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Saturday, September 6, 2014

Blogging the Articles of Religion: #1 THE TRINITY

Fundamentals. Fundamentals.  Fundamentals. 

Sports, art, music, martial arts, education, whatever.   No matter what the discipline a successful practitioner must understand and rehearse the fundamentals.  

That goes for theology, too.

And even if you’re not clergy, or a seminary student, or anything with a title in your church, if you’re a Christian then you practice  theology.  You live according to the doctrines of the Bible, or at least you try to.  Right? 

Well, practitioners need to rehearse fundamentals--- or they’ll get their butts kicked by opponents who do.

All of that stuff I just said:  that’s why we’re studying the basic doctrines and documents of our church.  For Methodist (CME’s in particular) those documents are The 25 Articles of Religion, the Affirmation of Faith (also known as the Apostles’ Creed), The General Rules of the United Societies, and the Social Creed of the CME Church.

Over the next weeks and months I’ll be blogging from these Bible studies.

Fundamentals.

So, here’s Article #1.

Article I - Of Faith in the Holy Trinity
There is but one living and true God, everlasting, without body or parts, of infinite power, wisdom, and good; the maker and preserver of all things, both visible and invisible. And in unity of this Godhead there are three persons, of one substance, power, and eternity—the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost.

Trinity.  Tri-unity.  One God in 3 persons.  Not 3 gods.  Not God appearing in 3 forms.  Father, Son, Holy Spirit each themselves and all One. 

Does that sound weird?

Well, you know what?  You’re weird.

Seriously.  You’re weird like the concept of the Trinity is weird.  So am I.

You, and I, and every human being in history are made in the image of God---God who speaks of Himself as singular and PLURAL.

Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.” (Genesis 1:26, ESV)

And what does it mean to be in the image of God?  Does it mean that we all have God’s cheekbones?

Nah.

It means that you, and I, and every human being formed and future are created in imitation of the fundamental nature of God.   

for in Him we live and move and have our being, as also some of your own poets have said, ‘For we are also His offspring.’  (Acts 17:28)

So if you want a good idea/ image of how the Trinity works, just look at yourself.

You have a MIND.  More importantly, you are your mind.  Mathematician and philosopher Rene Descartes said, “I think, therefore, I am.”  The unique collection of ideas, memories,  and intellectual processes that make up your mind are what make you----- YOU.

You also have a BODY.  And, your body is YOU. Your fingerprints, your DNA, the pattern of veins in your eyeballs, even the collection of bacteria in your gut are all unique to your self.  Nobody has a body exactly like your body.  That’s all you.

And---- you have a SOUL.  In fact, you are a soul.  The you that goes to Heaven (or not) when you die is your soul (Spirit, if you prefer).  You are a unique, transcendent spiritual manifestation on this plane of reality.

An old saying (older than C.S. Lewis by the way) goes, “You don’t have a soul.  You are a soul.  You have a body.”

The truth is that you have a soul, and a body, and a mind.  And, you are a soul, and a body, and a mind.  You and I are little trinities.

Like THE Trinity, the 3 persons of me can act independently without being separate.  And they/ I can act together as a single, indivisible whole.

Weird, huh? 

Yeah, well we take after our Father.

Now, let’s be clear.  It’s not that God the Trinity is like us.  It’s that we are kinda like God the Trinity.

The semi-independence of your mind, your body, and your soul is a greatly diminished reflection of the uniqueness of God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit.

The absolute unity of my mind, body, and spirit as one human being is a pale, low-level reproduction of the unity of God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit.

The Father rules, decides, and wills.  Your mind is made in His image.

Our Father in heaven, Hallowed be Your name. Your kingdom come. Your will be done On earth as it is in heaven. (Luke 11: 2)

For I have not spoken on My own authority; but the Father who sent Me gave Me a command, what I should say and what I should speak. (John 12:49)

The Son, aka the Word made flesh, acts out the Father’s will.  He creates, builds, and shows Himself visibly to us.  In His image, my physical body acts out the thoughts and decisions of my mind. 

In the beginning was the Word, and 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 nothing was made that was made. (John 1: 1-3)

My body is the face (literally) of my mind, just like Jesus “ is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation” (Colossians 1: 15)

For in Him dwells all the fullness of the Godhead bodily (Colossians 2: 9)

I and the Father are one. (John 10: 30)

God the Holy Spirit, aka the Holy Ghost, is exactly what His name implies.  He is the Spirit of God.  In that sense, “God is Spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth.” (John 4: 24)  

God has the Holy Spirit and God is the Holy Spirit.

Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty (2 Corinthians 3: 17).

For what man knows the things of a man except the spirit of the man which is in him? Even so no one knows the things of God except the Spirit of God. (1 Corinthians 2: 11)

Like Him, your Creator made you with a spirit/ soul.

And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living being. (Genesis 2: 7)

You and I are weirdly trinitarian, because we are made in the image of God who is the perfect Trinity.

In our imperfectness, body, mind, and spirit don’t always agree or work harmoniously.   Sometimes the spirit is willing when the flesh is weak.   

Sometimes my human mind is torn between listening to my body and listening to my spirit.

For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit, the things of the Spirit.  (Romans 8: 5)

But I’m a copy flawed by sin.

God is the real deal, the original, the perfect prototypical three-in-one.

God is Trinity.

And that is weirdly cool.

For there are three that bear witness in heaven: the Father, the Word, and the Holy Spirit; and these three are one. (1 John 5: 7)



---Rev. Anderson T. Graves II   (email:  atgravestwo2@aol.com )

Anderson T. Graves II is a writer, community organizer and consultant for education, ministry, and rural leadership development.

Rev. Anderson T. Graves II is pastor of Miles Chapel CME Church (5220 Myron Massey Boulevard) in Fairfield, Alabama;  executive director of the Substance Abuse Youth Networking Organization (SAYNO);  and director of rural leadership development for the National Institute for Human Development (NIHD).

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