Post by Admin on Jun 14, 2024 16:18:25 GMT -5
The Divine Trinity by Herman Bavinck
The Eternal Being reveals Himself in His triune existence even more
richly and vitally than in His attributes. It is in this holy trinity that
each attribute of His Being comes into its own, so to speak, gets its
fullest content, and takes on its profoundest meaning. It is only when
we contemplate this trinity that we know who and what God is. Only
then do we know, moreover, who God is and what He is for lost man kind.
We can know this only when we know and confess Him as the
Triune God of the Covenant, as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
In considering this part of our confession, it is particularly necessary
that a tone of holy reverence and childlike awe be the characteristic
of our approach and attitude. For Moses it was an awful and
unforgettable hour when the Lord appeared to him in the desert in
the flame of fire coming from the bramble bush. When Moses looked
upon that burning fire, which burned but did not consume, from a
distance, and when he wanted to hasten to the spot, the Lord
restrained him and said: Draw not nigh hither: put off thy shoes
from off thy feet, for the place whereon thou standest is holy ground.
And when Moses heard that he feared greatly, hid his face, and was
afraid to look upon God (Ex. 3:1-6).
Such a holy respect suits us also as we witness God revealing Himself
in His word as a Triune God. For we must always remember that as
we study this fact, we are not dealing with a doctrine about God, with
an abstract concept, or with a scientific proposition about the nature
of Divinity. We are not dealing with a human construction which we
ourselves or which others have put upon the facts, and which we now
try to analyze and logically to dismember. Rather, in treating of the
Trinity, we are dealing with God Himself, with the one and true God,
who has revealed Himself as such in His Word. It is as He said to
Moses: I am the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob (Ex. 3:6). So He
reveals Himself to us also in His Word and manifests Himself to us
as Father, Son, and Spirit.
It is thus that the Christian church has always confessed the
revelation of God as the Triune God, and accepted it as such. We find
it in the Twelve Articles of the Apostles’ Creed. The Christian is not in
that creed saying just how he thinks about God. He is not there
giving out a notion of God, nor saying that God has such and such
attributes, and that He exists in this and that wise. Instead, he
confesses: I believe in God the Father, and in Jesus Christ His only begotten Son,
and in the Holy Spirit: I believe in the Triune God. In
confessing this the Christian gives expression to the fact that God is
the living and the true God, that He is God as Father, Son, and Spirit,
the God of His confidence, to whom he has wholly surrendered
himself, and upon whom he rests with his whole heart. God is the
God of his life and his salvation. As Father, Son, and Spirit, God has
created him, redeemed him, sanctified him, and glorified him. The
Christian owes everything to Him. It is his joy and comfort that he
may believe in that God, trust Him, and expect everything from Him.
What the Christian goes on to confess about that God is not
summarized by him in a number of abstract terms, but is described,
rather, as a series of deeds done by God in the past, in the present,
and to be done in the future. It is the deeds, the miracles, of God
which constitute the confession of the Christian. What the Christian
confesses in his creed is a long, a broad, and a high history. It is a
history which comprises the whole world in its length and breadth, in
its beginning, process, and end, in its origin, development, and
destination, from the point of creation to the fulfillment of the ages.
The confession of the church is a declaration of the mighty deeds of
God.
Those deeds are numerous and are characterized by great diversity.
But they also constitute a strict unity. They are related to each other,
prepare for each other, and are interdependent. There is order and
pattern, development and upward movement in it. It proceeds from
creation through redemption to sanctification and glorification. The
end returns to the beginning and yet is at the same time the apex
which is exalted high above the point of origin. The deeds of God
form a circle which mounts upward in the form of a spiral; they
represent a harmony of the horizontal and the vertical line; they
move upwards and forwards at the same time.
God is the architect and builder of all those deeds, the source and the
final end of them. Out of Him and through Him and to Him are all
things. He is their Maker, Restorer, and Fulfiller. The unity and
diversity in the works of God proceeds from and returns to the unity
and diversity which exist in the Divine Being. That Being is one
being, single and simple. At the same time that being is threefold in
His person, in His revelation, and in His influence. The entire work
of God is an unbroken whole, and nevertheless comprises the richest
variety and change. The confession of the church comprehends the
whole of world history. In that confession are included the moments
of the creation and the fall, reconciliation and forgiveness, and of
renewal and restoration. It is a confession which proceeds from the
triune God and which leads everything back to Him.
Therefore the article of the holy trinity is the heart and core of our
confession, the differentiating earmark of our religion, and the praise
and comfort of all true believers of Christ.
It was this confession which was at stake in the warfare of the spirits
throughout the centuries. The confession of the holy trinity is the
precious pearl which was entrusted for safekeeping and defense to
the Christian church.
* * * * *
If this confession of the trinity of God takes such a central position in
the Christian faith, it is important to know on what ground it rests
and from what source it has flowed into the church. They are not a
few in our time who hold that it is the fruit of human argument and
academic learning and who, accordingly, regard it as of no value for
the religious life. According to them the original Gospel, as it was
proclaimed by Jesus, knew nothing about any such doctrine of the
trinity of God — that is, nothing about the term itself nor about the
reality to which the term was intended to give expression. It was only
— so the argument goes — when the original and simple Gospel of
Jesus was brought into relationship with Greek philosophy and was
falsified by it that the Christian church absorbed the person of Christ
in His Divine nature, and eventually also the Holy Spirit into the
Divine Being. And so it came about that the church confessed three
persons in the one Divine being.
But the Christian church itself has always had quite a different idea
about that. It saw in the doctrine of the trinity no discovery of subtle
theologians, no product of the wedding of Gospel and Greek
philosophy, but a confession rather which was materially concluded
in the Gospel and in the whole Word of God — a doctrine, in short,
which was inferred by Christian faith from the revelation of God. In
answer to the question, Since there is but one Divine Being, why do
you speak of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit? the Heidelberg
Catechism gives a brief and conclusive answer: Because God has so
revealed Himself in His Word (Question 25). The revelation of God is
the firm ground on which this confession of the church also rests. It
is the source out of which this doctrine of the one, holy, catholic,
Christian church has grown and been built up. God has thus revealed
Himself. And He has revealed Himself thus, that is, as a triune God,
because He exists in that way; and He exists in this way because He
has so revealed Himself.
