Study of the Trinity
I must start out by saying man is not in any way capable of truly understanding the Trinity. How can One be Three or Three be One? It is beyond our ability to truly comprehend and must accepted by faith. Regardless we will strive to have some understanding of the Trinity. Much of the information below is from the Internet with my thoughts thrown in. It is intended as a start and guide, not an end, for discussion.
The doctrine of the Trinity is arrived at by looking at the whole of scripture rightly divided not in a single verse. It is the doctrine that there is only one God, not three, and that the one God exists in three persons: the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. An analogy (but not a great one) would be a family. There are multiple members but only one family. The family operates as one with their goals and actions being unified and working to the same end but each member of the family is an individual personality.
God is one, (Genesis 1:22, 26; Deut. 6:4-5; Isaiah 44:6, 45:5 and 55:5) but the one God is in three simultaneous persons with the same essence. The idea of a composite unity is not a foreign concept to the Bible; man and wife become and are said to be one flesh. The idea of a composite unity of persons is spoken of by God in Genesis 2:24.
God is One in essence but is also three persons: the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. The Father is not the same person as the Son; the Son is not the same person as the Holy Spirit; and the Holy Spirit is not the same person as the Father. They are not three gods but are three distinct persons; yet, they are all the one God. Theologian and apologist Norman Geisler has explained it, “while essence is what you are, person is who you are. So God is one ‘what’ but three ‘who’s.’” Each has a will, can speak, can love, etc. These are demonstrations of personhood.
The Father, Son and Holy Spirit are in absolute perfect harmony. They are co-eternal, co-equal, and co-powerful. The Bible speaks of the Father as God (Philippians 1:2), Jesus as God (Titus 2:13), and the Holy Spirit as God (Acts 5:3–4). Jesus, the Son, is one person with two natures : Divine and Human.
God Himself is in community. God IS community: one God, three persons. “Before all worlds”—before any sort of human community existed—there was God, dwelling in perfect, loving harmony and communication in His threefold being”
Some people have problems with the idea that 3 is one, they say 1(God) + 1(Christ) + 1(Holy Spirit) = 3. An alternate, and perhaps better, arithmetic is 1(God) X 1(Christ) X 1(Holy Spirit) =1
The chart below will help us to see how the doctrine of the Trinity is systematically derived from Scripture. The list is not exhaustive, only illustrative.
FATHER
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SON
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HOLY SPIRIT
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Called God
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Creator
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Resurrects
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Indwells
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Everywhere
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All knowing
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Sanctifies
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Life giver
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Fellowship
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Eternal
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A Will
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Speaks
| |||
Love
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Searches the heart
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We belong to
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...
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Savior
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...
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We serve
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Believe in
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Gives joy
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Judges
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Doctrine proved from Scripture
TRINITY
Ge 1:2, 26; 3:22; Isa 11:2,3; 48:16; 61:1; 63:10; Mt 12:28; Joh 3:33-35; 1Co 2:10-11; Heb. 9:14; 1Pe 1:2; 1Jo 5:6-7;
HOLY SPIRIT
Ge 1:2; 6:3 Ex 31:3; Ne 9:20; Ps; 139:7; Joel 2:28,29; Hag 2:5 Zec. 12:10; Mt 1:18,20; 3:11,16,17; Joh 1:32,33; 3:34; Rom 5:5;
JESUS SON OF GOD
Ps 2:7; 89:26,27; Mt 3:17; 4:3,6; Lu 3:22; Joh 1:1,2,14,18, 49-51; Ac 3:13; 13:33; Rom 8:3, 11, 16, 32; Heb. 1:1-3,5; 5:5, 2Pe 1:17; 1 John 2:22-24; 2Jo 1:3; Re 2:18
References:
Holy Bible; KJV, NKJV, NEB, Tanakh
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