Basic Christianity
The Trinity
Every cult and most other religions attack the Christian concept of the trinity, and they are much better at attacking than the majority of Christians are at defending it. As Christians, we should know what scripture says and be able to defend our faith, at least to ourselves if not others.
Here are the most common challenges to the trinity:
Of course, the biggest problem is too many people listen to what some other person says and accept it without question or checking scripture for themselves. As Christians we ought to start with scripture. And we should check everything with scripture to see if it is in agreement. Almost every cult misuses scripture to lead people astray. Therefore, we need to be grounded in it.
Yes, the word "trinity" is not in the Bible. Neither is the word "sacrament" and a lot of other words we use to describe things in Christianity. Trinity is a theological term coined to shorten a concept into one word for clarity and brevity. But words don't precede concepts, concepts come first and then words are coined to describe them. People navigated across land and sea before the word "navigate" existed. The word was coined to describe an existing concept. The word did not create the concept. The word was coined to more easily refer to the concept after the concept already existed. Try to talk about navigation without using the word and you use a lot more words.
Theologians come up with terms like this all the time, just as they do in any field. In education people use the word proctor rather than say "a neutral person who monitors students during an examination to verify they took their own test and didn't cheat." Eschaton is not in the Bible. This word was coined by theologians to refer to the end times, including the return of Jesus Christ, the establishment of His eternal kingdom, judgement day, and so on. Thus one can say that a section of Paul's writing is eschatological without having to write a thousand words to describe what they mean. While the word itself is not in the Bible, no one can honestly say that the concept of the trinity is not in the Bible.
Some critics will try to discredit the term trinity by saying the theologian who coined isn't credible because they were wrong about something else. This is an argument of false equivalence. Just because someone failed to stop at a stop sign doesn't mean they were speeding on the road before it, they don't have their required documents, or any other infraction. They were just wrong not to stop for that stop sign. Any other inference is a deception. If getting one thing wrong means we can't listen to or learn from a person, then there is no one we can listen to or trust, including these critics. Because everyone is wrong about something, including us. Only Jesus was infallible.
There are a couple of givens that are not challenged by these critics. One is that there is only one God. And the other is that the Father is God. It is easy to see those two points in scripture, so an in depth analysis of those isn't necessary. But for the sake of being thorough, here are two scriptures on the subject.
1 Peter 1:2a according to the foreknowledge of God the Father.
Isaiah 46:9 "Remember the former things long past, For I am God, and there is no other; I am God, and there is no one like Me".
So the Father is God, and there is only one God. Next, the Father, the Son, and the Spirit are all in scripture as separate persons.
Matthew 3:16-17 After being baptized, Jesus came up immediately from the water; and behold, the heavens were opened, and he saw the Spirit of God descending as a dove and lighting on Him, and behold, a voice out of the heavens said, "This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well-pleased."
The Father speaks about the Son as a separate person. There are many other scriptures on this. But most critics accept that Jesus the Christ was the Son of God. Where they begin to go sideways is to deny the deity of Jesus. However, scripture is clear on this subject as well.
Colossians 2:8-9 See to it that no one takes you captive through philosophy and empty deception, according to the tradition of men, according to the elementary principles of the world, rather than according to Christ. For in Him all the fullness of Deity dwells in bodily form.
Verse 8 is a warning not to let people deceive us and lead us away from the Gospel. And verse 9 plainly states one of the things people try to deceive us about, that Jesus was fully God, and was God incarnate, (embodied in flesh.) There is no language in scripture that uses percentages. Any talk of percentage of God or man is non-biblical. Jesus was truly and fully the Son of God, and truly and fully the Son of Man. Not being able to understand this truth doesn't make it untrue. Not to mention that denying it is possible is to say God can't do it. There are many more scriptures that say this as well.
Titus 2:11-13 For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation to all men, instructing us to deny ungodliness and worldly desires and to live sensibly, righteously and godly in the present age, looking for the blessed hope and the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior, Christ Jesus.
