| God is Triune! |
God is - TriuneAn Old Testament SurveyThe Westminster Larger Catechism -
Q 7 - What is God? God is a Spirit, in and of Himself infinite in being, glory, blessedness, and perfection; all-sufficient, eternal, unchangeable, incomprehensible, everywhere present, almighty, knowing all things, most wise, most holy, most just, most merciful and gracious, long-suffering, and abundant in goodness and truth..” Q. 8. Are there more Gods than one? There is but one only, the living and true God. Q. 9. How many persons are there in the Godhead? There be three Persons in the Godhead, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost; and these three are one true, eternal God, the same in substance, equal in power and glory; although distinguished by their personal properties. Q. 10. What are the personal properties of the three Persons in the Godhead? It is proper to the Father to beget the Son, and to the Son to be begotten of the Father, and to the Holy Ghost to proceed from the Father and the Son from all eternity. Q. 11. How doth it appear that the Son and the Holy Ghost are God equal with the Father? The Scriptures manifest that the Son and the Holy Ghost are God equal with the Father, ascribing unto Them such names, attributes, works, and worship, as are proper to God only. ~ ~ ~
The God of the bible is ONE God - eternally existent in three distinct Persons.
God is a Trinity! • Wayne Grudem’s definition: “God eternally exists as three persons, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, and each Person is fully God and there’s one God.”
• The Nicene Creed We believe in one God,
the Father, the Almighty, maker of heaven and earth, of all that is, seen and unseen. We believe in one Lord, Jesus Christ, the only Son of God, eternally begotten of the Father, God from God, Light from Light, true God from true God, begotten, not made, of one Being with the Father. Through Him all things were made. For us and for our salvation He came down from heaven: by the power of the Holy Spirit He became incarnate from the Virgin Mary, and was made man. For our sake He was crucified under Pontius Pilate; He suffered death and was buried. On the third day He rose again in accordance with the Scriptures; He ascended into heaven and is seated at the right Hand of the Father. He will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead, and His kingdom will have no end. We believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the giver of life, who proceeds from the Father and the Son. With the Father and the Son He is worshiped and glorified. He has spoken through the Prophets. We believe in one holy catholic [meaning universal] and apostolic Church. We acknowledge one baptism for the forgiveness of sins. We look for the resurrection of the dead, and the life of the world to come. Amen. __________________________
The majority of attacks against the Trinity come in two specific areas. Firstly: Denial of the distinction of the three Persons. This is sometimes called “Oneness” or more historically called “Sabellianism” and/or “modalism”. These people assert that there is only one God, and that He exists as a single Person. And this makes up for a huge group of people on planet earth today and it’s a very attractive heresy. It holds that each divine Person of the Trinity is in fact a manifestation or appearance of the one Person who is God. This view does not accept the historic, biblical truth that each Member of the Trinity is a distinct Person and fully God. So in this heresy God, who is one, might be better viewed like an actor on a stage who keeps changing his costume to play different roles. We have to be careful not to teach this heresy by mistake because many modern illustrations used to help explain the Trinity actually teach this unawares. Like the washing machine or the water illustration, which teach that, like God these things have 3 manifestations (Washing machine has three cycles; rinse, wash, spin. Water has three forms; ice, steam and liquid) but each manifestation is essentially the same original thing, just morphed into a different form. Where these illustrations collapse is when then fail to acknowledge that each manifestation/form of the original is not distinctly and fully that original. For example, the washing machine illustration fails to acknowledge that the 'spin cycle' is in and of itself a washing machine, but only a function of it. Whereas when we see the Divine Persons in the scriptures we note that each is fully God and yet there is only ONE God. Jesus is not a part, function, form of God HE is FULLY GOD. Secondly: Denial that each member of the Trinity are in fact, EQUALLY God. That the Father is God is rarely disputed, but this heresy often argues that the Son and Holy Spirit are not fully, personally God but some kind of inferior beings or emanations. This error has it's modern expression in many groups and cults like Arianism, Universal Unitarianism and possibly the largest is the modern cult Jehovah's Witnesses who give Jesus no more honour than an incarnate angel. __________________________
So is the Trinity in the bible?The Trinity in the Old Testament
It has been said that the revelation of God as a Trinity has been progressive through the bible. While Trinitarian concepts are more explicitly laid out in the New Testament, they are implicitly revealed in the Old Testament. Clear intimations of Trinitarian concepts CAN be seen in the Hebrew Bible: 1. The use of plural forms.Firstly I acknowledge that the bible regularly uses singular personal pronouns whenever speaking of the Being of God. Unitarians [people whom assume God is Uni-Personal] argue that the Jews were, and thus we Christians must be convinced by the 9,000+ singular personal pronouns used for God in the scripture (e.g. I, Me, He, His etc.) and thereby concluded that God is one Person. If God was more than one Person, it's absurd to these folk that God would use these to describe Himself in scripture. These singular personal pronouns are accepted by trinitarians and harmonised by what we also observe as plural personal pronouns. God has revealed Himself in scripture to be single in Being; to be ONE God and yet a plurality of Persons. When God speaks in the creation account and other places in the Old Testament we see that He uses "us" and "our": Genesis 3:22 Genesis 11:7 Isaiah 6:8. Most importantly we see in Genesis 1:26-27; “Then God said, ‘Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness; let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.’ So God created man in His own image; in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them.”
