Trinity Sunday also offers us the chance to be confused anew by one of Christianty’s hardest doctrines.

The following is a Sunday School lesson I offered on Trinity Sunday this year (May 18) that helps explain – but not make sense of – the doctrine of the Holy Trinity.  It’s mostly in lecture-note format, and not everything is cited properly.  But I’d love to hear what you think!

The Holy Trinity
What Is It?  Why Does It Matter?

The doctrine has lost much of its importance in modern-day Christianity.  In a world in which most everything can be explained scientifically (and in which most things that can’t be explained are ignored), the Trinity is one of those doctrines that Christians shy away from.  We’re afraid because we don’t understand it.

The Nature of Theology
Main idea: Our doctrine is an attempt to describe what we’ve read and experienced.  It is not “eternal truth” – it’s simply our best understanding.

[Here, I held up a sheet of paper with a color that was questionable.  I asked people to raise their hands to say what color they think it is.  Some simply said "green," while others said "forest green" or "hunter green" or "pine."  There were several ideas.]

Why are our ideas so different?  Because there’s no universal rule for color names.  Your idea of the color of this paper is based on your experience and what you’ve seen in life.

There are LOTS of things we see this way in our world.  We describe things and we take for granted that our description is universal… but that might not be the only way of looking at things.  Most of our systems of thought developed over centuries, as people tried to describe what they experienced.

Take math, for instance.  We are used to the Arabic system of numbering that’s based on groups of 10’s.  But that’s not the only way to do math.  There are also binary, hexadecimal, three-based counting systems.  And many of these developed independently of each other, as people in different places in the world tried to figure out ways to count things.  Each came up with a method that suited what they understood of the world at the time.

Now, which way is “right?”  We’re used to the base-10 system, but some places in the world still use other methods.  If we worked on a practical problem separately, we’d probably come to the same answer.  So both ways are “right.”  They’re just different ways of describing something we all see.

This same principle is true of so many things you and I take for granted.  The Romans formalized the calendar used in the north since ancient times – a calendar that is derived from the movement of the sun in the sky.  In the Middle East, however, people developed a calendar based on the movements of the moon.  Which is right?  They both are.  They are different ways of describing the passage of time.

The laws of gravity, motion, physics; the colors we use; the sciences we refer to so often… all these things were not given to us in a universal instruction manual at the beginning of time.  Rather, we’ve developed a way to describe them as people have observed the same things through the millennia.  Sometimes, we’ve had to correct something we thought we had right (the earth used to be flat, and at the center of the universe).  Then things will stick for a while.

That’s the way theology is.  Theology is not something we are handed down from heaven.  God didn’t gives us a theology textbook – he gave us a collection of stories and letters.  Theology as we know it, then, is our understanding of God based on what we’ve observed and read.  We might or might not be right.  Even reading the Bible, sometimes there are contradictions and things that are not clear.  Theology is how we make sense of God based on what we have learned, and based on what millions of intelligent men and women have learned before us.  Our theology is simply our best way to “describe” God.

Basic Definition of the Doctrine of the Trinity

The particulars of the doctrine of the Trinity are always under debate, but here is the basic idea:

1) There is only one God. (Isaiah 43:10-11; 44:6, 8; 45:5)

2) The one God includes three persons. (Matthew 28:19; Isaiah 48:11 with Revelation 5:12-13; 2 Corinthians 3:17-18)

3) These three persons are distinct. (Matthew 3:16-17)

Our doctrinal guideline, the Baptist Faith and Message of 1963, reads: “The eternal God reveals Himself to us as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, with distinct personal attributes, but without division of nature, essence, or being.”

The Biblical Basis of the Trinity

The word “trinity” is not specifically mentioned in the Bible.  That term didn’t come about until the 2^nd Century, when Christians started to wrestle with the idea that we see three different manifestations of God.  Trinity is a merging of the words “tri” (three) and “unity” (one).

The idea that there is only one God is as old as the worship of God.  In fact, one of the primary axioms of the Jewish faith was the “Shema” from Deuteronomy 6:4: “Hear O Israel: the LORD our God, the LORD is One.”  Monotheism has always been a hallmark of the Jewish/Christian/Muslim faiths.

And yet, even in the Old Testament, we find ideas that things are not so simple.

• Abraham entertains three strangers in Genesis 18:1-15, and at least one of them clearly speaks as God.
• As early as creation, God uses the plural to speak of God’s self – Genesis 1:26 says, “let us make man in our own image.”
• Also at Creation, there seems to be a distinct “Spirit of God” that hovers over the waters.  This “Spirit of the LORD” also came over people at specific times and places, when God wanted to use them to accomplish his work.