This could not be more clear. Jesus is God and not a lesser god. He is the great God. Some critics will try to separate great God from Savior Christ Jesus to say these are referring to both the Father and Jesus. This is a huge stretch in English. But in Greek it is impossible. Without getting too deep into the Greek, Titus 2:13 and 2 Peter 1:1 are perfect examples of the Granville Sharp rule. When the two substantives agree in gender, number and case, they are connected with kai, (Greek for "and,") and only the first has the definite article, then they are always referring to the same person. This is an absolute rule of Greek with zero exceptions, (unlike many so-called rules in English.) If you want a detailed explanation of this rule with a lot of scriptural examples, here's a great video: Granville Sharp Rule.
John 1:1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
John 1:3 All things came into being through Him, and apart from Him nothing came into being that has come into being.
John 1:14 And the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us, and we saw His glory, glory as of the only begotten from the Father, full of grace and truth.
In verse 14, the Word is clearly identified as Jesus. He became flesh and was the only begotten Son of God the Father. Verse 1 identifies that Jesus was there at the beginning, and was God as well as with God. That is the essence of the concept of the trinity. Verse 3 states that all creation was through Jesus, and nothing was created without Him. Thus, Jesus is God, and was not a created being, but was always in existence with the Father.
John 17:5 Now, Father, glorify Me together with Yourself, with the glory which I had with You before the world was.
Jesus is not the Father. He was with the Father. And this was before creation. Only God existed before creation. Only God is not created.
That Jesus is God is more fully covered on the webpage Jesus Is God. Although even that article does not list all the scriptures that state that Jesus is God.
That the Holy Spirit is both God and is a separate person is also in scripture.
Acts 5:3-4 But Peter said, "Ananias, why has Satan filled your heart to lie to the Holy Spirit and to keep back some of the price of the land? While it remained unsold, did it not remain your own? And after it was sold, was it not under your control? Why is it that you have conceived this deed in your heart? You have not lied to men but to God."
Ananias and Sapphira lied and said they had donated all the money from the sale of a piece of land they owned. Peter said that they didn't just lie to him and the church, but they lied to the Holy Spirit which is to lie to God.
Acts 13:2 While they were ministering to the Lord and fasting, the Holy Spirit said, "Set apart for Me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them."
The Holy Spirit is a distinct person from the other two persons of God. The Spirit spoke. The Spirit said to set them apart "for me." And it was the Spirit that had work for Paul and Barnabas to do.
Acts 10:19-20 While Peter was reflecting on the vision, the Spirit said to him, "Behold, three men are looking for you. But get up, go downstairs and accompany them without misgivings, for I have sent them Myself."
Again, these are words and actions by the Holy Spirit. And this is spoken both as a distinct person and as God. There are distinct characteristics of the person of the Holy Spirit in scripture. The Spirit speaks, testifies, guides people, and reveals things to people. These are the actions of a person who is God. Jesus also speaks of the Spirit as a different person.
Luke 12:10 And everyone who speaks a word against the Son of Man, it will be forgiven him; but he who blasphemes against the Holy Spirit, it will not be forgiven him.
So blasphemy against the Son of Man, (Jesus Christ,) is forgivable. But blasphemy against the Spirit is unforgivable. If they are one and the same, how can this be forgiven for one and not the other? It is because they are different persons.
Christianity is unique in that it teaches that God is not only loving, not only has perfect love, but that God Himself is love. (Although many have incorporated that into their own philosophy since, the origin of this is Christianity.)
1 John 4:8 The one who does not love does not know God, for God is love.
Love requires an object. Since God created everything and is the only thing that existed before creation, who was there for God to love? As we saw in John 1:1, Jesus was both with God and was God. Thus the one God could be love because each person of God had two others to love. That is the trinity.
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.
It's not the names of the three persons, but the name. In the Greek anoma, or name, is singular, which would be a mistake in Greek. But it is fitting because they are one God.
Scripture teaches us the concepts of the Trinity. It clearly says that there is one God, that the Father is God, the Son is God, and that the Spirit is God. The trinity is the answer to this. It is not something some guy came up with on his own. However, our limited minds cannot truly comprehend this. Every attempt to come up with an analogy to understand the trinity, (except one,) doesn't really explain the trinity, but instead teaches a heresy. For example, the water analogy. In this they say that water has three forms, water, ice and vapor. But it's all still water. Unfortunately that is the modalism heresy. Most attempts to come up with an analogy for the trinity are really modalism. Scripture clearly shows that they are three distinct persons, but still one God.
