Vera Nazarian, a Russian-American writer once remarked: “Love is made up of three unconditional properties in equal measure: 1. Acceptance, 2. Understanding, 3. Appreciation. Remove any one of the three and the triangle falls apart. Which, by the way, is something highly inadvisable. Think about it - do you really want to live in a world of only two dimensions? So, for the love of a triangle, please keep love whole.” 1 Corinthians 8:5-6 reminds us: “For although there may be so-called gods in heaven or on earth - as indeed there are many “gods” and many “lords” - yet for us there is one God, the Father, from whom are all things and for whom we exist, and one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom are all things and through whom we exist.”
The Trinity is considered to represent the strong bond of God’s love, centered on its unity. It is regarded as the unique oneness of three. The Christian doctrine of the Trinity is the definitive orthodoxy concerning the undeniable recognition that there is one God existing in three separate, but consubstantial divine presences linked together as one entity. These individual echelons form the identifiable embodiments of God the Father, God, the Son and God, the Holy Spirit. 2 Corinthians 1:21-22 reminds us: “And it is God who establishes us with you in Christ, and has anointed us, and who has also put his seal on us and given us his Spirit in our hearts as a guarantee.”
For some, there is skepticism, confusion or even disbelief as to the concept of three individual identities being formed as one. How can this be so? they might say. How can three totally different persons represent one being? To believe that the Trinity can be easily understood may indicate that God is transparent. However, 1 John 3:2 reminds us: “Beloved, we are God's children now, and what we will be has not yet appeared; but we know that when he appears we shall be like him, because we shall see him as he is.”
Some have attempted to explain the difficult to comprehend existence of the Trinity by using the analogies of water or a triangle. However, as helpful as these may appear to some, they do not explain the deep complexities of God, they only explain certain aspects of the Trinity in an attempt to enhance ease of understanding.
Job 11:1-9 confirms: Then Zophar the Naamathite answered and said: “Should a multitude of words go unanswered, and a man full of talk be judged right? Should your babble silence men, and when you mock, shall no one shame you? For you say, ‘My doctrine is pure, and I am clean in God's eyes.’ But oh, that God would speak and open his lips to you, and that he would tell you the secrets of wisdom! For he is manifold in understanding. Know then that God exacts of you less than your guilt deserves.
“Can you find out the deep things of God? Can you find out the limit of the Almighty?
It is higher than heaven - what can you do? Deeper than Sheol - what can you know?
Its measure is longer than the earth and broader than the sea.”
The concept of Modalism suggests that God is one person who manifested himself in three different modes at different times in the biblical evolution of the universe, rather than three separate persons. It believes that God as the Father was prominent in times of the Old Testament. God the Son was created at the birth of Jesus Christ and God became the Holy Spirit after the ascension of Christ.
It is stated that He was never in more than one mode at a time. If this is true then it might be much easier to understand that Jesus could have died on the cross as a separate entity and then was reborn to become the Holy Spirit after his ascension. Now things begin to make more sense and can be more easily understood.
The revelations in the bible can now be taken in context and placed in the order of events that they should be. But is this really true? Can the Trinity be explained so simply? Unfortunately, modalism fails to account for several passages of scripture that define God, The Father, Son and the Holy Spirit as distinct from one another, but able to interact with each other. John 14:16 confirms: “And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Helper, to be with you forever.”
Modalism initially has great appeal for its simplicity, but it can be considered as dangerous because it fails to understand what God is and even more importantly who God is. It doesn’t relate to God as a real true God whom we respect and love and consider as our Father in heaven. Moreover, it doesn’t relate to God as the true Father of our Lord Jesus Christ - Remember the words on the cross? “My God, my God why have you forsaken me?” And “Father into your hands I commit my spirit” The true God is hidden from us behind a screen. A screen that we are not able to see through and clouds our own judgment, understanding and relationship with Him.
God has often been considered a mystery since life began. Because God, His Son and the Holy Spirit are of a Divine source, knowing Him fully has to remain an impossibility. But faith and trust can replace any doubt, uncertainty or confusion. Revelation 10:1-7 reminds us: “Then I saw another mighty angel coming down from heaven, wrapped in a cloud, with a rainbow over his head, and his face was like the sun, and his legs like pillars of fire. He had a little scroll open in his hand. And he set his right foot on the sea, and his left foot on the land, and called out with a loud voice, like a lion roaring. When he called out, the seven thunders sounded. And when the seven thunders had sounded, I was about to write, but I heard a voice from heaven saying, “Seal up what the seven thunders have said, and do not write it down.” And the angel whom I saw standing on the sea and on the land raised his right hand to heaven and swore by him who lives forever and ever, who created heaven and what is in it, the earth and what is in it, and the sea and what is in it, that there would be no more delay, but that in the days of the trumpet call to be sounded by the seventh angel, the mystery of God would be fulfilled, just as he announced to his servants the prophets.”
Eugene H. Peterson, an American minister of religion once remarked: “It is commonly said that the Trinity is a mystery. And it certainly is … . But it is not a mystery veiled in darkness in which we can only grope and guess. It is a mystery in which we are given to understand that we will never know all there is of God … . It is not a mystery that keeps us in the dark, but a mystery in which we are taken by the hand and gradually led into the light … ” John 17:21 reminds us: “That they may all be one, just as you, Father, are in me, and I in you, that they also may be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me.”
Amen.
