Trinity Sunday

The first Sunday after Pentecost is traditionally called Trinity Sunday and on this day the Church celebrates the Trinity: God is one Being who exists as three Persons: The Father, The Son (Jesus), and The Holy Spirit. Today we shall discuss that the Trinity is real and rational and true and Biblical.

The Trinity is Real and Rational

One of the main push backs against believing God is Triune is that it is difficult to understand. Another attack is to accuse Christians of contradicting themselves when they speak of God as 3 and 1. While it might be easier to believe something else, we must remember that in our quest to know more about God we must begin and end with what God has chosen to reveal about Himself in Scripture. Also, the Christian understanding of the Biblical teaching of the Trinity is not contradictory. Let us consider this in more detail:

The Trinity does not mean 3 gods. 

The Bible teaches that there is one (and only one) God. The Old and New Testaments are monotheistic texts that reject polytheism. For example, Deuteronomy 6:4 says: “Listen, Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is One.” Jesus also quotes this verse in Mark 12:29. Christianity is a Monotheistic religion that worships one God, not three. The Trinity does not mean three gods, but one God revealed as three Persons. These three are distinct, yet they are not three separate Beings forming three separate gods

Understand the difference between Being and Person. 

If you remain confused, hopefully this next section will bring clarity. There is an important reason we use the words “being” and “person”. These words have different meanings. Being refers to existence or essence. Think of this as “What” you are. Everything that exists has being (e.g., humans, rocks, clouds, etc.) Person refers to behavioral and emotional characteristics. We usually speak of this as personality. Think of this as “Who” you are. This is a necessary distinction because being and person are not synonymous. For example, a rock can have being/existence without person/personality. The Trinity can be difficult to grasp because we are accustomed to human beings who are limited to one person. For humans, person and being is always 1-to-1. This is not so with God because God is not a human being but the Divine Being. God is one in Being and three in Person. This may be difficult to comprehend, but it is true and Biblical as we shall see.

The Trinity is True and Biblical

As people who are committed to the truths found in the Bible, we believe the Trinity because the Bible teaches the Trinity. No other position is faithful to the teaching of Scripture. While there is no verse in the Bible that explicitly says, “God is Trinity”; the Bible clearly teaches the Trinity in two very important ways: 1) there is only one God (Deuteronomy 6:4, Isaiah 44:8) and 2) the Father is God (Eph 4:6), the Son is God (John 1:1, John 20:28, Titus 2:11), and the Spirit is God (Rom 8:9). Let’s look at some more key verses of Scripture that show the Trinity (Father, Son, and Spirit). 

1. Matthew 3:16-17 “When He had been baptized, Jesus came up immediately from the water; and behold, the heavens were opened to Him, and He saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and alighting upon Him. And suddenly a voice came from heaven, saying, ‘This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.’”
2. Matthew 28:19 “Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit.”
3. John 14:26 “But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My [Jesus] name, He will teach you all things, and bring to your remembrance all things I said to you.”
4. John 15:26 “But when the Helper comes, whom I [Jesus] shall send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth who proceeds from the Father, He will testify about Me.”
5. Acts 1:4 “And being assembled together with them, He [Jesus] commanded them not to depart from Jerusalem, but to wait for the Promise of the Father, “Which,” He said, “you heard of from Me.”
6. Acts 2:33 “Therefore being exalted to the right hand of God, and having received from the Father the promise of the Holy Spirit, He [Jesus] has poured forth this which you both see and hear.”
7. Ephesians 1:17 “That the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give to you the Spirit of wisdom and of revelation in the knowledge of Him.”
8. Ephesians 2:18 “For through Him we both have access by one Spirit to the Father.”
9. Hebrews 9:14 “How much more shall the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered Himself without blemish to God, cleanse your conscience from dead works to serve the living God?”
10. 1 Peter 1:2 “elect according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, in sanctification of the Spirit, for obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ: grace to you and peace be multiplied.”

Finally, consider the Trinitarian blessing Paul gives to the church in Corinth: “The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit, be with you all. Amen” (2 Cor 13:14). May the Almighty and Everlasting God bless you with His peace. Worship the Trinity in holiness and righteousness.