The Trinity in the revelation of God points back to the Trinity in His
existence.
This revelation did not happen in a single moment. It was not
presented and perfected in a single point of time. Rather, this
revelation has a long history, spread out over the centuries. It began
at the creation, continued after the fall in the promises and deeds of
grace which accrued to Israel, and reached its apex in the person and
work of Christ, in the pouring out of the Holy Spirit, and the
establishment of the church. It maintains itself now throughout the
centuries, and over against all opposition, in the ineradicable witness
of Scripture and in the rock-firm confession of the church. Because
the revelation has had this long history, there is progress and
development also in the confession of God’s triune existence. God
undergoes no change, remaining always the same. But in the
progress of revelation, He makes Himself always clearer and more
glorious to people and to angels. As His revelation continues, our
knowledge grows.
* * * * *
When, in the days of the Old Covenant, God begins to reveal Himself,
the thing that stands in the foreground is certainly the unity, the
oneness, of God.
For, due to the sin of man, the pure knowledge of God had been lost;
the truth, as Paul profoundly says, was held in unrighteousness.
Even that which can be known of God in the things that He has made
was made vain by their imaginations and was darkened by the
foolishness of their hearts. On every hand mankind fell into idolatry
and the worship of images (Rom. 1:18-23).
Hence it was necessary that the revelation begin with an emphasis
upon the unity of God. It seems to cry out to mankind: The gods
before which ye bow are not the true God. There is but one true God,
namely, the God who at the beginning made the heaven and the
earth (Gen.1:1 and 2:1), the God who made Himself known to
Abraham as God the Almighty (Gen. 17:1 and Ex. 6:3), the God who
appeared to Moses as Jehovah, as the I-Am-that-I-Am (Ex. 3:14),
and the God who, out of sovereign favor, chose the people of Israel,
and called them, and accepted them in His covenant (Ex. 19:4ff.).
First of all, therefore, the revelation had as its content: Jehovah
alone is Elohim, the Lord alone is God, and there is no other God
beside Him.1
For the people of Israel, too, the revelation of the oneness of God was
desperately necessary. Israel was surrounded on all sides by heathen
and by heathen who at all times tried to tempt it into apostacy and
unfaithfulness to the Lord; moreover, right on up to the captivity a
great part of the people of Israel felt themselves attracted to the
pagan idolatry and image worship, and again and again fell into the
practice of them despite the proscription of the law and the warning
of the prophets. Therefore, God Himself placed the emphasis on the
fact that He, the Lord, who was now appearing to Moses and who
wanted to redeem His people through Moses, was the same God who
had made Himself known to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob as the
Almighty God (Ex. 3:6 and 15). When He gave His law to Israel He
wrote above it as its preamble: I am the Lord thy God, which have
brought thee out of the land of Egypt. And in the first
commandment, and the second, He strictly forbade all idolatry and
worship of images (Ex. 20:2-5). Be’cause the Lord our God is one
God, Israel must love Him with its whole heart, its whole soul, and
all its strength (Deut. 6:4-5). The Lord alone is Israel’s God and
therefore Israel may serve only Him.
Nevertheless, despite the fact that the oneness of God is so strongly
emphasized, and, as it were, constitutes the first article of Israel’s
basic law, the distinctions within that unity of the Godhead come to
light also as in that revelation His fulness of Being progresses. The
very name which is usually employed for designating God in the
original Hebrew has a certain significance here. For this name
Elohim,is in plural form, and therefore, although it does not, as was
formerly generally supposed, designate the three persons of the
divine Being, it does, in its character as an intensive plural, point to
the fulness of life and of power which are present in God. It is, no
doubt, in connection with this same fact, that God sometimes, in
speaking of Himself, uses a plural referent, and by this means makes
distinctions within Himself that bear a person’al character (Gen.
1:26-27; 3:22; and Isa. 6:8).
Of greater significance is the teaching of the Old Testament to the
effect that God brings everything in His creation and providence into
being by His Word and Spirit. He is not a human being, who, at the
cost of great difficulty and exertion, makes something else out of the
materials He has at hand. Instead, simply by the act of speaking, He
calls everything into being out of nothing.
In the first chapter of Genesis we are taught this truth in the loftiest
way possible, and elsewhere, too, it is expressed most gloriously in
word and song. He speaks, and it is done; He commands, and it
stands fast (Ps. 33:9). He sends out His word, and melts the morsels
of ice (Ps. 147:18). His voice is upon the waters, shakes the
wilderness, causes the hills to skip like a calf, and discovers the
forests (Ps. 29:3-10). Two truths are contained in this exalted
account of God’s works: the first is that God is the Almighty One who
has but to speak and all things leap into being, whose word is law
(Ps. 33:9) and whose voice is power (Ps. 29:4); and the second is that
God works deliberately, and not with’out forethought, and carries
out all His works with the highest wisdom. The word which God
speaks is power, but it is also the vehicle of thought. He has made the
earth by His power, He has established the world by His wisdom,
and has stretched out the heavens by His discretion (Jer. 10:12 and
51:15). He has made all His works in wisdom: the earth is full of His
riches (Ps. 104:24). This wisdom of God did not come to Him from
outside Himself, but was with Him from the beginning. He possessed
it as the principle of His way, before His works of old. When He
prepared the heavens, set a compass upon the face of the deep,
established the clouds above, strengthened the fountains of the deep,
then wisdom was already there, brought up alongside of Him, daily
his delight, and rejoicing always before Him (Prov. 8:22-31 and Job
20:20-28). God rejoiced in the wisdom with which He created the
world.
Alongside of this word and wisdom the Spirit of God as the Mediator
of the creation makes His appearance just as God at one and the
same time is wisdom and possesses it, so that He can share it and can
exhibit it in His works, so He Himself is Spirit in His being (Deut.
4:12, 15) and He possesses Spirit, that Spirit by which He can dwell
in the world and be always and everywhere present in it (Ps. 139:7).
