Trinity: The Unity Factor
1 John 5:7 NKJV
If someone asked you, “What’s God like?” how would you respond? One email I received answered this way: "God is a little like General Electric. He brings good things to life." God is a little like a Visa Card. He’s everywhere you want to be. God is like Scotch Tape. You can’t see Him, but you know He’s there. God is like Alka Seltzer. Oh, what a relief He is. God is like Tide. He gets the stains out that others leave behind." These are nice ways to describe what God is like. But they are limited explanations. Who is God and what’s he like?
In an attempt to explain the person and nature of God, the early church fathers began to clarify the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. The reason was throughout the ancient world, as far back as the 16th century BC, the worship of pagan gods grouped in threes, or triads, was common. That influence was also prevalent in Egypt, Greece, and Rome in the centuries before, during and after Christ. After the death of the apostles, such pagan beliefs began to invade Christianity. In response, the church from the first to third centuries sought to clarify the nature of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit until in A.D. 381 when the Council of Constantinople settled on the definitive phrase "Three persons in One God". And thus, the doctrine of the Trinity was formed.
The Trinity is one of the distinctive beliefs of the Christian faith. No other religion has incorporated in its belief system this concept of the Trinity. Many religions propose that there is only one God – Islam, for example declares that, “there is only one God”. The Trinity says there is one God, who exists in three distinct persons, who are each equally the one God. Why is the Trinity important to understand? Part of our spiritual growth and our transformation is coming to a deeper understanding of and thus relationship to God. Matthew 22:37 says to "Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your MIND. There’s an intellectual side to Christianity. We’re expected to think through the teachings of Scripture for ourselves
The second reason we need to understand the Trinity is that our understanding of who God is affects our attitudes, relationships and actions toward other people. When you have a wrong understanding of God, then you will have wrong attitudes and actions toward other people. This war on terror going on right now is a God war. It’s interesting that ancient wars were God wars too, and the future wars we will see are going to be God wars. This is a God war because Islamic fundamentalists believe that Americans and Jewish people are Satan, or anti-God. They think we are enemies of God. So when your understanding of God is not right, then your attitudes and actions toward other people are going to be wrong.
We need to keep in mind in this series that everything we say about God as the Trinity will be inadequate. How do you try to describe an infinite God with finite words? The Trinity is one of the most difficult things to understand about God. Scholars and theologians have been arguing about the Trinity and what it means for centuries and there is still no definitive understanding. In part because it is impossible for the finite, limited human mind to totally comprehend the infinite God. 1 Corinthians 13:9 reminds us that “we know in part and we prophesy in part" meaning we will never fully understand God now because of our limitations. We’ll only come to get the rest of the story until we get to heaven. But that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t work to understand God and the Trinity. Coming to a deeper understanding of God brings about the transformation of our lives.
The other point we need to be aware of: you don’t have to understand this to experience it. You don’t have to understand the Trinity in order to experience God, Jesus or the Holy Spirit. Through his grace we can experience the Trinity even though we don’t understand it. Any time you are trying to explain something to another person that they have never experienced, it’s difficult. So you resort to using analogies. Have you ever tried to explain to another the taste of a food they have never experienced? You describe what something is like by relating it to something the person already knows. God is like water in that God shows himself in 3 different ways like water shows itself in the form of ice, steam, and liquid. Each has different qualities and characteristics and thus can have different functions but the composition is still H2O. Likewise, the Father, Son and Holy Spirit are all God equally three distinct persons but are each equally the one God. But what are the qualities of the Trinity as a whole. Today, we’re going to look at those qualities in the unity of the Trinity and then the following three weeks .
Now the word Trinity does not appear in the Bible and thus some have argued it’s not Biblical. But as we look at the Scriptures we evidence of the Trinity. There are 3 truths about the Trinity. First is the unity of the Trinity. In Genesis 1:26, it says, "Let US make man in OUR image." It doesn’t say, "Let ME make man" but "Let us!" God involves the other members of the Trinity in the creation of mankind. How do I know he’s not referring to the angels? Because in Genesis 1:1, you have God creating the heavens and the earth. And in verse 2, you have the Spirit of God hovering over the face of the waters. And in Colossians 1:16, we’re told that Christ made the heavens and the earth!
In Genesis 18:1-2 it says: “The Lord (singular) appeared to Abraham, near the great trees of Mamre, while he was sitting at the entrance to his tent in the heat of the day. Abraham looked up and saw three men standing nearby.” When the Lord appeared to Abraham, it was as three distinct, separate persons but only one word is used for him. Then in verses 16-18 it says: When the men (plural, three forms but one God) got up to leave, they looked down toward Sodom, and Abraham walked along with them to see them on their way. Then the Lord said, “Shall I hide from Abraham what I am about to do?” Not we but I.