This is so important (and compelling) because it is here where the plurality is used in connection with the very nature of God, here God uses plural forms in the context of His own "image and likeness." The “Us” that God uses in the Old Testament is shown often enough to assert that God has no qualms referring to Himself with pluralistic pronouns, suggesting we should not either. The Old Testament had a singular term for God, Eloah, which is only occasionally used. The vast majority of the references to God using this noun, use the plural form, Elohim, throughout the Old Testament. Had there been only be two Persons within the Godhead, the Hebrews could have used a dual form Elohiayim. 2. Christophanies; The Second Person of the Trinity appearing outside of His incarnational form (physical body of Jesus Christ of Nazareth), in the form of the "Angel (or Messenger) of the Lord."The Old Testament presents compelling and striking examples of a Person who, although He appears in the form of a man/angel, He acts and speaks as God and is even referred to as God (an act He never corrects or rebukes, though it appears if He were no more than a common angel indeed He must; Rev. 19:10; Rev. 22:8-9). Mysteriously, He is both identified as God and distinguished from God. We find this in passages such as Genesis 16:7-13; 18-19; 22:11-18; Exodus 3:2-6; 23:20-23; Judges 6:11-14, 20-22; 13:21-23). Note also how Zechariah 12:8 makes equal the Person God and the Angel of the Lord in the same passage.
"On that day the LORD will protect the inhabitants of Jerusalem, so that the feeblest among them on that day shall be like David, and the house of David shall be like God, like the angel of the LORD, going before them." These Christophanies (Sometimes referred to as Theophanies) were preparation for God the Son’s appearing amongst humanity as Jesus the Christ. This preparation was apparently only for the astute and humbly perceptive Jews who would ready themselves for the coming of a Heavenly Visitor. 3. The "Son" passages:The Old Testament reveals a certain Person who is uniquely a human-divine Son. This term son is used more than once in the Old Testament to describe a divine Person; a Person who is also referred to as God. Proverbs 30:3-4 “I have not learned wisdom, nor have I knowledge of the Holy One. Who has ascended to heaven and come down? Who has gathered the wind in his fists? Who has wrapped up the waters in a garment? Who has established all the ends of the earth? What is his name, and what is his son’s name? Surely you know!”
Isaiah 9:6 “For to us a child is born, to us a son is given; and the government shall be upon his shoulder, and his name shall be called Wonderful Counsellor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.”
He is a Son and Child, but also the "mighty God." This passage must have seemed totally unacceptable to the one who first read it without considering the incarnation of Christ. Psalm 2:7-12 “‘As for Me, I have set my King on Zion, my holy hill.’ I will tell of the decree: The LORD said to me, ‘You are my Son; today I have begotten you. Ask of me, and I will make the nations your heritage, and the ends of the earth your possession. You shall break them with a rod of iron and dash them in pieces like a potter’s vessel.’ Now therefore, O kings, be wise; be warned, O rulers of the earth. Serve the LORD with fear, and rejoice with trembling. Kiss the Son, lest he be angry, and you perish in the way, for his wrath is quickly kindled. Blessed are all who take refuge in him." This Psalm describes a Son-King who receives the nations as His inheritance.
Daniel 7:13-14. “I saw in the night visions, and behold, with the clouds of heaven there came one like a son of man, and he came to the Ancient of Days and was presented before him. And to him was given dominion and glory and a kingdom, that all peoples, nations, and languages should serve him; his dominion is an everlasting dominion, which shall not pass away, and his kingdom one that shall not be destroyed.” This passage forms the background behind Christ's use of the Messianic title "Son of Man." Note that the contexts of Psalm 2 and Daniel 7 have identical strands of thought: the inheriting of all the kingdoms of the earth. The title "Son of Man" does not here mean "a mortal man" or as one from among the "sons of men." The point here is not that the Person is human. The significance of the title "Son of Man' as the passage reveals is fourfold:
4. The use of pronouns suggesting more than one Person within God.The LORD talking, uses both "Me" and "Him" referring to the same Being in Zechariah 12:10, “And I will pour out on the house of David and the inhabitants of Jerusalem a spirit of grace and pleas for mercy, so that, when they look on Me, on Him whom they have pierced, they shall mourn for Him, as one mourns for an only child, and weep bitterly over Him, as one weeps over a firstborn.” 5. Consider the passages that identify two Persons as God or LORD (YHWH).Psalm 45:6-7, “Your throne, O God, is forever and ever. The sceptre of your kingdom is a sceptre of uprightness; you have loved righteousness and hated wickedness. Therefore God, your God, has anointed you with the oil of gladness beyond your companions...”Zechariah 3:1-2 (YHWH invoking the Name YHWH for authority): "And the LORD said unto Satan, The LORD rebuke thee, O Satan" 6. The Holy Spirit is linked with God and also given divine attributes of personality.All three Persons of the Trinity can be seen in Isaiah 63:8-10,"For He said, 'Surely they are My people, children who will not lie.' So He became their Savior. In all their affliction He was afflicted, and the Angel of His Presence saved them; in His love and in His pity He redeemed them; and He bore them and carried them all the days of old. But they rebelled and grieved His Holy Spirit; so He turned Himself against them as an enemy, and He fought against them."
Look firstly at the way the Persons in the first sentences are being confused between Me and My, obviously referring to God (otherwise who's the prophesy being given by if not God?) and then the identification of this mysterious Angel of God's presence who will save His people and His love and pity redeem them? There's no doubt that this angel is Christ Jesus who is equally God with His Father who spoke unto Isaiah. There's another important observation we should make here regarding the personality of the Holy Spirit. He is "vexed, grieved" by disobedience. This verb in Hebrew is always used in conjunction with persons (or God and gods); never for inanimate things; it is a certain stretch beyond logic to purport that objects or inanimate forces can experience such emotion as grief. Prior to the incarnation of our Lord Jewish scholars would translate the Old Testament Hebrew into the more common Aramaic and these translations were often called Targums. A specific translation dating back 200 years before Christ had rendered Genesis 1:1 like this: “In the beginning by the firstborn, God created the heavens and the earth; now the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters.” Targum Neofiti. Facebook Social Comments Box for Joomla
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