Without any’one having been His counsellor, the Lord by His Spirit
brought everything into being (Isa. 40:13ff.). At the beginning that
Spirit moved upon the face of the waters (Gen. 1:2), and He remains
active in all that was created. By that Spirit God garnishes the
heavens (Job 26:13), renews the face of the earth (Ps. 104:30), gives
life to man (Job 33:4), maintains the breath in man’s nostrils (Job
27:3),gives him understanding and wisdom (Job 32:8), and also
causes the grass to wither and the flower to fade (Isa. 40:7). In short,
by the Word of the Lord were the heavens made, and all the host of
them by the Breath of His mouth (Ps. 33:6).
* * * * *
And this self-diversity of God comes out even more in the works of
the re-creation. Then it is not Elohim, but Jehovah, not God in
general, but the Lord, the God of the covenant, who reveals Himself
and who makes Himself known in wonders of redemption and
salvation. As such He redeems and leads His people, not by His word
alone which He speaks or has conveyed to them, but also by means of
the Angel of the covenant (the Angel of the Lord). This Angel appears
already in the history of the patriarchs: to Hagar (Gen. 16:6ff.), to
Abraham (Gen. 18ff.), and to Jacob (Gen. 28:13ff.). This Angel
reveals His grace and power especially in the emancipation of Israel
from the bond’age of Egypt.2 This Angel of the Lord does not stand
on the same plane of importance as the created angels; rather, He is
a special revelation and manifestation of God. On the one hand, He is
clearly distinguished from God, who speaks of Him as of His Angel,
and yet, on the other hand, is one in name with God Himself, and in
power, in redemption and blessing, in worshipfulness and honor. He
is called God in Genesis 16:13, the God of Bethel in Genesis 31:13,
exchanges places with God or the Lord (Gen. 28:30, 32 and Ex. 3:4),
and He bears the name of God within Him (Ex. 23:21). He redeems
from all evil (Gen. 48:16), rescues Israel from the hand of the
Egyptians (Ex. 3:8), cleaves the waters and dries up the sea (Ex.
14:21), preserves the people of God in the way, brings them safely
into Canaan, causes them to triumph over their enemies (Ex. 3:8 and
23:20), is to be absolutely obeyed as though He were God Himself
(Ex. 23:20). and always en’camps around those who fear the Lord
(Ps. 34:7 and 35:5).
Just as in His re-creating work, Jehovah carries out His redemptive
activities through this Angel of the covenant, so He by His Spirit
gives out all kinds of energies and gifts to His people. In the Old
Testament the Spirit of the Lord is the source of all life, all weal, and
all ability. He grants courage and strength to the judges, to Othniel
(Judges 3:10), Gideon (Judges 6:34), Jephthah (Judges 11:29), and
to Samson (Judges 14:6 and 15:14). He grants artistic perception to
the makers of the priests’ garments, the tabernacle, and the temple,3
and He gives wisdom and understanding to the judges who bear the
burden of the people alongside of Moses (Num. 11:17, 25). He gives
the spirit of prophecy to the prophets,4 and renewal and
sanctification and guidance to all of God’s children (Ps. 51:12-13 and
143:10).
In short: the Word, the promise, the covenant, which the Lord gave
to Israel at the exodus from Egypt, have existed throughout the ages,
and still stood fast even after the Captivity in the days of Zerubbabel,
so that the people had no need to fear (Haggai 2:4-5). When the Lord
led Israel out of Egypt He became the Savior of Israel. And this
disposition of God towards His people came to expression in the fact
that in all their oppression He was oppressed (He regarded the
affliction of His people as His own affliction), and that He therefore
sent them His Angel to preserve them. He redeemed them by His
love and grace and He took them up and carried them as His own
throughout those days of old. He sent them the Spirit of His holiness
in order to lead them in the ways of the Lord (Isa. 63:9-12). In the
days of the Old Covenant, the Lord through the high priest laid His
threefold blessing on the people of Israel: the blessing of vigil, the
blessing of grace, and the blessing of peace (Num. 6:24-26).
Thus gradually, then, but ever more unmistakably, the threefold
distinction within the Divine being comes to expression already in
the history of God’s leading of Israel. However, the Old Testament
includes the further promises that in the future there will be a higher
and richer revelation. After all, Israel repudiated the Word of the
Lord and vexed His Holy Spirit (Isa. 63:10 and Ps. 106). The
revelation of God in the Angel of the covenant and in the Spirit of the
Lord proved to be inadequate: if God wanted to confirm His
covenant and fulfill His promise, another and higher revelation
would be necessary.
Such a revelation was heralded by the prophets. In the future, in the
last days, then the Lord will call up out of the midst of Israel such a
prophet as Moses was, and the Lord will put His words in that
prophet’s mouth (Deut. 18 :18). This one will be a priest for ever after
the order of Melchizedek (Ps. 110:4); He will be a king out of the
house of David (2 Sam. 7:12-16), a rod out of the stem of Jesse (Isa.
11:1), a king, judging and seeking judgment (Isa. 16:5). A human
being, a man He will be, and the son of a woman (Isa. 7:14), and He
will be without form or comeliness (Isa. 53:2ff.); but, at the same
time, He will be Immanuel (Isa. 7:14), the Lord our righteousness
(Jer. 23:6), the Angel of the covenant (Mal. 3:1), the Lord Himself
appearing to His people (Hos. 1:7 and Mal. 3:1). And He bears the
name of Wonderful, Counsellor, The mighty God, The everlasting
Father, The Prince of Peace (Isa. 9:6).
This manifestation of the servant of the Lord is to be followed by a
richer dispensation of the Holy Spirit. As the Spirit of wisdom and
understanding, of counsel and strength, of the knowledge and fear of
the Lord, this Spirit will rest upon the Messiah (Isa. 11:2; 42:1; and
61:1). He will be poured out upon all flesh, over sons and daughters,
old men and young men, servants and handmaids,5 and He will give
a new heart and a new spirit, so that His people may walk in His
statutes, and keep His ordinances, and do them.6
Thus the Old Testament itself points out that the full revelation of
God will consist of the revelation of His triune being.This promise and announcement the fulfillment of the New
Testament fully satisfies. In this respect also, the unity or oneness of
God is the point of departure of all revelation.7 But out of this
oneness the difference in the Divine being now, in the New
Testament, comes into much clearer light. This happens first in the
great redemptive events of incarnation, satisfaction, and outpouring,
and next in the instruction of Jesus and His apostles. The work of
salvation is one whole, a work of God from beginning to end. But
there are three high moments in it, election, forgiveness, and
renewal, and these three point to a threefold cause in the Divine
being: that is, to the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.
