One in Being, Three in Person: The Trinity Explained and Defended | Rev. Michael Fredericks

All right. What Christians believe. This

is our series that we are on here now.

And um the kind of the theme verse for

this series is Titus 2:1, which says,

Titus 2:1

"Teach what accords with sound

doctrine." And so that's our goal is to

teach what accords with sound doctrine

over these next several weeks as we work

through sort of systematic theology,

uh different key Christian beliefs that

we have. Last week we looked about we

talked about how do we know about God

and uh how do we know anything? How do

we know how do we what are we basing

this series on? And so we talked about

how God has spoken. We talked about

general revelation versus special

revelation. And thankfully God has made

himself known to us. We talked all about

that last week. Okay. So this morning

then the the question is who is God? Who

is God anyway?

That's maybe the most fundamental

question we can answer. Who is God? What

is he like? How do we describe him?

What's his name?

You know, it's it's actually very hard

for us to fully comprehend God, right?

He is transcendent.

He is ineffable. I love that word

ineffable. It's a a word I learned in

seminary about God. Um, and the word

ineffable means too great or extreme to

be expressed or described in words.

Yeah, that's our God. I heard someone

one time say, and I've used this

illustration before, but I love it.

Trying to understand God with our brains

is like trying to fit the ocean inside a

cup.

I mean, you can go to the ocean with a

cup and you can scoop up a little bit of

ocean and you can look at it in your cup

and you can go, "Oh, that's what the

ocean is like." Okay, well, you're

missing a whole lot, right? Yeah, you

can put a microscope on it and study it

and it be be fascinating, I'm sure, but

obviously there's so much more to the

vastness and complexity of the ocean

than what you can fit inside a single

cup. And but that's what it's like with

our human brains trying to understand

God. He is just way beyond what we can

process. But we can get a little bit of

a sample and we he has revealed himself

to us. So he is knowable. But we have to

be humble about how much we can really

understand about God. And I mean some of

you might have a really big cup. I mean

you're really smart. And some of you

might have a little tiny little shot

glass. Um but still nevertheless

compared to God it's just tiny.

There's really no way this side of

heaven we will ever be able to fully

understand God. I like what St.

Augustine said and I'm going to read

some Latin here. See comprehend.

What was he saying? Anyone know?

>> If you can understand it, it's not God.

Right? If you can understand it, if you

can comprehend it, it's not God.

The best we can do really is study the

scriptures and take from it all we can

and compile it together into a picture

of who God is based on what he has

chosen to reveal to us. Hank Hanograph

said, "We cannot comprehend God. The

best we can do is apprehend him. Just

grab hold of whatever knowledge of him

we can get our hands on."

Thankfully, we do have the word. We

talked about that last week. the

supernatural word through the spirit of

God, the written word in scripture form,

and of course the living word, Jesus

Christ. And we can grab hold of some

knowledge of God. He is not unknowable.

And when we turn to the scriptures, we

do learn quite a lot about God. We

learn, for example, some of the

characteristics of God. We learn that

he's all powerful, that he is all

present, he is all knowing. We learn

that God is good. We learn that he is

the creator. We're going to talk about

that next Sunday when we talk about in

the beginning. What is what is what do

we understand about creation? We know

that God cares about us. We know that

God is active and close. We know that

God is eternal. The scriptures reveal

his holiness and his justice, his

sovereignty over the universe and his

mercy and so on and so on. On it goes.

There are things we can learn about God.

We also learn God's name in the Bible.

Yes, God has a name. In the Hebrew, it

is Yahweh. The the the is called the

tetetrogrammaton. Four Hebrew letters

that in roughly English are YHW.

And uh Hebrew written Hebrew doesn't

have vowels, but when you put them in uh

estimating on how you would say that

YHW, it comes out Yahweh. This is what

God told Moses when Moses said, "What's

your name?" He said, "Yahweh." I am that

I am is what it means. But his name is

Yahweh. So, there's quite a bit we can

know about God. But what I really want

us to try and begin to apprehend today

is the very essence of our God.

What and who is this God?

And that question leads us to one of the

most central doctrines of all of

Christianity, the Trinity.

