The Holy Trinity

“I have many more things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now. But when He, the Spirit of truth, comes, He will guide you into all the truth; for He will not speak on His own initiative, but whatever He hears, He will speak; and He will disclose to you what is to come. He will glorify Me, for He will take of Mine and will disclose it to you. All things that the Father has are Mine; therefore I said that He takes of Mine and will disclose it to you.

We cannot exhaustively discuss the third person of the Trinity today.

The Holy Spirit has long been taught as a truth within Judaism - however, it gets remarkably difficult to dialog with them on this, as they A). will not budge an inch on the issue of the Trinity and B). They will not budge an inch on the subject of Jesus Christ.

The minute you try to pin them down on the Holy Spirit, they balk, and respond, “It’s God.” and change the subject.

In the Old Testament, He is known as the רוח הכֹדש. In Greek, the πνευμα ἅγιος, the Holy Spirit. In our text here, He is called πνεῦμα ἀληθείας, the spirit of truth.

Truth

Let me take a minute and point out that in these three verses we discuss today, the most important words are ἀληθείας Truth and λαλήσει, to speak. I’ve got a weird little conviction about Greek - I try not to give you the root word, or lemma form, too often. I prefer to give you the actual manuscript tense of the word. If λαλεω is λαλήσει in the text, I like to tell you the actual verb tense. I’ll spare you whether it’s an Aorist, genetive, present active indicative, etc. There’s also the word ἀναγγελεῖ, to announce or relay information. It’s roughly like someone who is dispatched to tell others a report of something they weren’t present for. “We’ve won against Sparta” kind of thing. The Father tells the Son who tells the Spirit to announce it, proclaim it, ἀναγγελεῖ to us. Some of my Greek lexicons add the note that ἀναγγελεῖ carries with it the implication of giving you the details of it.

As we go through this text, notice how a lot of what the Lord says to His apostles is Trinitarian. All things that the Father - that’s יהוה Adonai - has are Mine - that’s ישוע or Jesus in English - therefore I said that He - רוח הכֹדש. In Greek, the πνευμα ἅγιος or the Holy Spirit - will take of Mine and will disclose it to you.

The Trinity was active in the creation of the world. The Trinity is active in the judgment of mankind. The Trinity is active in the redemption of mankind, and the Trinity is active in the salvation of the Elect. Everything is a case of inter-Trinitarian cooperation.

Errors in the interpretation of the Holy Spirit include minimizing the spirit, maximizing the spirit, de-personizing the spirit, and denying the spirit.

The Trinity

The Trinity is, as we have learned many times, One God revealed in Three Persons.

It has been this way since before the creation of the world or universe. There never has been a time that God the Father did not exist.

There never has been a time that the Holy Spirit did not exist.

There never has been a time that Jesus Christ did not exist.

Understand that all three of these are God.

None of them were created. All have existed throughout all eternity.

I’m always amused when I hear Mormons dismiss the Trinity as polytheism, when their entire theology is based upon poly-theism.

In modern Christian thought, each member of the Trinity seems to be doing their own thing. Jesus is saving, God the Father is being God the Father, and the Holy Spirit is making people drunk and barking like dogs, while at the same time causing those Baptists and Presbyterians to understand their Bibles soberly.

Nothing could really be further from the truth. The entire Trinity is functioning together as God. It’s been said many times that there is a dynamic tension within almost every area of Biblical doctrine. When you think the Trinity is too impossible to understand, ask yourself - who wrote Romans? Are we saved now, in eternity past or is it future salvation? Is the New Covenant in place now, the future, in the days of Pentecost, or was it inaugurated in Jeremiah’s day?

When you can answer the last three questions, come see me and I’ll have an answer for you on exactly how the Trinity works.

But remember this - We’re discussing the nature of God. God exists outside of creation, because by definition He created all of Creation; thus He is not bound by rules and physical laws He himself created.

It’s funny, I actually used this in an unofficial debate with an atheist and he had no response whatsoever, except argument by distraction - he attempted to say we could learn of God through the laws of His creation.

