Does God Work Part Time?
Does God work part time? This might seem to be a ridiculous question. You may say, “Of course God works full time. If God only works part time, I am in big trouble. I always believed that God was at work 24/7. God neither slumbers nor sleeps. God works all 3 shifts of life. God is not a part time God.” Of course you are correct. We don’t want a part time God.
But this is not to put down part time workers. The labor force could not operate without part time workers. Many people work part time so they can take care of their families at home. Some people work part time because that is all their employer can pay. In this day and age many churches have part time ministers because they cannot afford a full time one.
But when it comes to God, we want a full time God. But there are certain beliefs and attitudes we can have that have the effect of reducing God to part time work. This actually is a sermon on one of the basic doctrines of the church--The Trinity--the idea that the one God exists in three different and distinct persons as Father, Son, and Spirit.
In our passage for today in John 14:15-21, Jesus is trying to reassure and comfort his disciples before he leaves them. He is telling them that even though he is leaving them, they shall not be left alone. In verses 16 and 17, he tells them that he is sending the Spirit. In verse 23 he says that he and the father will come and make our home with them. So we are promised the complete presence of God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
Now in recent years, some have objected to the term Father, saying that it is sexist. But when we speak of God as
Father, we are not talking about the gender of God, because God is neither male nor female. We are speaking about the kind of relationship that exists between the members of the Trinity. The Brief Statement of Faith of our denomination says that God is like a mother who will not forsake her nursing child, and like a father who welcomes the prodigal home.
But why do we need a sermon on the Trinity? We in the Presbyterian church believe that it is important for Christians to know what we believe and why we believe it. In these days of pop psychology type sermons, it is important to be grounded in the basics of the faith. Many people in today’s church not only are biblically illiterate, but they are ignorant of the great beliefs and doctrines of Christianity.
The Trinity is one of the most important doctrines of the Church. If you are not informed concerning the Trinity or the Triune God, your knowledge of God is incomplete, and you run the risk of worshipping a part time God. Anybody can get people to feel good in church. All you need is some rocking type music and a so called relevant sermon and you can make people feel good. But people need to know what they are feeling good about. You need to know something in order to feel good about it.
People in the church today need some teaching along with preaching. Some of the most popular preachers today are more like motivational speakers than preachers of the word. But we need to understand what we mean when we speak of the Trinity or the Triune God. The Trinity says that God is one. Over and over again the Bible affirms that God is one God all by himself. The Lord your God is one God says Deut 6:4. I am the Lord and there is no other God besides me says Isa 45:5.
Most of the great religions of the world are monotheistic, meaning the belief in one God. But the Trinity also says that God is three. This one indivisible God consists of 3 persons, commonly known as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Each of these persons or modes of being is God. They are distinct from each other. Each one has the attributes of God, and they are related to each other in love. They are equal to each other. They are co-equal and co-eternal. The Trinity insists that there are not 3 Gods, but only 1 God expressed in 3 distinct modes or persons.
We must admit that the doctrine of the Trinity is difficult to understand That’s why it is called a mystery. Now in the attempt to simplify things there have risen some false ways of thinking of the Trinity. One is called modalism. This says that God is one, but he wears 3 hats or 3 roles. He is like an actor in a play who plays 3 roles. With one hat he plays the role of God the Father. Then he comes out again with another hat and plays God the Son. Then he comes out again with another hat and plays God the Holy Spirit.
But this is not what the Trinity means. There are 3 distinct persons in the Godhead. Some years ago when I was on the committee of ministry, we had a minister come before the committee to be admitted to the Presbytery. I had some doubts about her, and I asked her what was her understanding of the Trinity. She came up with the 3 hats or 3 roles of God. I had reservations about receiving her because of her mixed up idea of the Trinity. But nobody else picked it up, and she now has a church in the Presbytery. Unless she has learned a lot since that time, what can she teach her congregation about the Trinity since she is so mixed up on it herself?
Now another fallacy which is very close to the other is the one where God has 3 titles at the same time. Take Frank Reeder back there. At one time he was the son of his mother. Then he was the husband of his wife. And he is the father of his children. 3 titles at the same time, son, father, husband. We don’t see three Frank Reeders back there. We see one Frank, but he is a son, a husband, a father. Same man with 3 roles or positions. But that is not what the Trinity means.