So today, that is the focus of our of

our message, the triune God. I like the

word triune even better than Trinity.

Try unity

threeness but oneness at the same time

God in three persons as we sang blessed

trinity father son holy spirit

this is a mystery to the human mind

right obviously it defies laws of human

logic I'm going to use the whiteboard

again to this Sunday and basically what

we're saying is 1 + 1 + 1 equals

>> right yeah what no it doesn't as it does

when we're talking about the trinity.

And this obviously is confusing. It's

been confusing people for a very long

time. In fact, if we go way back in

through church history, uh this

question, this mystery, this complexity

of the trinity was the basis for the

council of Nika in 325 AD. This was the

first ecumenical

church council uh that was was convened

by the emperor emperor Constantine as an

effort to try to settle the debate

around uh the the nature of God. See the

concept of the trinity was not invented

by the council of Nika. It was not it

was not formulated by the council of

Nika. It existed it existed from the

time of Jesus on through. The new

testament teaches it. I mean it existed

into eternity past. But the

understanding, the revelation of the

trinity existed from the time of Jesus

um all the way through the early church

and in the early church fathers, but it

was never really clearly articulated

like it needed to be clarified and

affirmed officially.

And in the early 300s, there was a small

group of people including a guy named

Aras, a pastor who was starting to

challenge the concept of the trinity.

even he what he was saying was that well

Jesus is just a created being of God not

equal to God.

So this big meeting was called uh the

council of Nika held in N in the city of

Nika which is in modern day Turkey and

over 300 bishops and many church

leaders, pastors and theologians

convened to study the scriptures and

come to a a clear conclusion.

And um

things got heated. There's actually a

story I It's It's probably not true, but

it's fun to think about. Um uh about St.

Nicholas. Yes. Santa Claus, right? St.

Nicholas. That apparently St. Nicholas

got so mad at Aras for the things he was

saying. You got a we got a painting here

that St. Nicholas punched Aras in the

face for his heresy of of the Trinity.

I don't know. But wouldn't that be cool

if that was true?

Um, what was the result of the Council

of Nika? The result was overwhelmingly

the the people, the delegates at the

Council of Nika voted in favor of of

understanding the Trinity as the church

had traditionally understood it. Only

two of the 300 plus bishops did not

agree. So that's over 99

something%,

right? That's better than even Pierre

Polyv can get. Okay. So, like they did

this was this was an overwhelming show

of support.

And one of the gifts of this council is

the beautiful Nyian creed which some

churches recite which describes Jesus as

being of one substance with the father.

A generation after the Nyian uh council

happened there was a group of of people

called the Capidocian fathers. This is

Basil the great, Gregory of Nissa and

Gregory of Nazanzius, three prominent

theologians of their time. And they came

up with language that further clarifies

the nature of the triune God. And this

is what they said. It's called the

Capidosian formula in the Greek. Here

I'm going to put my Greek skills to

work. Now we've had Latin, now Greek.

Mia

trace hoopostasis.

One being, one essence, three persons.

One being, three persons.

God is one in being,

three in person.

So I really think this this captures the

essence of of what we believe as

Christians about the Trinity. One God is

one in being, three in person.

Think about it this way. Um, if a a

being is what you are, and a person is

who you are. So, I am a human being,

that's what I am, but I am Michael

Frederick's. That's who I am. And

thankfully, there's only one of me and

not a whole bunch of little Arabic

Michaels all over the Middle Eastern

North Africa region. Um, I am Michael

Frederick. That's who I am.

And God is one being. That's what he is.

He is God. He is the only one. He is the

only God. There's one of him. That's

what he is. That's his being. But he is

three persons at the same time. Father,

son, and spirit. That's who he is. One

being, three persons.

Now, analogies over the years have been

attempted to try to help the human brain

comprehend this. And they can be very

helpful. Most of them fall short. Uh in

fact probably all of them fall short

because it really is as as Augustine

said if you can comprehend it it's not

God but uh analogies have been attempted

like the analogy of water where water is

in three can be in three different

states and yet it's still water. Um the

egg uh right the shell the yolk and the

white make up the egg three different

parts. St. Patrick talked about the

clover the threeleaf clover. Um, all of

these are good attempts, but they fall

short. I used to really like um the the

sun analogy, right? That the sun uh is

like a ball of flaming ball of gas and

it emits heat and light. And with all

three of those together make the sun.