That’s not refuting me, that’s agreeing with me. In an official debate, at that point I would have won, because he conceded my entire argument.

Yes!

I would like to thank the Academy, my director, my agent...

The Unitarian would try to invoke argument one of logic, which is “A cannot be A and not A at the same time.” My response: “A can be A and B at the same time. Since B is not exclusively A, it is not a contradiction.”

We tend to think of God as the Father, Jesus as the Son, and The Holy Spirit starring as Himself. In reality God’s nature is so complex - as you would expect God’s nature to be - that it would take all of our time together to articulate exactly what I mean. I’d start every sermon with “And God” - and then spend the rest of the time defining.

We’d never get anywhere.

However.

God is better expressed in terms that the church has used for centuries, God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Spirit.

Let me take a moment to address 1 John 5:7, since it is a controversial verse.

The words of 1 John 5:7 - also called the Comma Johanneum - cannot be found in any Greek manuscript prior to the fifteenth century.

When King James Only’ists cry foul, we respond with this - it is not included in the Textus Receptus. Erasmus left the verses out of the first two editions of his text, and when controversy erupted, he challenged them this - find me ONE Greek manuscript in which this verse appears in the text, and not written in a different hand in the margin.

At this point I’ll quote from a classic commentary, the JFB:

Two or three witnesses were required by law to constitute adequate testimony. The only Greek manuscripts in any form which support the words, “in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost, and these three are one; and there are three that bear witness in earth,” are the Montfortianus of Dublin, copied evidently from the modern Latin Vulgate; the Ravianus, copied from the Complutensian Polyglot; a manuscript at Naples, with the words added in the Margin by a recent hand; Ottobonianus, 298, of the fifteenth century, the Greek of which is a mere translation of the accompanying Latin. All the old versions omit the words. The oldest manuscripts of the Vulgate omit them: the earliest Vulgate manuscript which has them being Wizanburgensis, 99, of the eighth century.

The text can be found in the Middle ages Vulgate alone, which is why Ottobinianus contains the verse. The verse as you just heard was added to the Complutensian Polyglot. The only Greek manuscript to contain the verse is Montefortianus. Erasmus was given Montefortianus, and he indicated in his 3rd edition of his Textus Receptus that he suspected Montefortianus as being written explicitly for the purpose of confounding him by his enemies - of which there was many.

Examining this verse - and not the Vulgate - we see a tremendous disclosure of inter-trinitarian working. God tells the Son and the Spirit. Christ gives us the Spirit, who discloses or announces in detail to us.

This is why Romans 5 says that the love of God has been poured out, ἐκκέχυται, within our hearts.

It’s worth mentioning also here parenthetically that the heart in Jewish literature means the seat of intellect, reason - not emotion. The bowels, or the innermost regions of us is the seat of emotions. So when you see “Heart” in the Bible, it doesn’t mean good tingly feelings, it means within our minds, our mental facilities.

ἐκκέχυται is a word that is often used to describe the tremendous bloodshed when someone is butchered in battle. The Roman short sword was designed for stabbing, hacking, slashing - nearly the perfect sword for up close combat. The victim would bleed out rapidly, making the surrounding area drenched in blood. Think of Christ on the Cross - the Greek word for His atoning blood offering for us is exactly the same word, just as the pouring out of the blood of a sin offering upon the altar was.

This verse should communicate the incredible Grace of God to us. God - while we were still His enemies - chose some of us, brought us to life, and saved us. Then He sets His love on us, and pours that love out into our minds. Then in the future, He’s going to give us - His former enemies - rewards for Things He helped us do.

And we get to live forever. With Him.

This is Grace.

Lord, thank you for all You have done for us. You have given us many things when we deserve nothing. We ask you to watch over us in this coming week and keep us close to you, in Jesus name we pray, Amen.

Numbers 6:24–26 NASB95PARA

The Lord bless you, and keep you; The Lord make His face shine on you, And be gracious to you; The Lord lift up His countenance on you, And give you peace.’

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