(Additional passage: John 16:5-15)
In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. May the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable to you, Lord, my rock and my redeemer. Amen. (Psalm 19:14)
Today is the Celebration of the Holy Trinity. The Father is revealed in Jesus through the Holy Spirit. The father is unseen by us, but we know him through the son, and the Spirit provides us with the gifts to bring the blessings of the Gospel message to others.
In today’s Gospel we hear Jesus telling his disciples that he’s returning to the father who sent him, and will be sending them the spirit of truth, an advocate. He describes the unity of their relationship.
This is an example of the Bible affirming the concept of the Holy Trinity. Yet the Bible does not specifically mention the Trinity in a decisive “three-in-one and one-in-three” statement that would eliminate further discussion.
And I get the felling that we’re not supposed to fully understand it as mere humans, but we’re supposed to keep trying to get closer to the truth, even if it is a mystery.
A casual glance at scripture shows us a clear indication of the unity of the three persons of God, such as Matthew 28:19, the Great Commission, in which Jesus says, “Go, therefore, and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit…”
And also in our greeting and dismissal found in 2 Corinthians 13:13, “The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with all of you.”
Many people believe that the concept of the Trinity was created by Christians centuries after Christ’s time on earth. But that’s not really true. It just became more obvious then.
The New Testament reveals what the Old Testament foreshadows. The entire Old Testament points to Jesus Christ as the promised Messiah, redeeming the Father’s children through the power of the Holy Spirit. But we see that only when viewed through the prism of the New Testament.
Without the New Testament, we don’t see the culmination of the Old Testament; and without the Old Testament, the promises of the New Testament have no foundation. So we first look in the Old Testament for a foundation for the concept of the Holy Trinity.
The first words of the Old Testament, originally written in Hebrew, are “Bereshit Elohim…,” which means, “In the beginning, God….”
Elohim is the Hebrew word they used for God. But there’s something rather significant and strange about that particular word choice. It’s plural, but not just a regular plural noun. El would be singular, and the plural for two would be Ela. But Genesis 1:1 uses Elohim, a Hebrew plural for three or more.
In verse 26 of the same chapter, we read “Let us make man in our image.…” The pronoun choice is plural.
Later in the Second Book of the Law, or Deuteronomy, Chapter 6, verse 4, is recited by every Jew on the Day of Atonement, and is the primary prayer in his heart. It leads into what Jesus called the greatest commandment, and Moses implored the Israelites to focus on it continuously:
4 Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one. 5 Love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength. 6 These commandments that I give you today are to be on your hearts. 7 Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. 8 Tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads. 9 Write them on the doorframes of your houses and on your gates.
Even beyond the individual word usage, the Old Testament shows a three-part “personification” of God, which leads a natural Trinitarian development.
The first is Wisdom.
• Especially evident in Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, and Job
• Attribute of Divine wisdom treated as if a person
• Portrayed as active in creation, fashioning the world in her imprint
• Wisdom, incidentally, is always portrayed as female
Second is the Word of God
• God’s speech or discourse is treated as an entity independent of God yet originating in God
• Portrayed as gong forth into the world to confront humanity with God’s will and purpose
• Bringing guidance, judgment, and salvation
Third is the Spirit of God
• Phrase is used to refer to God’s presence and power
• Shown as present in expected Messiah (Isaiah 42:1-3)
• Agent of a new creation when the old has passed away (Ezekiel 36:26; 37:1-14)
There’s another reason the Bible doesn’t specifically mention the word Trinity: that’s because the word didn’t exist yet.
A Roman theologian named Tertullian, from the late second and early third centuries, was responsible for creating hundreds of new words that became part of the Latin lexicon.
He created the word Trinitas, the Latin form of Trinity, which has since become an integral part of Christian theology and doctrine.
He also created the word “persona,” which literally means “a mask,” like those worn by actors in Roman dramas. Tertullian used this image to let his readers understand the idea of “one substance, three persons” to show the three distinct roles of the one God in the drama of humanity’s salvation.
He also created a third word, “substantia,” which expressed a basic, foundational unity within the three personas of God.
The Eastern and Western Christian churches both believe in the Trinity, but have a slightly different belief in how the three aspects of one God are aligned. This led to a split between the two churches at the end of the first millennium.
Before that, however, two main heresies arose concerning the trinity, and periodically they resurface as “new” understandings. But they are still wrong.
The first is modalism. In modalism, God works in three different modes to fulfill his plan. In one mode he is shown as the creator and lawgiver, or Father; in another he is the Savior, in the person of Jesus Christ, or son; and in the last he is the one who sanctifies and gives life, or spirit. This is a bit like the analogy of the Trinity being like water, which can be liquid, or solid (ice), or gas (steam). But it can only be one at a time, not all three at once. God, however, is all three at the same time, yet is one substance.