There is one God, but expressed in 3 different and distinct persons. Now another analogy I have used in the past is still inadequate. That is the H2O example. H20 is water. When you freeze it, it becomes ice. When you heat it, it becomes steam. But that isn’t accurate either. H20 can’t be all those things at the same time. Sometimes it is water. Sometimes it is steam. Sometimes it is ice. But God is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit all the time at the same time.
Now briefly, there are other fallacious ideas about the Trinity. One idea is that the Father is the chief God and the Son and Spirit come under Him. But the Trinity means that the 3 persons in the Godhead or equal in power. Then another fallacy is the emphasis on one of the persons over the others. We can talk about God the Father, God the Creator all the time. We dispense with the Son and the Spirit.
There are some churches who pride themselves in how little they mention the name of Jesus. Jesus is ignored entirely. And if they would mention the Spirit, he is reduced to an “it” or some kind of influence. That is not what the Trinity is all about.
Then others overemphasize Jesus. It is Jesus all the time. In fact there is a denomination which is known as Jesus only, who hold to what is called the Oneness doctrine. They worship Jesus and Jesus only. People must be baptized in the name of Jesus only. And if you were baptized in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, you must be baptized over again in the name of Jesus alone. As quiet as it is kept one of the most popular preachers in the country subscribes to this teaching. He was brought up in this denomination, and he still holds to those teachings. He subscribes to the Jesus only doctrine.
Then you have some that overemphasize the Spirit. They don’t ignore the Father and the Son. But everything is geared toward the Spirit. You find that in a lot of Pentecostal and charismatic churches.
Now what we have been talking about so far is known as immanent trinity, that is, how the persons of the trinity relate to each other. But our focus is going to be on how the persons of the Trinity work and function in relation to us and to the world. This is called economic trinity. How does God work in the world? How does God work in our lives? Does He work full time or part time? Now it is my contention that unless you accept the doctrine of the Trinity, you wind up with a part time God. In order to have a full time, God you must have a proper understanding of the Trinity. It is just that important.
The first thing we need to see about how God works is that all of God is involved in everything God does. All of God is involved in everything God does. The persons of the Godhead do not work by committee or task force. The Father does not say to the Son, “ that is your department.” The Son does not say to the Spirit, “ you handle that.” What the Father does, the Son and the Spirit do. What the Son does, the Father and the Spirit do. What the Spirit does, the Father and the Son do.
But there are certain functions we associate with particular persons of the Godhead. We see this God in three persons, this triune God, at work in salvation. There is no salvation without the Trinity. The opposite of Trinitarianism is Unitarianism. Unitarians say that there is only one God, but that he is not in three persons. God is God alone. But there is no room in Unitarianism for the Son or the Holy Spirit. Unitarianism is a branch of Christianity. There are Unitarian churches. The other main religions of the world are monotheistic, meaning that they believe in one God, but like the Unitarians, they do not believe in the Trinity. Unitarians worship in places called churches. But you will never see a cross in an Unitarian church. For Unitarians there is no need for Christ, because there is no need for salvation. That’s why years ago the Unitarians got together with the Universalists to form the Unitarian Universalist church. The universalists believe that everybody is going to heaven, if there is a heaven, therefore there is no need for Christ since there is no need for salvation.
In the Trinity, the 2nd person of the Godhead, the Son, is associated with salvation and redemption. So if God is not involved in salvation because there is no need for salvation, God is reduced to a part time God. All God needed to do was to sit back in heaven and pat us on the head and tell us that everything is alright. That’s a part time God. There was no need for God to work for our salvation. No need for God to suffer on a cross to bring about our salvation and to grant us the gift of eternal life. God is working part time. No need for him to tread the winepress of suffering and shame for us. No need for him to suffer the ridicule and the humiliation of the cross. No need for him to be bruised for our iniquities and wounded for our transgressions. No need for him to hang on a cross for our hang-ups.