The very conceiving of Christ already shows us the threefold activity
of God. For while the Father gives the Son to the world (John 3:16),
and while the Son Himself descends from heaven (John 6:38), that
Son is conceived in Mary of the Holy Spirit (Matt. 1:20 and Luke
1:35). At His baptism Jesus is anointed by the Holy Spirit, and is
there publicly declared to be the beloved Son of the Father, the Son
in whom He is well pleased (Matt. 3:16-17). The works which Jesus
did were shown Him by the Father (John 5:19 and 8:38), and they
are fulfilled by Him in the strength of the Holy Spirit (Matt. 12:28).
In His dying He offers Himself to God in the eternal Spirit (Heb.
9:14). The resurrection is a raising up by the Father (Acts 2:24) and
is at the same time Jesus’ own act by which He is greatly proved to be
the Son of the Father according to the Spirit of holiness (Rom. 1:3).
And after his resurrection He, on the fortieth day, ascends in the
Spirit which quickened Him on high in heaven and there He makes
the angels and authorities and powers subject to Himself.
The teaching of Jesus and the apostles agrees fully with the lesson of
those events themselvesJesus came to earth to declare the Father and to make His name
known among men (John 1:18 and 17:6). The name of father applied
to God as creator of all things was also used by the pagans. This
meaning of the term is supported also by Scripture at various
places.8 Besides, the Old Testament several times uses the
designation Father to refer to God’s theocratic relationship to Israel
because in His marvelous ability He has created and maintained that
relationship (Deut. 32:6 and Isa. 63:16). But in the New Testament a
gloriously new light is shed upon this name of father as applied to
God. Jesus always indicates an essential difference between the
relationship in which He Himself stands to God and that in which
others, say the Jews or the disciples, stand to Him. When, for
example, He teaches the disciples, at their request, the “Our Father. .
.” He says expressly “When ye pray, say. . . .” And when, after the
resurrection, He announces His forthcoming ascension to Mary
Magdalene, He says: “I ascend unto my Father, and your Father; and
to my God, and your God” (John 20:17). In other words, God is His
own Father (John 5:18). He knows the Son and loves Him in such a
way and to such an extent as, reciprocally, only the Son can know
and love the Father.9 Among the apostles, accordingly, God is
constantly referred to as the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ (Eph.
1:3). This relationship between the Father and the Son did not
develop in time but existed from eternity (John 1:1, 14; 17:24). God is
therefore Father in the first place because in a very unique sense He
is the Father of the Son. This is His original, special personal
characteristic.
In a derived sense God is further called the Father of all creatures
because He is their creator and sustainer (1 Cor. 8:6, and elsewhere).
He is called the Father of Israel because Israel is His handiwork by
virtue of election and calling (Deut. 32:6 and Isa. 64:8), and the
Father of the church and all believers because the love of the Father
for the Son accrues to them (John 16:27 and 17:24) and because they
have been accepted as His children and are born of Him through the
Spirit (John 1:12 and Rom. 8:15).
The Father is therefore always the Father,the first person, He from
whom in the being of God, in the counsel of God, and in all the works
of creation and providence, redemption and sanctification, the
initiative proceeds. He gave the Son to have life in Himself (John
5:26), and He sends out the Spirit (John 15:26). His is the election
and the good pleasure (Matt 11:26 and Eph. 1:4, 9, 11). From Him
proceed the creation, providence, redemption, and renewal (Ps. 33:6
and John 3:16). To Him in a special sense the kingdom and the
power and the glory accrue (Matt 6:13). He particularly bears the
name of God in distinction from the Lord Jesus Christ and the Holy
Spirit. Indeed, Christ Himself as Mediator calls Him His Father, not
only, but also His God (Matt 27:46and John 20:17) and Christ is
Himself called the Christ of God.10 In a word, the first person of the
Divine being is the Father because “of Him are all things” (1 Cor.
8:6).
If God is the Father, the inference is that there also is a Son who
received life from Him and who shares His love. In the Old
Testament the name of son of God was used for angels,11 for the
people of Israel,12 and particularly too for the theocratic king of that
people.13 But in the New Testament this name takes on a far
profounder meaning. For Christ is the Son of God in a very peculiar
sense; He is highly exalted above angels and prophets (Matt. 13:32;
21:27; and 22:2), and He Himself says that no one can know the Son
except the Father, and no one can know the Father except the Son
(Matt. 11:27). In distinction from angels and men, He is the Father’s
own Son (Rom. 8:32), the beloved Son in whom the Father is well
pleased (Matt 3:17), the only-begotten Son (John 1:18) whom the
Father gave to have life in Himself (John 5:26).
This very special, this unique, relationship between Father and Son
did not develop in time by way of the supernatural conception of the
Holy Spirit, or of the anointing at baptism, or of the resurrection and
ascension — though many have maintained this — but is a
relationship which has existed from all eternity. The Son who in
Christ assumed human nature was in the beginning with God as the
Word (John 1:1). then already had the form of God (Phil. 2:6), was
rich and clothed with glory (John 17:5, 24), was then already the
brightness of God’s glory and the express image of His person (Heb.
1:3), and precisely therefore He could in the fulness of time be sent
out, given, and brought into the world.14 Hence, too, the creation
(John 1:3 and Col. 1:16) and providence (Heb 1:3) and the
accomplishment of the whole of salvation (1 Cor. 1:30) are ascribed
to Him. He is not, as creatures are made or created, but is instead,
the first-born of all creatures that is the Son who has the rank and
rights of the first-born over against all creatures (Col 1:15) Thus He is
also the first-born of the dead, the first-born of many brethren, and
therefore among all and in all He is the first (Rom 8:29 and Col 1:18)
And even though in the fulness of time, He assumed the form of a
servant, He was nevertheless in the form of God. He was in all things
like unto God the Father (Phil. 2:6):. in life (John 5:26), in
knowledge (Matt. 11:27), in strength (John 1:3 and 5:21, 26), in
honor (John 5:23). He is Himself God, to be praised above all else
into eternity.15 Just as all things are of the Father, so they are also all
through the Son (1 Cor. 8:6)
The Eternal Being reveals Himself in His triune existence even more
richly and vitally than in His attributes. It is in this holy trinity that
each attribute of His Being comes into its own, so to speak, gets its
fullest content, and takes on its profoundest meaning. It is only when
we contemplate this trinity that we know who and what God is. Only
then do we know, moreover, who God is and what He is for lost man kind.