The other heresy is Tritheism, opposite approach to explaining the idea of the Trinity. Tritheism offers three equal, independent, and separate beings, each being divine. This is more of a tribunal than a Trinity.
Fortunately, light itself, offers some light in describing the Trinity. Christian Victory has the following description:
Science tells us that light is constituted of three rays, or groups of wavelengths, distinct from each other, no one of which without the others would be light. Each ray has its own separate function. The first originates, the second formulates, illuminates or manifests, and the third consummates. The first ray, often called invisible light, is neither seen nor felt. The second is both seen and felt. The third is not seen but is felt as heat.
A triangle can be imagined to contain those three elements within its boundary, and illustrating their individual aspects by the three angles.
So the triangle image remains for us as a fairly useful image of the Trinity. But which end is up? Does the triangle rest on its base or a point? That’s the basic argument between the Eastern and Western Christian Churches. The Nicene Creed we read today is not the creed agreed upon at Nicea.
First Council of Nicea (325): "...and the Holy Ghost."
That’s the entire mention of the Holy Spirit in the original Nicene Creed.
First Council of Constantinople (381): "And in the Holy Ghost, the Lord and Giver of life, who proceedeth from the Father, who with the Father and the Son together is worshiped and glorified, who spake by the prophets. In one holy catholic and apostolic Church; we acknowledge one baptism for the remission of sins; we look for the resurrection of the dead, and the life of the world to come. Amen."
There’s a lot more about the Holy Spirit in the First Council of Constantinople Creed.
In 447, a church in Toledo, Spain added the term “and the Son” to the sentence describing the Holy Spirit as proceeding from the Father. This was the start of the “filioque” controversy which helped split the Church officially in 1054 into the Eastern and Western Churches.
Filioque is Latin for “and the son.” This one term packs a lot of theology in it though.
In Eastern Christian thought, the Father is at the top of the triangle, and both the Son and the Spirit proceed from him. He “begets” the Son and “breathes” the Spirit.
In Western Christian thought, the triangle stands on its point, where the Father begets the Son, both positioned at the top, and they each breathe the Spirit, who is positioned at the point of the bottom.
So the main argument between the two churches pertaining to the Trinity is whether the Holy Spirit proceeds from only the Father, or from both the Father and the Son.
The problem with proceeding from both the Father and the Son is that this seems to allow for two sources of divinity within the one Godhead, with all the contradictions that this creates.
If the Son shares in the exclusive ability of the Father to be the source of all divinity, then this ability is no longer exclusive. For that reason, the Eastern Church viewed this “double procession” of the Holy Spirit with disbelief.
After centuries of thought and prayer, the Anglican Communion has changed its position. Currently our position as a communion is “recommending to the provinces of the Anglican Communion that in future liturgical revisions the Niceno-Constantinopolitan Creed be printed without the Filioque clause.” (1988 Lambeth Conference of Anglican Bishops, Resolution 6.5)
The discussion of the Trinity is not just academic. We often forget that. The Trinity enabled our unseen God to reveal himself to us for the purpose of redeeming us and sending us forth with the Holy Spirit to show others how they can also be redeemed.
The Trinity is not a table-talk discussion.
The Trinity is not a concept.
The Trinity is missional.
Listen again to Isaiah 6:8. “Then I heard the voice of the Lord saying, ‘Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?’ And I said, ‘Here am I: send me!’”
“Send me” is our response to God’s missional purpose in our lives. Isaiah was send forth to proclaim God’s word. And it wasn’t easy.
When we are sent forth as missionaries, it isn’t easy for us either. People treat us differently at work, neighbors may laugh at us, people may even laugh at us behind our backs. But we’ve got it very easy compared to many other countries where people are tortured, imprisoned, or killed for believing in the Trinity.
I want to get back to the triangle image for a moment, and change the names a bit. At the top point, think of the Father and the word “up.” On a bottom corner, think of Jesus and the word “in.” In the last corner, think of the Holy Spirit and the word “out.”
“Up” represents our relationship with our unseen Father in heaven. “In” represents our relationship with Jesus became one of us to guide us and be the authority in our lives. “Out” represents our relationship with the Holy Spirit, who gives us the gifts we need to go out into the world and show Christ to others so they can have the same relationship with the Father, and thus the rest of the Trinity.
We need the up, the in, and the out, just like our triangle needs all three corners. Without all three, our triangle is incomplete. And without the Trinity, our God is incomplete.
A Gaelic poem from 1889 called “St. Patrick’s Lorica,” or breastplate, was set to music as a hymn in 1902. Its strong focus on the importance of the Trinity is most appropriate for us today. The last verse reads:
I bind unto myself the Name, The strong Name of the Trinity,
By invocation of the same, The Three in One and One in Three.
By Whom all nature hath creation, Eternal Father, Spirit, Word:
Praise to the Lord of my salvation, Salvation is of Christ the Lord.