So we cannot say the OT “teaches” the doctrine of the Trinity, and the OT doesn’t teach us anything about the triune nature of God.  But as the old saying goes, “hindsight is 20/20.” When we look back into the OT, we see many places where we realize that the idea of Trinity was there all along.

The New Testament is similar, except that the signs of the Trinity are much more evident.  Here are some examples:

• In the New Testament, three persons are distinctly spoken of as God.
  • Spoken of separately – Matthew 28:19, 2 Corinthians 13:14; Luke 1:35;
  • And they appear together in the story of Jesus’ Baptism – Matthew 3:13-17.
• Jesus speaks in ways that don’t make sense unless we accept some idea of multiple persons in God:
  • “I and the Father are One” (John 10:30)
  • “I Am” (John 8:58).  This is a direct reference to God speaking to Moses in Exodus 3:14.  Some speculate that the divine name in the Old Testament – YHWH – is a form of the Hebrew word for “I Am.”
  • In Matthew 11:27, Jesus says: “All things have been handed over to me by my Father, and no one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son and anyone to whom the Son chooses to reveal him.”  This passage, along with some passages of Jesus’ words in John’s Gospel, are downright confusing!
• There are many examples in the Gospels when Jesus prays to God the Father, and talks directly to him.
• In many places in the Gospels, Jesus also speaks of the Holy Spirit as someone who is distinct from himself and from God the Father.

But it’s important to remember that the Gospels might be “tainted.”  The Gospels were the last books in the Bible to be written, so they may already display the apostles’ and early church’s understandings of the Trinity.

The History of the Trinity

As theology developed in the first decades and centuries of the church, church leaders began to see the importance of coming together to discuss the different interpretations and doctrines and to decide which ones were “correct.”  Councils like Nicene came about to try to refine theology as it was developing, and to put controversies to rest by the authority of the church (remember, they weren’t Baptists!).

These were very serious affairs, and the discussion of theology was literally a “life or death” activity.  People kept coming up with new ways to explain what they read and experienced.  If their ideas were proven “correct,” the ideas were incorporated.  If they weren’t, they were called “heresies,” and those who believed it were forced to recant their ideas, or they were persecuted.  Many were killed for their ideas.

What’s the big deal with all of this?  I mean, we have all these simple statements that help us understand it as best we can.  Why argue about such trivial things?

• First, they weren’t trivial things – the doctrine of the Trinity was (and still is) one of the most distinctive ideas about the Christian faith.  It sets us apart from other religions, and paints a very different picture of God.
• Second, they didn’t have the advantage of centuries of history like we do.  They were trying their best to figure it out from what they found in the scriptures.  They weren’t inventing the doctrine of the Trinity, they were describing it.  Imagine if you were a caveman, and you came upon a fully built, shiny car in the desert.  How would you describe it?  You wouldn’t even have words.  You’d have to figure out what you were doing as you went along.

Think about it:  The only thing we really get from the scripture is that there are three different “persons” who are called God, and they all seem to get along.  So where do you go from there?

Are there really three gods?  No, there’s only ONE – the Bible’s very clear on that.

First you have to establish that each one really IS God.  The Father is obvious.  The Holy Spirit is another can of worms all together – we never SEE the spirit.  Maybe the Spirit is just a way to personify the actual power of God.

Jesus was quite a controversy in this area – even today, the Jews and Muslims claim that Jesus was only a man and not really God.   He had to be part human, after all, to have been born and to die… so can a human being really be God?  And was he begotten, or was he created?  If he was created, he’s just another creature.  If he was “begotten,” then that would imply that the Father existed before Jesus in order to “beget” him.

So assuming they’re all God, are they all EQUALLY God?  Maybe the Father is the ultimate God, but Jesus and the Spirit are kind of “lesser” versions, like reflections in a mirror? Is there a hierarchy, is one subordinate to the others?  It would appear so, but we won’t get into that.

Is each one maybe just a different way we see God – like one actor playing three different parts?  No, because we see all three of them at once in a couple of places (like the baptism).

And did they always each exist?  Except for Paul talking about Jesus being present at creation, you have to look hard to see any evidence that the Son existed before the beginning of the New Testament.  Some say that there is a three-fold revelation or modes of God – Father in the OT, Jesus in the NT, and Spirit after the NT.

It took a couple of minutes for us to go through just the questions, but to come up with acceptable answers that made biblical sense took CENTURIES.  And people fought and were killed over their answers!