We can know this only when we know and confess Him as the
Triune God of the Covenant, as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
In considering this part of our confession, it is particularly necessary
that a tone of holy reverence and childlike awe be the characteristic
of our approach and attitude. For Moses it was an awful and
unforgettable hour when the Lord appeared to him in the desert in
the flame of fire coming from the bramble bush. When Moses looked
upon that burning fire, which burned but did not consume, from a
distance, and when he wanted to hasten to the spot, the Lord
restrained him and said: Draw not nigh hither: put off thy shoes
from off thy feet, for the place whereon thou standest is holy ground.
And when Moses heard that he feared greatly, hid his face, and was
afraid to look upon God (Ex. 3:1-6).
Such a holy respect suits us also as we witness God revealing Himself
in His word as a Triune God. For we must always remember that as
we study this fact, we are not dealing with a doctrine about God, with
an abstract concept, or with a scientific proposition about the nature
of Divinity. We are not dealing with a human construction which we
ourselves or which others have put upon the facts, and which we now
try to analyze and logically to dismember. Rather, in treating of the
Trinity, we are dealing with God Himself, with the one and true God,
who has revealed Himself as such in His Word. It is as He said to
Moses: I am the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob (Ex. 3:6). So He
reveals Himself to us also in His Word and manifests Himself to us
as Father, Son, and Spirit.
It is thus that the Christian church has always confessed the
revelation of God as the Triune God, and accepted it as such. We find
it in the Twelve Articles of the Apostles’ Creed. The Christian is not in
that creed saying just how he thinks about God. He is not there
giving out a notion of God, nor saying that God has such and such
attributes, and that He exists in this and that wise. Instead, he
confesses: I believe in God the Father, and in Jesus Christ His only begotten Son,
and in the Holy Spirit: I believe in the Triune God. In
confessing this the Christian gives expression to the fact that God is
the living and the true God, that He is God as Father, Son, and Spirit,
the God of His confidence, to whom he has wholly surrendered
himself, and upon whom he rests with his whole heart. God is the
God of his life and his salvation. As Father, Son, and Spirit, God has
created him, redeemed him, sanctified him, and glorified him. The
Christian owes everything to Him. It is his joy and comfort that he
may believe in that God, trust Him, and expect everything from Him.
What the Christian goes on to confess about that God is not
summarized by him in a number of abstract terms, but is described,
rather, as a series of deeds done by God in the past, in the present,
and to be done in the future. It is the deeds, the miracles, of God
which constitute the confession of the Christian. What the Christian
confesses in his creed is a long, a broad, and a high history. It is a
history which comprises the whole world in its length and breadth, in
its beginning, process, and end, in its origin, development, and
destination, from the point of creation to the fulfillment of the ages.
The confession of the church is a declaration of the mighty deeds of
God.
Those deeds are numerous and are characterized by great diversity.
But they also constitute a strict unity. They are related to each other,
prepare for each other, and are interdependent. There is order and
pattern, development and upward movement in it. It proceeds from
creation through redemption to sanctification and glorification. The
end returns to the beginning and yet is at the same time the apex
which is exalted high above the point of origin. The deeds of God
form a circle which mounts upward in the form of a spiral; they
represent a harmony of the horizontal and the vertical line; they
move upwards and forwards at the same time.
God is the architect and builder of all those deeds, the source and the
final end of them. Out of Him and through Him and to Him are all
things. He is their Maker, Restorer, and Fulfiller. The unity and
diversity in the works of God proceeds from and returns to the unity
and diversity which exist in the Divine Being. That Being is one
being, single and simple. At the same time that being is threefold in
His person, in His revelation, and in His influence. The entire work
of God is an unbroken whole, and nevertheless comprises the richest
variety and change. The confession of the church comprehends the
whole of world history. In that confession are included the moments
of the creation and the fall, reconciliation and forgiveness, and of
renewal and restoration. It is a confession which proceeds from the
triune God and which leads everything back to Him.
Therefore the article of the holy trinity is the heart and core of our
confession, the differentiating earmark of our religion, and the praise
and comfort of all true believers of Christ.
It was this confession which was at stake in the warfare of the spirits
throughout the centuries. The confession of the holy trinity is the
precious pearl which was entrusted for safekeeping and defense to
the Christian church.
* * * * *
If this confession of the trinity of God takes such a central position in
the Christian faith, it is important to know on what ground it rests
and from what source it has flowed into the church. They are not a
few in our time who hold that it is the fruit of human argument and
academic learning and who, accordingly, regard it as of no value for
the religious life. According to them the original Gospel, as it was
proclaimed by Jesus, knew nothing about any such doctrine of the
trinity of God — that is, nothing about the term itself nor about the
reality to which the term was intended to give expression. It was only
— so the argument goes — when the original and simple Gospel of
Jesus was brought into relationship with Greek philosophy and was
falsified by it that the Christian church absorbed the person of Christ
in His Divine nature, and eventually also the Holy Spirit into the
Divine Being. And so it came about that the church confessed three
persons in the one Divine being.
But the Christian church itself has always had quite a different idea
about that. It saw in the doctrine of the trinity no discovery of subtle
theologians, no product of the wedding of Gospel and Greek
philosophy, but a confession rather which was materially concluded
in the Gospel and in the whole Word of God — a doctrine, in short,
which was inferred by Christian faith from the revelation of God. In
answer to the question, Since there is but one Divine Being, why do
you speak of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit? the Heidelberg
Catechism gives a brief and conclusive answer: Because God has so
revealed Himself in His Word (Question 25). The revelation of God is
the firm ground on which this confession of the church also rests. It
is the source out of which this doctrine of the one, holy, catholic,
Christian church has grown and been built up. God has thus revealed
Himself. And He has revealed Himself thus, that is, as a triune God,
because He exists in that way; and He exists in this way because He
has so revealed Himself.