But then someone said uh well that's

actually the idea that uh the sun and

the spirit emanate from the father that

they are created from the father. Like

oh rats that doesn't work either. Uh,

and then last night Janessa posted on

our on our Emanuel uh group uh on

Facebook about a a chord. I thought

that's pretty good, right? You've got

three notes

that together make one chord. I thought

that's not bad, right? The three the

three notes layered on top of each

other, but still if you take away one of

the like it's that's the the chord is

the sum of the parts. And that still

isn't quite it. So

really it's it's pretty impossible um to

come up with a perfect analogy but there

is an image an illustration that was

developed in the 12th century way back

in medieval times. I don't know who came

up with it but some smart person that

said this is the best way to describe

the trinity. It's called the shield of

the trinity and it it sort of goes like

this. You've got God

in the middle and you've got father here

and you have son

and you have the holy spirit.

And the way this goes is you say okay so

the father is god the son is god and the

holy spirit is god. The three are all

God. And yet the father

is not the son and the son is not the

father. And the holy spirit is not the

father and the father is not the holy

spirit. And the son is not the holy

spirit. And the holy spirit is not the

son.

The shield of the trinity. And this

whole thing is god. This is the triune

God.

Now, I know it still doesn't really make

sense, but it does hold these truths

together in one place that I think is

really good. What it illustrates, I

think, is the three truths that we find

in scripture. And we're going to look at

each of these. The three truths we find

in scripture is that there is one God.

There's not multiple gods. There is one

God who eternally exists as father, son,

and holy spirit who are each fully and

equally God and yet three distinct

persons.

So let's look at the scriptures together

to see if we can find these three

truths, these three simultaneous truths

found in the Bible.

So there is one God.

The Bible's very clear on this. This is

not controversial. Deuteronomy 6:4, for

Deuteronomy 6:4

example, says, "Here, O Israel, the Lord

our God. The Lord is one." Deuteronomy

Deuteronomy 32:39

32:39, "There is no God besides me, says

the Lord." And we could I there's like

dozens and dozens of scriptures we could

read. I'm not going to read them all

because we we'd be here all day. But all

throughout the Old Testament and

affirmed in the New Testament is the

very clear idea that there is only one

God. There is no other god. So this is

monotheism. We are monotheists. We come

from Judaism which is a monotheistic

religion. Uh so this is

non-controversial unless you're a

polytheist. Uh but we believe there is

one God. The scriptures teach that

clearly. Then we have the idea that the

father, son, and holy spirit are each

fully and equally god.

So starting with the father, do we see

that in scripture? Well, yes. Jesus

called God the father over and over and

over again. In John 6:27 as well, it

John 6:27

says on him, on Jesus, God the father

has set his seal and on it goes. This

again not controversial. No one is going

to debate that when the Bible talks

about the heavenly father, it's not

talking about God. Of course, it is.

It's talking about God, the father is

God.

Where it gets a little more uh debatable

for some people is whether or not the

son, Jesus is God.

So, what do the scriptures say there?

We'll start in John chapter 1, which is

John 1 · chapter mention

a scripture we used last week as well

when we were talking about the word made

flesh.

It says in John 1 verse one, in the

beginning was the word. We know this is

Jesus. And the word was with God.

>> And the word

>> and the word was God. So the son is not

the father. He was with the father, but

he also is God. So both of those truths

right there in one sentence. The word

was with God and the word was God. Not a

god. By the way, the Jehovah, if you

have a Jehovah's Witness Bible, it'll

say a god. that they've put that in

there to make it suit their doctrine,

but that's not in the Greek. The word

was with God and the word was God. He

was in the beginning with God. All

things were made through him and without

him was not anything made that was made.

That is a very clear statement of the

divinity of Jesus.

