How Can God Be Three and Still Be One?

The Trinity is where a lot of people get stuck, and most of them aren't being difficult. They're being honest.

The Bible calls the Father God. It calls Jesus God.

It calls the Holy Ghost God. Then it turns around and says there is only one God.

Before we go anywhere else, look at what the Bible actually does with that.

Jesus is standing in the Jordan River getting baptized. He comes up out of the water, the Holy Ghost comes down on Him like a dove, and the Father speaks out of heaven, "This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased." Matthew 3:17 (KJV).

Three of them, in one moment. Jesus isn't the voice.

The Father isn't the One standing in the water. The Spirit isn't either of them.

Nobody is changing costumes.

John, one of the twelve who walked with Jesus, says it about as flat as it can be said.

"For there are three that bear record in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost: and these three are one."

1 John 5:7 (KJV)

Notice he doesn't explain it. He states it.

Three, and these three are one.

Let me be careful with the wording here, because this is where sincere people go wrong.

Three distinct Persons. One being.

One nature. All three fully God, all three equal.

Not three gods. Not one God switching hats depending on the day.

Not three pieces that add up to a whole God.

I'm not handing you an illustration for it either. Every picture people reach for fails, and it fails in one of those two directions.

It either turns God into one Person changing forms, or it chops Him into parts. A bad picture will do more damage to how you see God than the mystery ever did.

A lot of us are running a deal with God that we never say out loud. Make it make sense to me, and then I'll believe it.

Read that sentence back slow. What it does is put your own understanding in the seat where God belongs.

Your mind becomes the final say on what's true, and God has to come explain Himself and get your approval before He counts. You end up leading and judging your own life while you're still calling it faith.

Almost nobody does that on purpose, and that's exactly what makes it dangerous.

It doesn't feel like rebellion. It feels like being careful.

"Trust in the LORD with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding."

Proverbs 3:5 (KJV)

Lean not.

He isn't telling you to quit thinking. He's telling you which one gets the last word when your understanding and His Word disagree.

"For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts."

Isaiah 55:9 (KJV)

Sit with that instead of fighting it. A God you could fit all the way inside your own head would be a God about your size.

Him running past the end of your understanding was never a problem with Him. It's the first honest sign that He really is God.

You don't get to God by passing a test on this doctrine. Go back to that river for a second.

The Father said "This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased"over Jesus before Jesus had preached a sermon, healed anybody, or gone to a cross. He was already loved, and the Father said so out loud, before He had done any of it.

That's the same voice that speaks over you, and it speaks because of what the Son already finished, not because you finally got your theology airtight.

You can believe this before you understand it. That is what believing has always meant.

Here's how to hold this today:

1. Read the scene before you read the argument

Open Matthew 3:16-17 and just watch who is doing what. Three at once, one God. Let the Bible show it to you before you demand that it explain it to you.

2. Say your real condition out loud

Ask yourself honestly whether you've been waiting to understand God before you'd fully trust Him, then tell Him that in plain words. He already knows. He'd rather have the honest sentence than the polite one.

3. Trust one thing today you can't explain

Pick one thing God has clearly said in His Word that your mind keeps arguing with, and obey that one thing today anyway. Faith gets built by walking, not by finally figuring it out.

PRAYER

Father God, thank You that You are bigger than my ability to explain You.

I've been holding out for things to make sense before I would fully trust You, and I didn't even know I was doing it.

I bring that to You today instead of dressing it up as being careful.

Thank You that You showed Yourself at that river as Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, and that You never waited for me to work it out first.

Teach me to lean on You instead of leaning on my own understanding.

In Jesus' wonderful name we pray. Amen.