The Trinity in the revelation of God points back to the Trinity in His
existence.
This revelation did not happen in a single moment. It was not
presented and perfected in a single point of time. Rather, this
revelation has a long history, spread out over the centuries. It began
at the creation, continued after the fall in the promises and deeds of
grace which accrued to Israel, and reached its apex in the person and
work of Christ, in the pouring out of the Holy Spirit, and the
establishment of the church. It maintains itself now throughout the
centuries, and over against all opposition, in the ineradicable witness
of Scripture and in the rock-firm confession of the church. Because
the revelation has had this long history, there is progress and
development also in the confession of God’s triune existence. God
undergoes no change, remaining always the same. But in the
progress of revelation, He makes Himself always clearer and more
glorious to people and to angels. As His revelation continues, our
knowledge grows.
* * * * *
When, in the days of the Old Covenant, God begins to reveal Himself,
the thing that stands in the foreground is certainly the unity, the
oneness, of God.
For, due to the sin of man, the pure knowledge of God had been lost;
the truth, as Paul profoundly says, was held in unrighteousness.
Even that which can be known of God in the things that He has made
was made vain by their imaginations and was darkened by the
foolishness of their hearts. On every hand mankind fell into idolatry
and the worship of images (Rom. 1:18-23).
Hence it was necessary that the revelation begin with an emphasis
upon the unity of God. It seems to cry out to mankind: The gods
before which ye bow are not the true God. There is but one true God,
namely, the God who at the beginning made the heaven and the
earth (Gen.1:1 and 2:1), the God who made Himself known to
Abraham as God the Almighty (Gen. 17:1 and Ex. 6:3), the God who
appeared to Moses as Jehovah, as the I-Am-that-I-Am (Ex. 3:14),
and the God who, out of sovereign favor, chose the people of Israel,
and called them, and accepted them in His covenant (Ex. 19:4ff.).
First of all, therefore, the revelation had as its content: Jehovah
alone is Elohim, the Lord alone is God, and there is no other God
beside Him.1
For the people of Israel, too, the revelation of the oneness of God was
desperately necessary. Israel was surrounded on all sides by heathen
and by heathen who at all times tried to tempt it into apostacy and
unfaithfulness to the Lord; moreover, right on up to the captivity a
great part of the people of Israel felt themselves attracted to the
pagan idolatry and image worship, and again and again fell into the
practice of them despite the proscription of the law and the warning
of the prophets. Therefore, God Himself placed the emphasis on the
fact that He, the Lord, who was now appearing to Moses and who
wanted to redeem His people through Moses, was the same God who
had made Himself known to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob as the
Almighty God (Ex. 3:6 and 15). When He gave His law to Israel He
wrote above it as its preamble: I am the Lord thy God, which have
brought thee out of the land of Egypt. And in the first
commandment, and the second, He strictly forbade all idolatry and
worship of images (Ex. 20:2-5). Be’cause the Lord our God is one
God, Israel must love Him with its whole heart, its whole soul, and
all its strength (Deut. 6:4-5). The Lord alone is Israel’s God and
therefore Israel may serve only Him.
Nevertheless, despite the fact that the oneness of God is so strongly
emphasized, and, as it were, constitutes the first article of Israel’s
basic law, the distinctions within that unity of the Godhead come to
light also as in that revelation His fulness of Being progresses. The
very name which is usually employed for designating God in the
original Hebrew has a certain significance here. For this name
Elohim,is in plural form, and therefore, although it does not, as was
formerly generally supposed, designate the three persons of the
divine Being, it does, in its character as an intensive plural, point to
the fulness of life and of power which are present in God. It is, no
doubt, in connection with this same fact, that God sometimes, in
speaking of Himself, uses a plural referent, and by this means makes
distinctions within Himself that bear a person’al character (Gen.
1:26-27; 3:22; and Isa. 6:8).
Of greater significance is the teaching of the Old Testament to the
effect that God brings everything in His creation and providence into
being by His Word and Spirit. He is not a human being, who, at the
cost of great difficulty and exertion, makes something else out of the
materials He has at hand. Instead, simply by the act of speaking, He
calls everything into being out of nothing.
In the first chapter of Genesis we are taught this truth in the loftiest
way possible, and elsewhere, too, it is expressed most gloriously in
word and song. He speaks, and it is done; He commands, and it
stands fast (Ps. 33:9). He sends out His word, and melts the morsels
of ice (Ps. 147:18). His voice is upon the waters, shakes the
wilderness, causes the hills to skip like a calf, and discovers the
forests (Ps. 29:3-10). Two truths are contained in this exalted
account of God’s works: the first is that God is the Almighty One who
has but to speak and all things leap into being, whose word is law
(Ps. 33:9) and whose voice is power (Ps. 29:4); and the second is that
God works deliberately, and not with’out forethought, and carries
out all His works with the highest wisdom. The word which God
speaks is power, but it is also the vehicle of thought. He has made the
earth by His power, He has established the world by His wisdom,
and has stretched out the heavens by His discretion (Jer. 10:12 and
51:15). He has made all His works in wisdom: the earth is full of His
riches (Ps. 104:24). This wisdom of God did not come to Him from
outside Himself, but was with Him from the beginning. He possessed
it as the principle of His way, before His works of old. When He
prepared the heavens, set a compass upon the face of the deep,
established the clouds above, strengthened the fountains of the deep,
then wisdom was already there, brought up alongside of Him, daily
his delight, and rejoicing always before Him (Prov. 8:22-31 and Job
20:20-28). God rejoiced in the wisdom with which He created the
world.
Alongside of this word and wisdom the Spirit of God as the Mediator
of the creation makes His appearance just as God at one and the
same time is wisdom and possesses it, so that He can share it and can
exhibit it in His works, so He Himself is Spirit in His being (Deut.
4:12, 15) and He possesses Spirit, that Spirit by which He can dwell
in the world and be always and everywhere present in it (Ps. 139:7).
