be exploited, but emptied Himself, by taking on the form of a servant”.  Jesus is again equated with God, but separated out in His action of the incarnation.  In 2:9, “God has highly exalted Him” speaking of God doing something TO Jesus.  How can you do something to yourself?  Don’t answer that question.  You get my point.

Colossians 1:15 occasionally throws people for a loop because it calls Jesus the “firstborn”.  This confusion comes from not understanding the Biblical usages of this term.  Sure, it does usually mean the first who was born, but there is a figurative meaning also of “most important” or “highest rank”.  For example, in Psalm 89:27 God calls David the “firstborn”.  God hasn’t forgotten the story of David in 1 Samuel.  David was not literally the firstborn son, yet he was first in rank because God chose him to be king.  All you need to do is keep reading in Colossians 2:9, “For in Him (Jesus), the whole fullness of deity dwells bodily.”  Jesus didn’t give up His divinity or cease to be God when He incarnated.  Jesus was always God.

Put it all together and you get Jesus is God, but God and Jesus are spoken of separately.  Doing different things.  One is incarnated, the other is not.  That is where the fun part comes in.  How can one God be spoken of as two “insert your own word here”.  What do you mean “insert your own word”???  I mean, the normal word used here is “person”.  I don’t know about you, but when I think person, I think of two, completely separate entities, not one God.  But, how else do you describe how the New Testament speaks of them in a separate manner?

In the next post, we will deal with two “fun” passages.  One is in Mark 13, where Jesus says only God knows when the 2nd coming will happen.  Yes, this seems like Jesus is saying even He doesn’t know.  How does God keep secrets from Himself?  We will also cover 1 Corinthians 15 which throws us another curve ball.  In this passage, Paul explains that Jesus in in submission to God (a point he also makes in 1 Corinthians 11).  How is God under His own authority?  You wouldn’t want to just have all your questions answered in one post.  What fun would that be?  See you next time.

Where do we start then?  Of course, with the Old Testament since that is what appears first in the Bible (quite brilliant aren’t I?)  If we only had the Old Testament, there is no doubt in my mind that no one would ever doubt that we are monotheists.  But, if we only had the Old Testament, we wouldn’t have Jesus and I wouldn’t be writing this blog.  Yet, I digress.  From Genesis to Malachi, there is a clear statement the Bible is making; that is there is only one, true, invisible, and all powerful God.  As we stand on the theological shoulders of the Old Testament, we can feel firm ground in our belief in our monotheism.

I have heard plenty of people argue that the Old Testament does indeed have the Trinity.  Looking backwards, we do have the ability to distinguish passages that talk about God’s Spirit and assign them to the Holy Spirit mentioned in the New Testament.  In the same way, passages which predict Jesus the Messiah give us much detail about His role in the Trinity.  A few passages are stretched to fit the doctrine, like Genesis 1:26 (and again in 3:22 and 11:7), “Let Us make mankind in our own image…”.  The use of the plural pronoun in this verse has been used often as evidence of the Trinity.  Some Bible scholars, however, assign this to the sense of either the “royal we” or more likely the sense of “God and the heavenly host” being spoken of.  No, without the New Testament, there would be no thought of multiple persons in the Godhead.

The Pentateuch lays the foundation for monotheism.  There was only one God who created man, met with him in the garden, and told Noah to build the Ark.  From Joshua 24:2, God makes it clear that beginning with Abraham, He was creating a monotheistic people group out of one who had previously only worshipped many gods.  God introduces Himself to Moses in the singular in Exodus 3:6 as the “I am” not the “We are”.  The whole covenant law begins in Exodus 20:1-4 with the commands to have “no other gods” and once again declaring, “I am the Lord” (not We are the Lord).  The slam dunk though comes in the last book of the Pentateuch.  Deuteronomy 6:4, “Hear O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one.”  Now, I may not be a Mensa candidate, but that seems clear to me, crystal clear.

From Judges to Esther shows the battle of monotheism against polytheism and idolatry.  Let me give you the Cliff Notes version, the “people of God” don’t do too well.  Joshua has barely been dead a few years, and the people give in to the attraction of polytheism and idolatry.  That leads to God’s covenant justice and a cycle of sin, oppression, and salvation that goes all the way until the end of 2 Kings which leaves Israel in exile.  2 Kings 17:7 sums it up succinctly, “they worshipped other gods”.  Game over if not for the grace of God to bring them back into the land for His Redemptive Plan.

The Prophets show the heart of God in this matter as a jealous husband wanting His people, the wife, to come away from it’s adulterous affairs with polytheism.  No book says it quite like Hosea, the first prophet to use the analogy of Israel as the unfaithful wife to their husband, God.  Hosea 2:16 says, “you will call me my husband (singular)”.  The whole illustration rides on the fact that a woman is supposed to have only ONE husband (doesn’t really work if there are three Gods; what is the big deal with a few more husbands?).

You put it all together and we can safely say that if Christianity is based on the Bible, the WHOLE Bible, then we are most definitely monotheistic and however we describe the Trinity MUST fit within that framework.  I only hit the highlights, as we could list so many more Old Testament passages to back this up.  The fun part comes up next.  Tune in next time when the New Testament says Jesus is God and the Holy Spirit is God too.  Hmmm……..

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.”