The Trinity working together in creation and throughout history speaks to the unity of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. But it’s not just the Father, Son and Holy Spirit unified, it’s also God’s desire for unity among His children. This is why Jesus’ last prayer before he went to the cross as recorded in John 17: 9-11, “I pray for them. I am not praying for the world, but for those you have given me, for they are yours. All I have is yours, and all you have is mine. And glory has come to me through them. I will remain in the world no longer, but they are still in the world, and I am coming to you. Holy Father, protect them by the power of your name—the name you gave me—so that they may be one as we are one.” Why is it so important to understand the Trinity? Because God wants unity in the body of Christ so His mission can be accomplished. He wants to establish a counter-cultural community of people that will not only demonstrate the love and unity of God but also allow others to experience it.
The second characteristic we see in the Trinity is diversity. The Trinity is one God, but three distinct persons. Remember, when Jesus prayed to the Father on the cross, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” He wasn’t praying to himself but to God. So the Son is not the Father, the Father is not the Spirit, the Spirit is not the Son, but they are all one God. They are not only different and distinct from one another but they don’t always do the same thing. The members of the Trinity work together, but like water, steam and ice, they don’t always do the same things. Look at salvation. God the Father governs the world. God the Son redeems the world (on the cross). And the Holy Spirit gives us the power and grace to change the world. Three very different roles. But all for the one purpose of manifesting God’s glory in the world and bringing the salvation of the world.
In the Trinity creating the world, we see how much God loves diversity. Genesis 1:27 says, “So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.” God is a God of diversity, and he demonstrates that even his creation of us. Just look around the room and you begin to see how much God loves diversity. We are male and female, young and old, white and black and shades in between. We have different shapes of bodies, different colors of eyes and hair. In fact, no two people, not even twins, are identically alike in all of creation. The diversity of God is reflected in the diversity of his children.
By ourselves, we are incomplete in our understanding of God. It’s in our diversity that we come to a clearer understanding of God. When the Spirit was given, it was a celebration of diversity. Look at what happened on the day of Pentecost. Each heard the Good News “in his own native language? Parthians, Medes and Elamites; residents of Mesopotamia, Judea and Cappadocia, Pontus and Asia, Phrygia and Pamphylia, Egypt and the parts of Libya near Cyrene; visitors from Rome (both Jews and converts to Judaism); Cretans and Arabs-we hear them declaring the wonders of God in our own tongues!" Acts 2:8-11 And more than 3000 came to believe that day. It is only in the completeness of the Trinity that the world comes together. Why is it so important that we understand this? Because in our diversity we get a clearer reflection of God and the unique roles that each of us is to pay in His plan of salvation.
Third is equality. The Trinity is three separate distinct persons – God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit, but each is equally God. They have different functions, but they are each equally God. Relationships don’t work if someone is put in a subservient position. Why do you think we have so many problems in our marriages? Why is there still racial tension in this country? Relationships don’t work if someone is put in a subservient position. Why is there constant tension between labor and management? Relationships don’t work if there is inequality. Why is it so important that we understand the nature of the Trinity? Because God wants us to have equality in all of our relationships.
Do you know why Jesus came? In Ephesians it says, Jesus came to break down the dividing walls that stand between us, that whether you are Jew or Gentile, black or white, young or old, male or female, we are one because we are all God’s children. And we are to be united by our faith in Jesus Christ. That is who we are to be as followers of Jesus in this counter-culture community. We are the people that break down walls that keep people from experiencing the grace and love and potential they have in God.
By the 1940s, organized baseball had been racially segregated for many years. The black press and some of their white colleagues had long campaigned for the integration of baseball. Although several people in major league baseball tried to end segregation in the sport, no one succeeded until Brooklyn Dodger’s general manager Branch Rickey. It all started when he was a young man, he worked for St. Louis and it burned him up on the inside that there was a rule saying you couldn’t sell tickets to African-Americans to come in and sit in the bleachers. That bothered him so bad, that he decided when he got the chance he was going to do the God thing. He was quoted as saying, "Ethnic prejudice has no place in sports, and baseball must recognize that truth if it is to maintain stature as a national game." In 1942, he did just that. Rickey joined the Dodgers and quietly began plans to bring black players to the team and set his "great experiment" into motion. In 1945, he was the first general manager to go against all of the other owners and general managers in major league baseball by signing an African-American player, Jackie Robinson, to a major league contract. He then later drafted the first Hispanic superstar, Roberto Clemente. Can you imagine, at the time, what he had to experience? You always look like a hero years later when you do the right thing, but you pay a major cost when you do it. But Brach Rickey believed "A great ballplayer is a player who will take a chance."
Every one of us has that opportunity to demonstrate the character of God, which is unity, diversity and equality. .” Why is it so important to understand the Trinity? Because God wants unity in the body of Christ so His mission can be accomplished. It’s in our diversity that we come to a clearer understanding of God and God wants us to have equality in all of our relationships. It is only through the Trinity that the world can come together.