John 8:58 is another passage where Jesus

John 8:58

said to them truly truly I say to you

before Abraham was I am. He didn't say

before Abraham was I was. He said before

Abraham was I am. That was an

intentional use of language because the

name Yahweh is I am. And so he is saying

before Abraham was me Yahweh. He's

talking about himself as God. In fact,

the people picked up on what he was

saying. So much so, so concerned about

the blasphemy that they picked up stones

to throw at him. It says in the next

verse, "This guy's claiming to be God."

Uh John 20:28, Thomas, doubting Thomas,

John 20:28

sees the resurrected Jesus and he bows

down before him and says, "My Lord and

my God." He calls him God. And Jesus

does not correct Thomas. In Romans 9:5

Romans 9:5

it says, "The Christ who is God over

all, blessed forever. Amen. Christ Jesus

who is God over all." Titus 2:13, "Our

Titus 2:13

blessed hope, the appearing of the glory

of our great God and Savior Jesus

Christ."

1 John 5:20. And we know that the son of

1 John 5:20

God has come and has given us

understanding so that we may know him

who is true and we are in him who is

true in his son Jesus Christ. He meaning

Jesus is the true God and eternal life.

I mean that's just a sampling. Plus we

could look at all the times when Jesus

did things that only God had the

authority to do. like forgiving sins,

like claiming authority over the

universe, like controlling the wind and

the waves and things that are obviously

the acts of God. The scriptures are

clear. Jesus is God. The father is God.

The son is God. What about the Holy

Spirit?

Some people think of the Holy Spirit

as an impersonal force,

as sort of just the emanation of God the

Father. But that's not how the Holy

Spirit is depicted in scripture. He's

not just a force like gravity or

electricity. He's not an it. He's a he.

He has personality.

A couple of key passages to illustrate

the divinity of the Holy Spirit. Uh 2

2 Corinthians 3:17–18

Corinthians 3:17 to18. And I know I'm

throwing out a lot of scripture here and

you're not going to catch it all. I'm

sorry if you're writing it down. Maybe

you can get it. Uh 2 Corinthians 3:17

2 Corinthians 3:17–18

to18 twice it says, "The Lord is the

spirit." The Lord is the spirit.

Uh in Acts chapter 5, you have the scene

Acts 5 · chapter mention

with Ananas and Safh, these this couple

who who lied uh to the leaders of the

church. Um they and and the the Lord

knew about this that what they were up

to. And in Acts 5:3 it says, "You have

Acts 5:3

lied to the Holy Spirit. You have not

lied just to human beings but to God."

By lying to the Holy Spirit, you are

lying to God. By lying to God, you are

lying to the Holy Spirit. Meaning the

Holy Spirit is God. God is the Holy

Spirit.

Uh the book of Hebrews calls the Holy

Spirit the eternal spirit which is a

title uh an adjective that is given

elsewhere only to the eternal God and on

it goes. So does the scripture teach

that the father is God?

>> Does the scripture teach that the son is

God?

>> Does the scripture teach that the Holy

Spirit is God?

>> All right, good. We're on the same page.

And if you don't agree, that's okay,

too. Um well, it's we're going to get to

that. We're going to talk about some

heresy in a minute here, but it's okay

to disagree. Um three distinct persons.

Does the scripture teach this? That even

though they are equally God, yet they

are distinct from one another in some

way. That this is not one God expressing

himself in three different ways. This is

one God existing as three distinct

persons simultaneously.

one God who is three.

Well, let's look at some things that

point to this.

Starting with God's name in the Hebrew.

Uh not the Yahweh name. That's one. But

there's another word that's used for God

in the Hebrew, and that is Elohim.

Elohim. Um in Genesis chapter 1, for

Genesis 1 · chapter mention

example, when it says in the beginning,

God created the heavens and the earth.

In the Hebrew, it's in the beginning,

Elohim created the heavens and the

earth. Elohim is a title for God.

Well, Elohim is actually a plural word.

Isn't that interesting? It's plural.

Even though it's used in the singular

sense, God did this, God said that. It's

Elohim is plural,

which I think is pointing to something

about the nature of God. three persons

are actively are active and present in

the story of creation in the in the

Genesis 1 uh creation narrative. You

have God the father obviously in the

beginning God uh but it also says that

God spoke and things came into being and

when we go to John chapter 1 that we

John 1 · chapter mention

just read where it says in the beginning

was the word and through the word

everything was created. This is the

Greek the logos. I know we're throwing

out a lot of Hebrew and Greek this this

morning but you don't have to memorize

it. uh but uh that the word of God that

he through whom he speaks things into

creation is the second person of the

trinity. This is Jesus who became flesh.