Without any’one having been His counsellor, the Lord by His Spirit
brought everything into being (Isa. 40:13ff.). At the beginning that
Spirit moved upon the face of the waters (Gen. 1:2), and He remains
active in all that was created. By that Spirit God garnishes the
heavens (Job 26:13), renews the face of the earth (Ps. 104:30), gives
life to man (Job 33:4), maintains the breath in man’s nostrils (Job
27:3),gives him understanding and wisdom (Job 32:8), and also
causes the grass to wither and the flower to fade (Isa. 40:7). In short,
by the Word of the Lord were the heavens made, and all the host of
them by the Breath of His mouth (Ps. 33:6).
* * * * *
And this self-diversity of God comes out even more in the works of
the re-creation. Then it is not Elohim, but Jehovah, not God in
general, but the Lord, the God of the covenant, who reveals Himself
and who makes Himself known in wonders of redemption and
salvation. As such He redeems and leads His people, not by His word
alone which He speaks or has conveyed to them, but also by means of
the Angel of the covenant (the Angel of the Lord). This Angel appears
already in the history of the patriarchs: to Hagar (Gen. 16:6ff.), to
Abraham (Gen. 18ff.), and to Jacob (Gen. 28:13ff.). This Angel
reveals His grace and power especially in the emancipation of Israel
from the bond’age of Egypt.2 This Angel of the Lord does not stand
on the same plane of importance as the created angels; rather, He is
a special revelation and manifestation of God. On the one hand, He is
clearly distinguished from God, who speaks of Him as of His Angel,
and yet, on the other hand, is one in name with God Himself, and in
power, in redemption and blessing, in worshipfulness and honor. He
is called God in Genesis 16:13, the God of Bethel in Genesis 31:13,
exchanges places with God or the Lord (Gen. 28:30, 32 and Ex. 3:4),
and He bears the name of God within Him (Ex. 23:21). He redeems
from all evil (Gen. 48:16), rescues Israel from the hand of the
Egyptians (Ex. 3:8), cleaves the waters and dries up the sea (Ex.
14:21), preserves the people of God in the way, brings them safely
into Canaan, causes them to triumph over their enemies (Ex. 3:8 and
23:20), is to be absolutely obeyed as though He were God Himself
(Ex. 23:20). and always en’camps around those who fear the Lord
(Ps. 34:7 and 35:5).
Just as in His re-creating work, Jehovah carries out His redemptive
activities through this Angel of the covenant, so He by His Spirit
gives out all kinds of energies and gifts to His people. In the Old
Testament the Spirit of the Lord is the source of all life, all weal, and
all ability. He grants courage and strength to the judges, to Othniel
(Judges 3:10), Gideon (Judges 6:34), Jephthah (Judges 11:29), and
to Samson (Judges 14:6 and 15:14). He grants artistic perception to
the makers of the priests’ garments, the tabernacle, and the temple,3
and He gives wisdom and understanding to the judges who bear the
burden of the people alongside of Moses (Num. 11:17, 25). He gives
the spirit of prophecy to the prophets,4 and renewal and
sanctification and guidance to all of God’s children (Ps. 51:12-13 and
143:10).
In short: the Word, the promise, the covenant, which the Lord gave
to Israel at the exodus from Egypt, have existed throughout the ages,
and still stood fast even after the Captivity in the days of Zerubbabel,
so that the people had no need to fear (Haggai 2:4-5). When the Lord
led Israel out of Egypt He became the Savior of Israel. And this
disposition of God towards His people came to expression in the fact
that in all their oppression He was oppressed (He regarded the
affliction of His people as His own affliction), and that He therefore
sent them His Angel to preserve them. He redeemed them by His
love and grace and He took them up and carried them as His own
throughout those days of old. He sent them the Spirit of His holiness
in order to lead them in the ways of the Lord (Isa. 63:9-12). In the
days of the Old Covenant, the Lord through the high priest laid His
threefold blessing on the people of Israel: the blessing of vigil, the
blessing of grace, and the blessing of peace (Num. 6:24-26).
Thus gradually, then, but ever more unmistakably, the threefold
distinction within the Divine being comes to expression already in
the history of God’s leading of Israel. However, the Old Testament
includes the further promises that in the future there will be a higher
and richer revelation. After all, Israel repudiated the Word of the
Lord and vexed His Holy Spirit (Isa. 63:10 and Ps. 106). The
revelation of God in the Angel of the covenant and in the Spirit of the
Lord proved to be inadequate: if God wanted to confirm His
covenant and fulfill His promise, another and higher revelation
would be necessary.
Such a revelation was heralded by the prophets. In the future, in the
last days, then the Lord will call up out of the midst of Israel such a
prophet as Moses was, and the Lord will put His words in that
prophet’s mouth (Deut. 18 :18). This one will be a priest for ever after
the order of Melchizedek (Ps. 110:4); He will be a king out of the
house of David (2 Sam. 7:12-16), a rod out of the stem of Jesse (Isa.
11:1), a king, judging and seeking judgment (Isa. 16:5). A human
being, a man He will be, and the son of a woman (Isa. 7:14), and He
will be without form or comeliness (Isa. 53:2ff.); but, at the same
time, He will be Immanuel (Isa. 7:14), the Lord our righteousness
(Jer. 23:6), the Angel of the covenant (Mal. 3:1), the Lord Himself
appearing to His people (Hos. 1:7 and Mal. 3:1). And He bears the
name of Wonderful, Counsellor, The mighty God, The everlasting
Father, The Prince of Peace (Isa. 9:6).
This manifestation of the servant of the Lord is to be followed by a
richer dispensation of the Holy Spirit. As the Spirit of wisdom and
understanding, of counsel and strength, of the knowledge and fear of
the Lord, this Spirit will rest upon the Messiah (Isa. 11:2; 42:1; and
61:1). He will be poured out upon all flesh, over sons and daughters,
old men and young men, servants and handmaids,5 and He will give
a new heart and a new spirit, so that His people may walk in His
statutes, and keep His ordinances, and do them.6
Thus the Old Testament itself points out that the full revelation of
God will consist of the revelation of His triune being.This promise and announcement the fulfillment of the New
Testament fully satisfies. In this respect also, the unity or oneness of
God is the point of departure of all revelation.7 But out of this
oneness the difference in the Divine being now, in the New
Testament, comes into much clearer light. This happens first in the
great redemptive events of incarnation, satisfaction, and outpouring,
and next in the instruction of Jesus and His apostles. The work of
salvation is one whole, a work of God from beginning to end. But
there are three high moments in it, election, forgiveness, and
renewal, and these three point to a threefold cause in the Divine
being: that is, to the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.
