Making Sense of the Trinity: Three Crucial Questions by Millard J. Erickson

Author:Millard J. Erickson
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Tags: Religion, Christian, Christian Theology, General
ISBN: 9781585583539
Publisher: Baker Books
Published: 2000-04-30T22:00:00+00:00

Notice the emphasis on the interpenetration of the Father and the Son, and the Father’s working in and through the Son. Verse 20, “On that day you will realize that I am in my Father, and you are in me, and I am in you” constitutes a transitional statement to the following chapter. There Jesus gives his teaching about himself and believers as being the vine and the branches—they are to be in him in a way similar to his being in the Father (15:9–10). Although the relationship of the believer to Jesus is only a partial metaphor for the much closer relationship of the Son to the Father, there must be some point of analogical similarity. This parallel is repeated in the high priestly prayer, where Jesus prays that his followers may be one as he and the Father are one (John 17:21, 22).

We now need to explore further the nature of this oneness. It is, as we noted in the preceding chapter, more the idea of union than of simplicity or singularity. We are thinking here of a union in which the three are so closely linked with one another that the life of each flows through the others as well. Each has immediate access to the consciousness and experiences of the others. This means that each is dependent on the others for his own life and for his being deity. It would not be possible for one of the members of the Trinity to cease to be, or to separate from the Godhead, and the other two to continue in existence as God.

It has been common to speak of the Son proceeding from the Father, or being generated from the Father. The Spirit also has been understood to proceed from, or to derive his life from the Father. The Western church added the phrase and the thought, “and from the Son,” which the Eastern church did not. On the model that we are expounding, however, each of the persons proceeds from or is generated by, each of the others. There is a mutual production of each of the persons by each of the others.

It may be helpful in this connection to think of the Godhead as a spiritual organism. This means that the three are so linked together and so interdependent that they cannot exist separately. We might think, in the human body, of the heart, lungs, and brain. Each is not the person, by itself. Yet, it is only because of the union of these organs (and many others) that the person is a person at all. It would not be possible for any one or two of the three to exist without the other(s). Without any one of these vital organs (or a replacement) you would not have a human, and you would not have a human heart or lungs. You would have a dead human, and a dead heart or lungs. Each supplies each of the others with its life. So, similarly, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit each supplies the others with its life.

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