Right? This is uh through uh through his

word he created. Right? The Bible says

that Jesus is the one who created

things. Um and and then it says that the

spirit was hovering over the surface of

the waters. And so you have you have God

the father, God the son, and God the

holy spirit all present in creation

simultaneously.

And in Genesis 1:26, when God creates

Genesis 1:26

people,

God says, curiously, "Let us make man in

our image."

Why is God speaking in the plural at

that point? Well, maybe God is three.

Isaiah 6:8, "Then I heard the voice of

Isaiah 6:8

the Lord saying, "Whom shall I send and

who will go for us?" God speaks of

himself as an us.

In Matthew 28:1 19 in the great

Matthew 28:1

commission when Jesus tells us to

baptize he says go and baptize in the

name singular of the father son and holy

spirit singular name but three

simultaneously

we also have instances where we can see

the distinction between the father and

the son and the holy spirit for example

Jesus praying to the father if jesus is

the father how is he praying to him that

doesn't make sense the new testament

also describes Jesus as the mediator

between God the Father and people. So

he's the mediator for himself. No,

there's some distinction there.

John 8:18, Jesus says, "I am the one who

John 8:18

testifies about myself. My other witness

is the father who sent me." Distinction.

In Matthew 3, at the baptism of Jesus,

this is perhaps the most clear. We have

Jesus in human flesh being baptized. We

also have the voice of God the father

who speaks and you have the Holy Spirit

in the form of a dove. All three

simultaneously there in the same scene

which tells you that the son is not the

father and the father is not the holy

spirit and the holy spirit is not the

son. There's distinction.

I'll have more to say about the the holy

spirit's unique role in a in a future

sermon. But what we see here as we take

this preponderance of scripture al

together is that it testifies to these

truths that there is one God who exists

eternally as father, son, holy spirit

who are each fully and equally god and

yet three distinct persons.

This is the testimony of the word. This

is the doctrine of the church.

Now, despite all of this overwhelming

scriptural evidence and the clear

statements of the church over the

centuries to clarify and affirm the

teachings of scriptures, there have been

several failures to correctly piece

together this doctrine over the

centuries. And the church calls them

heresies.

You like that? Heretic.

There are three main That's a strong

word, but it's probably accurate. There

are three main heresies, three false

doctrines of the Trinity that we're

going to look at.

Okay. The first one is tritheism.

Tritheism, [clears throat]

right? Theism is the belief that there's

a god. Atheism is the belief that

there's no god. Triism is the belief

that there it's three gods. Right? So

that's the idea that 1 + 1 plus 1 equals

three. It's actually three gods that

make up the Godhead. It's not uh one God

in three persons. It's three distinct

beings. Three in being, not one in

being.

So the church says, "No, that's a

heresy." And the Bible would not agree

with that idea. Who are modernday

trists? Yes, I'm going there. Who are

the trthists today?

It's the Mormons, the Church of Jesus

Christ of Latter-day Saints. They call

themselves the church of Jesus Christ.

Uh but uh that they believe in

three gods, right? God the father, he's

the main God, but then Jesus is another

God, literally the offspring of God. And

the Holy Spirit is another third God.

Three beings that work together but are

not all the one God. And by the way, you

can become a God too one day if you're a

good faithful Mormon. So they really

actually Mormonism teaches polytheism.

polytheism

that's not Christianity. So in response

to that we the script what we see the

scriptures say no there is one God and

only one God. That is so clear in the

Bible. That's like of all the things

we've said today the clearest is that

there is only one God.

There are no lowercase G gods.

And those who don't hold to that belief

cannot be called Christians.

Okay. What's the second one?

There's tritheism. And the second one is

Oh, it's going back to our boy Aras.

Aryanism.

All right.

