Three in One

I was channel surfing the other day, and came across "Christianity 101". The premise of the show is this; pastors team up to help young Christians as well as mature followers, find their way through complicated theology. Interested, I paused long enough to hear the word "Trinity". Wow, I thought, these pastors are taking on a heavy duty topic. Intrigued, I decided to watch, not expecting too much. After all, I've been a Christian for many years now, and even though I'm not theologian, I've got this Trinity thing down. Boy, was I wrong! I've heard the doctrine of the Trinity before, but not quite like this. It was explained in such a way that was easy to understand.

One of the principle doctrines of Christianity is that God exsists in three Persons; Father, Son, Holy Spirit (yep, just like the song says they are all Holy). They've always existed and are so united that they are all one God. That's pretty much a mind bender, isn't it. How can three people exist in one, and yet are separate from each other. This is were I would traditionally insert trite explanations like "God is like an apple... God the Holy Spirit is the skin, He leads us to the Son, the meat of the apple, who in turn leads us to the Father, the core of the apple. All are united ..." Yes, they are united, however, the guys on Christianity 101 brought up a good point... The skin, meat and core are just part of the apple, but not the whole! I can't say that I'm going to eat the entire apple, and just eat the meat! In order for me to eat an apple, I have to eat everything. Well, okay, okay maybe not the core! EWWWWWWE!

But that's beside the point. I was guilty of a version of "modalism", a heresy (even though I didn't know I was guilty of it at the time). Basically, modalist believe there is only one God who expressed Himself at different times. God the Father was expressed in the Old Testament, Christ was in the new until His resurrection, and then God was expressed in the Spirit after the resurrection. However, that cannot be true if thought out logically. So as not to take the text out of context, I'll tell you briefly what had transpired before hand. Jesus, knowing it was time to start His ministry, approaches his distant cousin John to be baptized. John looking at Him, testifies that he is not worth to baptize Him, because He is the Lamb of God. Jesus tells him it must be this way, and that John must continue with the ritual. He is baptize and look what follows in Luke 3:22;

22and the Holy Spirit descended on him in bodily form like a dove. And a voice came from heaven: "You are my Son, whom I love; with you I am well pleased."

How can God "express" Himself at the same time? Yes, He is all powerful and eternal, however, He will not transgress His own natural law, the laws of physics. If we were to view He'd have to time travel from the past in the form of the Father, while simultaneously traveling from the future, to meet with Himself in the form of Jesus. I'm not saying that He couldn't do this, but look at the nature of God Himself. He is not one to disobey His own law (in this case the law of physics) because the law that He created would be open to, for lack of a better term, interpretation. What chaos would ensue!

Let's look at another passage. This time, I'll include the entire text chapter.

Psalm 51 For the director of music. A psalm of David. When the prophet Nathan came to him after David had committed adultery with Bathsheba.
1 Have mercy on me, O God, according to your unfailing love; according to your great compassion blot out my transgressions.
2 Wash away all my iniquity and cleanse me from my sin.
3 For I know my transgressions, and my sin is always before me.
4 Against you, you only, have I sinned and done what is evil in your sight, so that you are proved right when you speak and justified when you judge.
5 Surely I was sinful at birth, sinful from the time my mother conceived me.
6 Surely you desire truth in the inner parts [a] ; you teach [b] me wisdom in the inmost place.
7 Cleanse me with hyssop, and I will be clean; wash me, and I will be whiter than snow.
8 Let me hear joy and gladness; let the bones you have crushed rejoice.
9 Hide your face from my sins and blot out all my iniquity.
10 Create in me a pure heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me.
11 Do not cast me from your presence or take your Holy Spirit from me.
12 Restore to me the joy of your salvation and grant me a willing spirit, to sustain me.
13 Then I will teach transgressors your ways, and sinners will turn back to you.
14 Save me from bloodguilt, O God, the God who saves me, and my tongue will sing of your righteousness.
15 O Lord, open my lips, and my mouth will declare your praise.
16 You do not delight in sacrifice, or I would bring it; you do not take pleasure in burnt offerings.
17 The sacrifices of God are [c] a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise.
18 In your good pleasure make Zion prosper; build up the walls of Jerusalem.
19 Then there will be righteous sacrifices, whole burnt offerings to delight you; then bulls will be offered on your altar.

In verse 11, David ask God to not take "your Holy Spirit from me". First of all the term Holy in the bible is a term exclusively used to label God. If David had the Holy Spirit (God), how could he have obtained Him if He wasn't in existence at Old Testament times? If it were true that God expressed Himself at different times as Father, then Son, then Holy Spirit, than David himself would have to be eternal (existed before time began) to know and have a relationship with the Holy Spirit because the Holy Spirit wasn't expressed or present until the New Testament.

People in the modalist camp will say that these are just isolated verses. However there are over 100 verses in the Old and New Testaments that reference God the Father, Son and Holy Spirit coexisting. If you want research and read about the Trinity (and yes, I do know that the word isn't found in the Bible, but it's still a good and orthodox way of describing God), use http://www.biblegateway.com/ to look up the Holy Spirit. Also, CARM also has a good definition of modalism on there website (www.carm.org/modalism). I'm still learning about the Trinity, and I hope you will too.

God Bless!