The Trinity is often identified as a divisive Christian doctrine. Some see it as needless or unimportant in the grand scheme of faith. Some see it as illogical and/or unbiblical. I’m going to say from the beginning of this essay… I think the Trinity is not only essential to the Christian faith, it is foundational to our very paradigm of God and every other doctrine of the Christian faith is affected by how much we consider the Trinity behind the processing of that particular doctrine. I’m not going to attempt to untangle the Trinity as a doctrine or demonstrate why it’s “biblical.”1I’d rather let more educated people do that for me (such as my pal Kenneth Myers in his book The Trinity Untangled Rather, what I’d like to do is show you four reasons the Trinity affects our paradigm of the world and God as Christians.
The Trinity shows that God created us by love and in love
In Genesis 1, when God said, “Let us create man in our image,” He intended man to be a relational being because God Himself is a relational being. But why create man at all? It’s because He wanted to expand and share His love. Think of how parents have children, not for any foreseeable benefit to themselves, but because they desire to share their love even more. God also created us to be a microcosm of His divine love and beauty. He shows this in creating Eve to provide Adam with that missing piece of relationship in the world. “It is not good for man to be alone,” God said and fashioned another person out of Adam’s own rib. So we see, that man and woman were both created to model love, with Adam giving part of himself for Eve’s very existence. After God took Adam’s rib and out of that made Eve, Adam created poetry for her and said, “This is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called ‘woman’ for she was taken out of man.” Genesis goes on to say that “a man leaves his father and mother and is united to his wife, and they become one flesh.” This is the mystery of marriage, but it also shows a glimpse of Trinitarian love, which is created in love and unites the couple through love. Just as a man is eternally tied to his wife in a mysterious, mutual essence, so the Trinity is tied in a mysterious and mutual essence together. The place of human beings in Creation is like a beautiful painting, not made for any tool or purpose other than to show this communal essence the Trinity exhibits and in some small way partake in its divine nature. (2 Peter 1:4)
The Trinity models self-giving love for others for us
The Trinity is often defined as a “community of persons.” God is One but in His “oneness” he exhibits “otherness.” Does this mean God is schizophrenic? No. We define otherness as “other consciences” around us, but in the Trinity, “otherness” isn’t really a concept. All are one, one are all; all are sustained together in love. I also think instead of defining the Trinity against our own reflections, maybe we should define ourselves in light of the Trinity. Maybe the Trinity’s otherness/sameness should show us how close we are to each other in our similarities, at least as Christians, so that we blur the lines in how we see our estrangement from others. Reflecting on this further, Paul says we are to consider one another as part of one body. (1 Cor. 12:12-26) We may all be different parts of that body with different functions, but we’re still one and this is a great mystery. There is no “otherness.”
The Trinity provides us with a God who is paradoxically larger, yet closer than anything to us
God is above all things and He’s infinite, which means the Trinity is infinite. The Son and the Spirit existed with the Father from the beginning. The Trinity is eternal and infinite, beyond anything we can comprehend. And yet, the Trinity also brings a significant closeness, in a way no other gods can. Our God doesn’t just act in love – He is love. (1 John 4:8) He embodies love. Unity, community, and love are why we were created. God created us to be in the community of persons, which existed from the beginning. We broke that communion by choosing to sin. When Adam and Eve bit into the fruit of the tree, they decided to turn their backs on this communion and create their own. They distanced themselves from the Triune God. But in Christ, this communion is healing and restoring Creation to bring us back into intimate union with the Trinity again. The Trinity now invites us back in and the only way is through Jesus Christ.
The Trinity shows that God is self-contained but not impotent
The Trinity is God making Himself known in ways that seem to contain His nature. The Son takes on a human body, subjects himself to a mortal body and empties himself on our behalf. The Spirit works in and among us to truly maintain the communion of the saints. The Father is the head and the one that is incomprehensible. God has decided to contain Himself in three persons, but within one essence. It is God restraining Himself to be in community, but still being the power that governs and upholds the universe. St. Athanasius explains further how there are three persons and one essence:
The Trinity is a Trinity not merely in name or in a figurative manner of speaking; rather, it is a Trinity in truth and in actual existence. Just as the Father is he that is, so also his Word is one that is and is God over all. And neither is the Holy Spirit nonexistent but actually exists and has true being.2Ep. 1 ad Serapionem 28-30: P. 26, 594-95, 599
What this means for us is we have a God who does not have to be humble in any way, but He chooses to bend down to us out of love. (Phil. 2:8) As Jesus said, “If you’ve seen me, you’ve seen the Father”, so we can rightly assume that the humility Christ carried in His character is part of the character of the Trinity.
Conclusion
The Trinity by its nature is a mysterious paradox of sorts. No rational person sees how something can be one and also be three, but the mystery of the Trinity bucks our logic. The Trinity is uniquely Christian and I would assert that’s why we should be even more bold in proclaiming its truth to the world. Through the Trinity, God makes His love known to the universe. Through the Incarnation, He makes it known to us even further. We Christians worship a God of love and justice, power and humility, glory and beauty. Our God then reflects this love to His Church, which then goes out to the world, proclaiming that the Created are reflections of the Uncreated, made for love and communion with one another and with the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.
References
1. | ↑ | I’d rather let more educated people do that for me (such as my pal Kenneth Myers in his book The Trinity Untangled |
2. | ↑ | Ep. 1 ad Serapionem 28-30: P. 26, 594-95, 599 |