The Difficulty of the Trinity

We wouldn’t keep the idea of the Trinity if it were something we were able to get rid of easily.  After all, who wants a religion that’s so complex?  Have you ever tried to explain the Trinity to someone, or listened to someone else try to fumble through a way to describe it?

It almost sounds comical.  And to folks in other religions – who watch the Christian Church closely for slip-ups – the doctrine of the Trinity is a powerful tool in their arsenal.  They consider it a joke that we claim to believe in One God – they say we must believe in three.

The doctrine is especially hard for the Jews, from whom we borrow much of our foundation.  We have statements that are kind of “slogans” for our faith – “salvation by grace through faith,” “do unto others…”  Well, one of the primary “slogans” of the Jewish faith (as we mentioned above) is the Shema – “Hear, O Israel: The LORD is our God; the LORD is One!”

It is also difficult for the Muslims.  Their religion is anti-Christian in its foundations, and one of the reasons Mohammed was so turned off by Christians is that he could not comprehend the doctrine of the Trinity.  Somehow, he came into contact with the idea that God the Father and Mary had some kind of sexual contact that created Jesus.  It was repulsive for Mohammed to think of One True God doing such a thing.  So he made it a point to refute any idea of multiple gods or multiple-personality God.  Even today, missionaries struggle to come up with ways to discuss this problem with Muslims.

Explaining the Trinity

One God – three distinct persons (idea of the Greek persona from the stage), coequal and coeternal.

• Distinct – each one is separate from the others (the Father is not the Son, the Son is not the Spirit, The Spirit is not the Father)
• Coequal – none is stronger or more powerful than another.  Not like the three branches of government where each one is limited in some way.
• Coeternal – all have always existed.

These three persons ALWAYS work in unity to accomplish the same end.  Almost like having two clones of yourself – you never work to undermine each other, but always work for the same goals.

There are many different illustrations used to describe the Trinity – and nearly all have been called incorrect or heretical by someone.  But each one has merit for helping us make sense out of a very confusing doctrine.

• Three working as one
  • Human beings are single beings, but we have several distinct parts – mind, body and soul.  So God has three distinct “parts” that work together in harmony to form one being.
  • There are three parts that make up one egg – the shell, the yolk, and the white.
  • A triangle has three sides, but makes only one figure
• One Working as Three
  • A man can simultaneously be three things – a father, a son, and a husband.  So God is one being, but has three distinct personalities.
  • The compound H2O has three states – ice, water, and steam.  Each one is still “water,” but each one is distinct.
  • St. Augustine said that “love” requires three different components – the beloved, the one who loves, and the “sprit” or “emotion” of love that is between them.
• All equal in substance and power
  • Suppose you took a cherry pie and cut it into three pieces.  On the outside, you’d see three slices.  But inside, there is no distinction.  So God the Father, Son and Holy Spirit are three distinct beings, but each one is of the same substance and each is equally powerful.

Finally, CS Lewis says that prayer is one of the best ways we see the Trinity at work.

• We pray TO Father,
• THROUGH the Spirit,
• And in the NAME of the Son.

Why Does it Matter to Us?

So if it’s so hard to understand, if it confuses other people and causes conflict, then why hang on to the Trinity at all?

Because the Trinity makes ALL the difference in the world to us.  We may not understand it, but it’s behind the very basic understandings of our faith.

The idea of the Trinity is ESSENTIAL to the Gospel, the Good News.

• Many people believe in a God of some sort – what makes our understanding of God different?  That our God is Love, and our God is unified.
• And what did God do to prove his love for us?  He sent his SON, Jesus, to come and live among us, to die to save us from our sins.  In order to live among us, he had to be HUMAN, but in order to die for our sins he had to be DIVINE.
• And why does this Good News matter anymore – Jesus went back to heaven, right?  Yes, but God is still with us – living within us as the Holy Spirit.  And that Holy Spirit gives us the power to live changed lives, and to change our world.

So our faith is based upon the fact that there is a God who loved us, a God who came to die on our behalf, and a God who walks with us every step and gives us power to do what he commands.

None of this will make sense without at least the idea of the Trinity.

All this is Great… But what do we DO with it?

1. First, we can appreciate the simple fact that God is bigger and smarter than us, and realize that we will never be able to grasp his nature completely.
2. But that doesn’t excuse us from trying to grasp it.  We must learn whatever we can about about God.
3. We can be amazed that God is present with us in at least three distinct ways, and realize that God is working around us and in us all the time.

©2010 Notes From Jon. All Rights Reserved.