Trinity
We have considered the oneness of God. We saw that the scriptures very clearly define Him as the one and only God. And yet, we don't get very far before we start to notice something unusual about Him. It first shows up in the verse above, as God identifies Himself with the plural pronouns us and our. It happens again later on in Genesis 3:22 when He says man has become "like one of Us." And again it shows up in Genesis 11:7 as He says, "Let Us go down" to confuse man's language at the tower of Babel. Why does God, who is One, identify Himself this way?
Here's what we can determine based on what the rest of God's Word reveals to us: Although He is one and only one being, there are also three separate and distinct persons that simultaneously exist. These persons are revealed as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. They are distinct from each other and yet they aren't three separate gods. They are three yet one, and the term we use to capture this concept is triunity, meaning three and one.
Sounds pretty confusing...how can we buy into something so mind-bending? Although the triunity, or the Trinity, is a challenge to our finite minds, we know it to be absolutely true because Scripture says so.
One of Jesus' final commands to His disciples on earth was to make disciples of all nations and to baptize them in the "name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit" (Matthew 28:19). Notice the singular form of the word "name," pointing to the oneness of God, and yet the three persons are clearly distinguished. We also have plenty of passages that identify each person of the Trinity as being God (John 1:1, Acts 5:3-5, Colossians 2:9).
So while we embrace the oneness of God, we also recognize the triunity of God as one of His essential attributes.
God is three yet one. He is one and only one being, yet there are also three separate and distinct persons that simultaneously exist.
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