The very conceiving of Christ already shows us the threefold activity
of God. For while the Father gives the Son to the world (John 3:16),
and while the Son Himself descends from heaven (John 6:38), that
Son is conceived in Mary of the Holy Spirit (Matt. 1:20 and Luke
1:35). At His baptism Jesus is anointed by the Holy Spirit, and is
there publicly declared to be the beloved Son of the Father, the Son
in whom He is well pleased (Matt. 3:16-17). The works which Jesus
did were shown Him by the Father (John 5:19 and 8:38), and they
are fulfilled by Him in the strength of the Holy Spirit (Matt. 12:28).
In His dying He offers Himself to God in the eternal Spirit (Heb.
9:14). The resurrection is a raising up by the Father (Acts 2:24) and
is at the same time Jesus’ own act by which He is greatly proved to be
the Son of the Father according to the Spirit of holiness (Rom. 1:3).
And after his resurrection He, on the fortieth day, ascends in the
Spirit which quickened Him on high in heaven and there He makes
the angels and authorities and powers subject to Himself.
The teaching of Jesus and the apostles agrees fully with the lesson of
those events themselvesJesus came to earth to declare the Father and to make His name
known among men (John 1:18 and 17:6). The name of father applied
to God as creator of all things was also used by the pagans. This
meaning of the term is supported also by Scripture at various
places.8 Besides, the Old Testament several times uses the
designation Father to refer to God’s theocratic relationship to Israel
because in His marvelous ability He has created and maintained that
relationship (Deut. 32:6 and Isa. 63:16). But in the New Testament a
gloriously new light is shed upon this name of father as applied to
God. Jesus always indicates an essential difference between the
relationship in which He Himself stands to God and that in which
others, say the Jews or the disciples, stand to Him. When, for
example, He teaches the disciples, at their request, the “Our Father. .
.” He says expressly “When ye pray, say. . . .” And when, after the
resurrection, He announces His forthcoming ascension to Mary
Magdalene, He says: “I ascend unto my Father, and your Father; and
to my God, and your God” (John 20:17). In other words, God is His
own Father (John 5:18). He knows the Son and loves Him in such a
way and to such an extent as, reciprocally, only the Son can know
and love the Father.9 Among the apostles, accordingly, God is
constantly referred to as the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ (Eph.
1:3). This relationship between the Father and the Son did not
develop in time but existed from eternity (John 1:1, 14; 17:24). God is
therefore Father in the first place because in a very unique sense He
is the Father of the Son. This is His original, special personal
characteristic.
In a derived sense God is further called the Father of all creatures
because He is their creator and sustainer (1 Cor. 8:6, and elsewhere).
He is called the Father of Israel because Israel is His handiwork by
virtue of election and calling (Deut. 32:6 and Isa. 64:8), and the
Father of the church and all believers because the love of the Father
for the Son accrues to them (John 16:27 and 17:24) and because they
have been accepted as His children and are born of Him through the
Spirit (John 1:12 and Rom. 8:15).
The Father is therefore always the Father,the first person, He from
whom in the being of God, in the counsel of God, and in all the works
of creation and providence, redemption and sanctification, the
initiative proceeds. He gave the Son to have life in Himself (John
5:26), and He sends out the Spirit (John 15:26). His is the election
and the good pleasure (Matt 11:26 and Eph. 1:4, 9, 11). From Him
proceed the creation, providence, redemption, and renewal (Ps. 33:6
and John 3:16). To Him in a special sense the kingdom and the
power and the glory accrue (Matt 6:13). He particularly bears the
name of God in distinction from the Lord Jesus Christ and the Holy
Spirit. Indeed, Christ Himself as Mediator calls Him His Father, not
only, but also His God (Matt 27:46and John 20:17) and Christ is
Himself called the Christ of God.10 In a word, the first person of the
Divine being is the Father because “of Him are all things” (1 Cor.
8:6).
If God is the Father, the inference is that there also is a Son who
received life from Him and who shares His love. In the Old
Testament the name of son of God was used for angels,11 for the
people of Israel,12 and particularly too for the theocratic king of that
people.13 But in the New Testament this name takes on a far
profounder meaning. For Christ is the Son of God in a very peculiar
sense; He is highly exalted above angels and prophets (Matt. 13:32;
21:27; and 22:2), and He Himself says that no one can know the Son
except the Father, and no one can know the Father except the Son
(Matt. 11:27). In distinction from angels and men, He is the Father’s
own Son (Rom. 8:32), the beloved Son in whom the Father is well
pleased (Matt 3:17), the only-begotten Son (John 1:18) whom the
Father gave to have life in Himself (John 5:26).
This very special, this unique, relationship between Father and Son
did not develop in time by way of the supernatural conception of the
Holy Spirit, or of the anointing at baptism, or of the resurrection and
ascension — though many have maintained this — but is a
relationship which has existed from all eternity. The Son who in
Christ assumed human nature was in the beginning with God as the
Word (John 1:1). then already had the form of God (Phil. 2:6), was
rich and clothed with glory (John 17:5, 24), was then already the
brightness of God’s glory and the express image of His person (Heb.
1:3), and precisely therefore He could in the fulness of time be sent
out, given, and brought into the world.14 Hence, too, the creation
(John 1:3 and Col. 1:16) and providence (Heb 1:3) and the
accomplishment of the whole of salvation (1 Cor. 1:30) are ascribed
to Him. He is not, as creatures are made or created, but is instead,
the first-born of all creatures that is the Son who has the rank and
rights of the first-born over against all creatures (Col 1:15) Thus He is
also the first-born of the dead, the first-born of many brethren, and
therefore among all and in all He is the first (Rom 8:29 and Col 1:18)
And even though in the fulness of time, He assumed the form of a
servant, He was nevertheless in the form of God. He was in all things
like unto God the Father (Phil. 2:6):. in life (John 5:26), in
knowledge (Matt. 11:27), in strength (John 1:3 and 5:21, 26), in
honor (John 5:23). He is Himself God, to be praised above all else
into eternity.15 Just as all things are of the Father, so they are also all
through the Son (1 Cor. 8:6)