If any doctrine makes Christianity Christian, then surely it is the
doctrine of the Trinity. The three great ecumenical creeds—the Apostles’
Creed, the Nicene Creed, and the Athanasian Creed—are all structured
around our three in one God, underlying the essential importance of
Trinitarian theology. Augustine once commented about the Trinity that
“in no other subject is error more dangerous, or inquiry more laborious,
or the discovery of truth more profitable.” More recently, Sinclair
Ferguson has reflected on “the rather obvious thought that when his
disciples were about to have the world collapse in on them, our Lord
spent so much time in the Upper Room speaking to them about the mystery
of the Trinity. If anything could underline the necessity of
Trinitarianism for practical Christianity, that must surely be it!”
Yet, when it comes to the doctrine of the Trinity, most Christians
are poor in their understanding, poorer in their articulation, and
poorest of all in seeing any way in which the doctrine matters in real
life. One theologian said, tongue in cheek, “The trinity is a matter of
five notions or properties, four relations, three persons, two
processions, one substance or nature, and no understanding.” All the
talk of essence and persons and co-this and co-that seem like
theological gobbledy-gook reserved for philosophers and scholars-maybe
for thinky bookish types, but certainly not for moms and mechanics and
middle-class college students. Keep Reading...
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