Even though St. Nicholas may or may not

have punched him in the face, his

beliefs persist. Aryanism. Aryan uh

Aryanism says, "Yes, there's only one

God. We affirm that." Okay, good. That's

a good starting point. But what Aryan

Aras Aryanism would say is that well

because there's only one God then surely

Jesus and the Holy Spirit cannot be God.

That doesn't make sense. So Jesus can't

be God. He's a created divine being but

not God. And the spirit isn't God. It's

just God's impersonal force.

So any idea who modernday

contemporary aryens are?

H.

>> Yes. Jehovah's Witnesses. this is what

they believe.

So when they come knocking on your door

next time, you can say, "Uh, well, I

understand that you're modern day arryan

and that's a heresy." And they're going

to say, "What are you talking about?"

Um, who are you? Um, but yes, they

Jehovah's Witnesses literally believe

that Jesus is not God. They believe he

is um the incarnation of Michael the

Archangel.

God created uh him along with all the

other angels and then sent him to Earth.

uh but he's not God and the Holy Spirit

is just God's spirit.

So in response to that we see the

scriptures clearly say no three are god

there is one god and it's three father

son and holy spirit and again those who

don't hold to that belief cannot be

called Christian.

The third is

anyone know

modalism.

Yeah, I know y'all did your homework.

Modalism.

Modalism is the heresy that uh there's

one God who expresses himself in three

different ways. So, it's close, but not

quite. Right? It's that it's not that

there's three persons, but three modes

of God. He's a shape-shifting God. Okay?

He's in father mode and then he shifts

into son mode when he comes to the earth

and then he's in the holy spirit mode

when he's doing holy spirit stuff. Uh

and so there's three different modes or

or some would say manifestations of god

but that he is not three simultaneously.

And in response to that we see the

scriptures clearly show no there are

three distinct persons within the

godhead.

By the way, who are modern-day

modalists?

Does anyone know?

Well, modern-day modalists are oneness

Pentecostals.

Oneness Pentecostals. This is not every

Pentecostal. Let me be clear.

Pentecostals,

most Pentecostal, the majority of

Pentecostals are brothers and sisters in

Christ who believe in the triune God as

the church has always believed, as the

scriptures teach. Um, but Oneness

Pentecostals are uh a distinct group

from the rest of them. They're also

known as the United Pentecostal Church.

We have one just over there. Yes, we do.

Right in town that the Turning Point

Church is a United Pentecostal church

and they are not trinitarians. May a lot

of people don't know this and a lot of

them probably don't even realize that

about themselves, but this is the truth.

Okay? And so we have to be mindful of

that.

Now, what's you're thinking? What's with

all this ganging up on other religions,

Michael? That's not like you. You don't

normally do that sort of thing. I know I

don't normally. This is out of character

for me. It makes me uncomfortable. It

makes me feel icky at times to talk

about stuff like this. So, I get that.

But we have to understand that this is a

foundational belief. Okay? This is a

core Christian doctrine. There are some

things and over the course of this

series, we're going to realize this that

there's some beliefs that are openhand

beliefs. They're they're beliefs that we

hold with grace and patience and

understanding for one another that we

might not always agree on these things.

Those are open-handed issues, right?

Sort of side issues. They're still

important, but they're not central. We

can still call each other brothers and

sisters in Christ and lovingly disagree

on some of these things. We're going to

talk about some of those things. Like

next week for example when we talk about

different ideas around how God created

the world that's open hand that's okay

but then there's some things that are

closedhand

these are things that are non comp uh

compromisable is that a word we don't

compromise on these things these are

central core tenants of the church right

and the trinity has always been

understood by the church as central this

is key that's why they were fighting

about it like in 1700 years ago because

they said we got to work this out. We

got to know for sure what is truth

because this is too important.

So that's why I'm I'm saying this stuff.

That being said, let's also approach all

of this with a dose of humility because

the truth is

none of us have perfectly nailed our

theology, right? We all probably have a

little heresy in us. I think we're we're

probably going to go to heaven. If you

know Jesus, we're going to go to heaven

one day and we're going to go, [sighs]

"Oh,

OH,

OH, OKAY, that makes more sense." Or,

"Oh, I never thought, oh, yeah, right. I

think that's probably what's going to

happen." So, we're not pointing fingers

like this heretic guy up here. We're not

doing that. We're not burning anyone at

the stake. Okay, we're we're we're

showing grace to one another. Um, the

reality is, like I said at the

beginning, God is the ocean and our

brains are a cup. So, we need humility.

