Oh, The Glorious Three-Personed God

 “Oh, The Glorious Three-Personed God”

Batter my heart, three personed God; for You

As yet but knock, breathe, shine, and seek to mend;

That I may rise, and stand, o’erthrow me, and bend

Your force, to break, blow, burn, and make me new.

I, like an unsurped town to another due,

Labor to admit You, but oh! To no end;

Reason, Your viceroy in me, me should defend,

But is captived and proves weak or untrue.

Yet dearly I love You, and would be loved fain,

But am betrothed unto Your enemy.

Divorce me, untie me, or break that knot again,

Take me to You, imprison me, for I

Except You enthrall me, never shall be free;

Nor ever chaste, except You ravish me.

John Donne (1572-1631)              

The revelation of God being One in Three is not an abstract notion fit only for theologians or philosophers.  There is also no inherent contradiction in God’s Triune nature.  We may not be able to comprehend how the one God eternally exists in the three persons of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit yet we can apprehend this.  It is not contrary to our reason.  As we believe this about God our faith must then move toward increased understanding.  This must occur if we are going to know and worship God in a way that really conforms to what He is.    The basic summation or confession of what the Bible teaches concerning the Trinity may be stated in the following way:

1.  There is only one God.

2.  The Father is God, the Son is God and the Holy Spirit is God

3. The Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit are distinct  persons (distinct centers of self-consciousness and self-awareness).

From this summary we can go back and reflect more deeply, worshipfully and prayerfully on the Bible texts that teach the following.

1. There is only one God who is indivisible.

2. The Father is God.

3. The one who is called the Son and the Word of God is       also fully God.

4.There is an eternal relationship, bond and fellowship between the Father and the Son.

5. The Holy Spirit is a person and not a thing or an inanimate power or presence.

6. The Holy Spirit is a person equal to the Father and the Son who also sustains an eternal relationship with the Father and the Son.

7. The Scriptures present the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit as sharing equally in the full attributes, glory and power of God.  Thus, they are as God in Three Persons to be honored, worshiped and obeyed.

It is also important to state that the words and terms that have been used to give expression to the Bible’s presentation and descriptions are legitimate and helpful and not contrary to Scripture. They are tools that help us by faith pursue a deeper understanding of God.

For example the ancient church was surrounded by a polytheistic culture.  Many gods were worshipped.  The Christian church embraced the Old Testament’s monotheism and affirmed that there was only one God who is indivisible and who revealed himself to Abraham, Moses, David and the Prophets.  When they came to give expression to how the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit could each be God without there being three Christian gods, they stated that the three shared equally in the one divine substance, essence or nature.  They used such Greek and Latin terms as phusis, essentia and natura. They were convinced from the Scriptures that the names Father, Son and Holy Spirit were not mere titles or roles that the God of the Old Testament assumed at different stages in redemptive history. So they used such Greek and Latin terms as hypostasis, subsistence and persona, which are best translated by the English word person.  The word person captures the Biblical reality that the Father and Son and Holy Spirit stand over against each other as distinct centers of self-consciousness and self-awareness.  There is mutual love and communication between them. 

Yet when the early church fathers tried to explain the manner or way or mode of how the three relate to one another they went a bit beyond Scripture and moved into a more metaphysical and abstract realm.  When we come to understand the Trinity we realize that the relationships between the three persons are eternal and necessary.  For God to be God there is and must be a Trinity.  Yet we come to understand to some degree the eternal inner workings of the Three in One and One in Three due to the work of redemption that God achieved for sinners.  It is an amazing thing to consider that within the inner fellowship of the Triune God the plan of redemption was established before the foundations of the world.  Here we begin to understand the eternal relations between the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.  To think that our salvation means that we come to share in the Triune fellowship of the Living God is indeed a source of wonder and joy!  As John Donne expressed the intense joy and glory of this union between the believer and the One he called the “three-personed God.”  “Except You enthrall me, (I) never shall be free; Nor ever chaste, except You ravish me.”