If there is no Trinity, God didn’t have to be involved with all that salvation work. God could just sit back and take it easy. A part time God is not involved in the work of salvation, because there is no need for salvation. The Bible says that all have sinned. I don’t need a part time God to sit back twirling his fingers while I am burdened with sins and iniquities. I don’t need a part time God who takes it easy in heaven. I need a full time God. I need a God who goes to work by coming down to see about me. I need a full time God. I need a full time God who loved me so much that he died for me in Jesus Christ. I need a full time God who looked beyond my faults and saw my needs. I believe in the Trinity because I need a full time God who can rescue me from danger and save my dying soul. Without a triune God, without the Trinity, there is no need for salvation. Since there is no need for salvation there is no need for Christ. If there is no Christ, there is no need for salvation. When you accept the Trinity, you know that God does all the work of salvation. A part time God has no time for the work of salvation.
In all the other religions of the world, we have to work to make ourselves right in the sight of God. We must work our way to God by doing certain things, praying three times a day, taking a journey to Mecca, or whatever. It’s all about what we must do to please God. In Hinduism, we have to live over and over again in reincarnated lives until we get it right. Then we become one with God in a state of Nirvana. In all the religions of the world, we must work our way to God. It’s not God’s work; it is our work. A part time God sits back and lets us work our way to heaven. A part time God sits back and lets us approach him. But a full time God comes searching for us. A full time God takes the initiative to see about us. A full time God comes searching for us crying out, “Where are you?” A full time God gets to work on behalf of our salvation. The Trinity does matter because without the Trinity, we have a part time God who doesn’t have time to save and redeem us.
Then a triune God is at work in our sanctification. In the Trinity, we have a God who works at our sanctification. God comes to us in the 3rd person of the Trinity to be our comforter and our guide. Jesus said the Holy Spirit would come to be our instructor. The Holy Spirit would teach us the way to go. But without the Trinity, there is no need for sanctification. The work of sanctification draws us closer to God. The work of sanctification makes us more and more godlike. The work of sanctification helps us along our journey of life. But without the Trinity there is no need for God to comfort, strengthen, direct, and instruct us. Without the Trinity, we get no help in how to live a life pleasing to God. We are on our own. We are self-taught because the part time God has no time to teach us. It would be a poor teacher in the School system of Phila., who would let the students fend for themselves. It would be a poor teacher who refused to give the students any direction. Can you imagine what chaos there would be in the classroom if the teacher only worked part time? The kids would be on their own because they only had a part time teacher.
But I need a full time God to help me along the way of life. I need a full time God who will guide me with His eye. I need a full time God who lifts me up when I fall. I need a full time God who walks with me day by day. I need a full time God who is my song in the night and my comfort by day. I need a full time God who holds me in his arms. I need a full time God who every now and then wipes the tears from my weeping eyes. I need a full time God who will feed me till I want no more. I need a full time God who gives me water for my thirsty soul. I need a full time God who will never leave me or forsake me. I need a full time God who will shape my back for the burdens of life. I need a full time God who walks with me and talks with me and tells me that I am His own. That’s why I believe in the Trinity because it tells me that I have a God who works 24 hours a day 7 days a week. It tells me that I have a God who neither slumbers or sleeps. It tells me that I have a God who watches over me night and day. I believe in the Trinity because it tells me that I have a full time God.
Then finally, in the Trinity we have a God who works for our glorification. God is at work to see that we have a place with him in heaven. A full time God is at work right now preparing a mansion for us in the sky. A full time God is preparing a rocket to propel us from earth to glory. I believe in the Trinity because we have a full time God that is working for our glorification. We have a full time God who right now is working on or robes so we can shout all over God’s heaven. We have a full time God who right now is working on our shoes so we can walk all over God’s heaven. We have a full time God who right now is working on our wings so we can fly all over God’s heaven. We have a full time God who right now is working on our harps so we can play all over God’s heaven.
We have a full time God who right now is working on our songs so we can sing all over God’s heaven.
We have a full time God who right now is working on our prayers so we can pray all over God’s heaven.
I believe in the Trinity because it gives me a full time God so I can sing Glory to the Father, Glory to the Son, and Glory to the spirit. I believe in the Trinity so I can receive the love of God, the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and the communion of the Holy Spirit. I believe in the Trinity so I can say Holy, Holy, Holy, God in three persons, blessed Trinity. When you believe in the Trinity you have a full time God.
In conclusion, my stepson, knowing I didn’t have any children of my own or any close relatives, said to me I little while before my wife died, “I don’t know who is going to take care of you.”
But I have news for him. I have a full time God who will see about me when I need him. I can call on him anytime I need him. He will provide a way for me. He will take care of me.
Thanks be to a God who works full time!