Here are the direct answers for the common challenges to the trinity stated at the beginning:
1 - The word "Trinity" is not in the Bible.
The word itself is not. But the concept clearly is. Omniscient is a word that isn't in the Bible either, but it does accurately describe one of the characteristics of God, that he is all-knowing, and that is in scripture.
2 - Jesus referred to the Father as the only true God in John 17:3.
John 17:3 "This is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom You have sent."
To say that this is proof against the trinity is to say that the trinity is a tritheistic belief. (A belief that there are three gods.) But the trinity affirms that there is one God. So yes, the Father is the one true God. And Jesus is the one true God. John 1:1, 3 & 14 are clear on that.
3 - Jesus said that the Father is greater than I in John 14:28. This is the favorite challenge.
John 14:28 "You heard that I said to you, 'I go away, and I will come to you.' If you loved Me, you would have rejoiced because I go to the Father, for the Father is greater than I."
Jesus does not say God is greater than I. He said the Father is greater than I. The context is that Christ is in his earthly body. That the Father is greater than Him was a temporary state.
Philippians 2:5-8 Have this attitude in yourselves which was also in Christ Jesus, who, although He existed in the form of God, did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied Himself, taking the form of a bond-servant, and being made in the likeness of men. Being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.
Jesus set aside his glory to become man. He was still God while he was man. Going to the Father meant returning to heaven in His glorified state he had from before creation as it says in John 17:5.
4 - Who was Jesus praying to?
God was not praying to God, as in some form of tritheism. But the person of the Son can and did pray to the different person of the Father. They can interact as different persons yet still be one God.
5 - How can Jesus be God if he's God's son?
The person of Jesus is the Son of the person of the Father. But they are both one being, God. That is the trinity. Our inability to fully understand the trinity doesn't make it false. Just as a failure to understand how the wing of a plane allows it to fly doesn't mean planes can't fly or Bernoulli's theorem is false.
6 - In Colossians 1:15 it says that Jesus was created.
Colossians 1:15 He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation.
This does not say that Jesus was created. That is reading into the text. First, it says that we can see God by looking at Jesus. The firstborn of all creation means that all of creation belonged to Him as a birthright belongs to a firstborn son. The word is used in the same way to refer to the nation of Israel.
Exodus 4:22 Then you shall say to Pharaoh, 'Thus says the LORD, "Israel is My son, My firstborn.
Israel was not the first nation of the earth. But it was the firstborn in the sense of their promised inheritance from God. If you go to the very next verse in Colossians, (instead of taking verse 15 out of context,) firstborn is explained.
Colossians 1:16 For by Him all things were created, both in the heavens and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities - all things have been created through Him and for Him.
Jesus was not created. He was the one who did the creating. He cannot create himself. Jesus Christ was firstborn in the sense of His birthright. All creation is under him and belongs to Him as in "for Him."
7 - Jesus never said He was God.
On the contrary, Jesus said He was God repeatedly. And the Jews wanted to kill Him for blasphemy. John 10:30-33, Exodus 3:14 & John 8:58-59, Mark 14:61-64 and many others are beyond clear that Jesus said He was God. For a full discussion of this see the webpage Jesus Is God.
The closest we can come to understanding the trinity without straying into heresy is this: God is three who's in one what. Jesus is two what's in one who.
Finally, the most common tactic of those who challenge the trinity is to change the subject. When they are shown a scripture that clearly teaches a trinitarian concept, they will shift the subject to another scripture they believe contradicts it. They won't deal with the scripture that doesn't support their narrative. But scripture is not a pick and choose buffet. It is all or nothing. Scripture cannot fight scripture. If a person cannot harmonize two scriptures it is because of their lack of understanding, not a failing of the word of God.
While this is the result of a deep dive into scripture, only some of the many scriptures on the subject were used. There are many others. An exhaustive quotation of all the relevant scriptures would be far too long.
Scripture quotations taken from the NASB © The Lockman Foundation.
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