What the Trinity Teaches Us
The puritan John Owen says that “the nature of all gospel truths” is that they are “experienced by a believing soul.”
Understanding the truth of the trinitarian doctrine puts us into an experience with the living God. Knowing who He is as Father, Son and Holy Spirit allows us to know Him more. It is a disturbing trend in our current Christian culture that people say they want to “experience God” but without the effort of seeking to know God. The reality is, and what John Owen says, is that we cannot truly experience God if we do not have a true knowledge of Him. Hear what Owen writes:
There was no more glorious mystery brought to light in and by Jesus Christ than that of the holy Trinity, or the subsistence of the three persons in the unity of the same divine nature . . . . And this revelation is made unto us, not that our minds might be possessed with the notions of it, but that we may know aright how to place our trust in him, how to obey him and live unto him, how to obtain and exercise communion with him, until we come to the enjoyment of him.
Note how Owen connects the knowledge of God as a Trinity with the experiences we have with God. This is the point of understanding this critical doctrine. God as Father, Son and Holy Spirit makes God someone that we can know. Because it teaches us that by His very nature he desired to save us. It teaches us that He wanted to reveal Himself to us. And, putting these together, it shows us how great His love for us is.
For example, the work of God as it relates to our salvation is tied into our understanding of the trinitarian nature of God. In fact, the Bible is more concerned about telling us how God offers salvation than it is about trying to teach us the truth of the trinity. Our understanding of the trinity comes from what is taught about the work God did to save us.
We find this in such statements as “For God so loved the world that He gave His one and only Son….” We find it in what happened on the cross as Jesus took the wrath of God’s judgment upon himself so that our sins could be forgiven. We find it in the evidence of becoming a people of faith by the coming of the Holy Spirit into the life of the new believer. All of these salvation steps scream to us that God is three persons accomplishing the work that gives us our redemption.
Another aspect of what the trinity tells us is the way in which God reveals himself. The idea of God being revealed to us through scripture and by Jesus is the topic of our next session. But in terms of the trinity, we can see that the three persons have three distinct roles in this revealing process. Maybe this can best be expressed by the way Karl Barth expressed it. Barth is considered one of the 20th Centuries brightest theological minds. His large Dogmatics gave over 220 pages to the issue of the Trinity. But he summed it up in these two simple words: “God speaks.” He saw God the Father as the Revealer, God the Son as the Revelation, and God the Spirit as the Revealedness. Or an easier way to see this: “He is reveals Himself, He is the Revelation and He is also the content of the Revelation” (Berkhof, Louis, Systematic Theology, p. 59, Kindle edition).
What does God as trinity reveal to us about Him?
Two important lessons are often expressed: one that it tells us that God is a relational being, and second (related to the first) is that God is love. Go back to the Bible Project video in the first lesson and you will see this connection brought out if you missed it.
Throughout all eternity – which has no beginning – God has always been and the doctrine of the trinity tells us that in this always existing state God has always been Father, Son and Holy Spirit. So, for eternity God has been in relationship. It is this nature that is part of what we take on by receiving the image of Him. We are made in the image of God. Therefore part of who we are is based on who He is. What this says to us is that we are by design also relational beings. We develop our own identity by understanding the identity of God.
John says this in a slightly different way:
So we have come to know and to believe the love that God has for us. God is love, and whoever abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him. — 1 John 4:16
One writer puts it this way:
The Trinity tells us that God was and is love from all eternity, because God is a community of love. And then that love spills over into our hearts. At the end of this day you may consider yourself broken and insignificant. You may be at the end of your rope. You may feel small, dirty, and ashamed. You may feel lost and empty. But you are loved by a three-fold cord of love. Jesus the Son left the glory of heaven to come to Earth—living, dying, and rising again for our sake. The Father has said, “I will offer my only son to save my fallen and wayward people.” The Spirit has been poured out on the Earth and into your heart. And you are invited into the presence of God. — Matt Woodley, Current Issues Bible Study
Finally, we need to say that you should NOT try to explain the trinity by using some analogies from nature. You have undoubtedly heard many of them. The most common is that the trinity is like H2O that hasthree ways of being: water, ice and steam. All analogies breakdown because they give the wrong understanding. Again from Woodley:
The Trinity does not mean that God is like a pizza cut into three big slices. Nor is God like the three parts of an egg. It does not mean that God has three modes or three disguises—so God puts on a Father hat and creates the world, and God puts on a Jesus hat and goes out to save the world, and then God puts on a Holy Spirit hat…. No, they truly are three in one. When you meet the Father, you meet Jesus and the Spirit.
So, don’t try to explain it. Just believe it. Know that it is a mystery but a mystery that has been revealed to us as truth.