God is indescribable, uncontainable,

incomparable, untameable.

The Trinity is hard to understand.

And that's actually the thing about

these doctrinal errors, right? is that

each one in some way is trying to make

sense of something in here that's hard

to understand. Each one of these things

is an effort to say, well, this makes

sense, but this doesn't make sense or or

this makes sense, but this doesn't make

sense. So, it's erasing some part of

this in some way. And you just can't do

that.

But I get it because it's it's hard to

understand. As Augustine said, if you

have comprehended it, it is not God.

So concluding thought, here's a big idea

that I want us to something we can take

home from this.

It's this that the Trinity reminds us

that the very essence of God is love.

It says in 1 John 4:16,

1 John 4:16

"God is love."

And of course he is

when he is himself

in his very being a perfect community of

love.

Three in one in perfect harmony and

unity, peace and joy.

for all eternity past and eternity in

the future. God is love. He is a of

himself.

Uh Pastor Greg Boyd says it this way.

The revelation

that God is an eternal loving divine

community is the most foundational

teaching of the Bible. For it reveals

that God is in his very eternal nature

perfect love. God is love. Love isn't me

merely something God does. Perfect love

is what God eternally is.

The theologians have pointed out over

the the centuries that the only way God

can be love in his very essence is if

God is in fact triune.

If God is only one in person, then he

was before creation without love. He had

nothing to express love to. Right? If

he's alone, how can you have love? And

so he it the people sometimes think of

God like that and think well that's why

he created us right he created the

universe so that he would have something

or someone to love and something and

someone who could love him in return.

But no God did not need us.

If God is three persons then for all

eternity he has already known love

before he ever created anything.

So this for me when I first understood

this like several years ago this was

sort of mind-blowing for me because I'd

always thought of that that you know God

created us because he was lonely or he

wanted worship. He wanted to be adored

and so he created beings who would

worship and adore him is that that's why

we exist right actually he didn't need

our worship and adoration. He already

had that forever in eternity past within

himself. Father, Son, and Holy Spirit

perfect love and adoration.

So, here's the big wow for me is that

God didn't create us in order for him to

experience our love.

God created us in order for us to

experience his love.

God didn't create us. Let me say it

again. In order for him to experience

our love, God created us in order for us

to experience his love.

He wanted

to share the love of the Trinity with

us.

We were created so that we can know the

love of the triune Godhead.

He doesn't need us. He's perfectly

satisfied in and of himself. But he is

generous. He is generous.

And you and I are invited through the

blood of Christ by the power of the Holy

Spirit to have relationship with God, to

have fellowship with the Trinity. Uh in

2 Peter 1:4 it says, "By his power, he

2 Peter 1:4

has granted to us his precious and very

great promises. So so that through them

you may become partakers of the divine

nature." Think about that. [music] The

ineffable God who completely satisfied

in himself for eternity nonetheless

longs for me and for you to be partakers

of his divine nature

which is love. In Jesus's prayer in John

17 when he he prayed for us and he said

his prayer was that they may all be one

just as you father and me are in me and

I in you

that they also may be in us so that the

world may believe that you have sent me.

Jesus wants us to partic participate in

the love and fellowship of the trinity.

Amazing. Amazing.

So God is saying and this is what he's

saying to you today. He's saying come

come boldly

to my throne of grace

and let us father, son, and holy spirit

wrap our arms around you. Come be part

of this beautiful family. Come sit at

our table and feast.

What an incredible invitation.

So I say that to you today. If you've

never come to the table to feast, if

you've never entered into relationship

with our triune God through Christ and

what he's done for you through faith in

him, what are you waiting for?

What are you waiting for?

Come.

And if you have before, you have

fellowshipped in the sweetness of God's

divine presence.

Whether you are in that place now or

maybe you've it's grown cold a bit and

you feel distant from the Lord. Why

don't you pull up a chair once again?

And so,