Question 10: How many persons are there in the Godhead?
There are three persons in
the Godhead: the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit; and these three are one
God, the same in essence, equal in power and glory.
DAY 1: 1
Corinthians 8:6;
We have looked at 1 Corinthians 8:6 before in the
discussion of there being only one living and true God. Therefore, we will not take an enormous
amount of time with it.
In this particular passage, we find that Paul
establishes that there is only one God. This is true.
The reference to Godhead in our question primarily refers to the
“persons” who are God. We are not
polytheists. We do not believe in three
gods. Rather, we believe in one God and
that the one God is three distinctive persons.
Paul identifies two of those persons in this passage. First, he says that the Father is God and
identifies Him as the Creator with the phrase, “of whom are all things”. Second, he says that the Son, the one Lord
Jesus Christ is also identified as the Creator with the phrase, “through whom
are all things”. Therefore, this is one
of many examples where Scripture makes the point of giving the equality of God
to both the Father and the Son.
You will want to make the point with your family
that, what is termed as modelism, is not a biblical view of God. Modelism is the view that there is one God,
but that he is not three distinctive persons.
Rather, he reveals himself in different persons or offices. It is best understood to say that God simply
is acting in a play and puts on a different mask for whatever part he wishes to
play. Therefore, this particular view is
heresy and again it is gaining popularity within the professing church today.
In 1 Corinthians 2:11, Paul also idenifies the
Spirit of God as equal with God. Just as
the spirit of man is able to know the mind of man and is indeed equal with man,
so is the Spirit of God, Who is the Spirit of truth and knows the mind of
God. The Holy Spirit is God also. He is the third member of the Godhead. His essence is the same as that of God the
Father and that of God the Son.
This passage also gives us the Spirits role. While all members of the Godhead are the same
in essence, equal in power and glory, their roles are distinctive. For instance, the Father is the person of the
Trinity, or Godhead, which is in the role of authority and the dispensing of
authority to the Son. The Son, submits
to the authority of the Father, though he is equal with the Father, and His
role is that of payment for sin and intercession on behalf of those whom He
purchases. The Spirit’s role is then to
speak about Christ and to convict of sin, righteousness, and judgment to come
and regenerate those who have been chosen by the Father.
DAY 2: John
1:1;
In John’s gospel, his goal is to present Jesus
Christ as the Son of God. His very first
words are to that effect. In John 1:1,
he refers to Christ as “the Word”. We
will not delve in to all the aspects of “the Word”. Our focus this week will be to stick to the
primary question of how many persons are in the Godhead. We will no doubt arrive back here in the
future for a deeper look.
John identifies Jesus Christ as the Word (logos), which is a very simply way of
affirming His deity. The term logos was not only used by the Hebrews
but also by the Greeks. First used in
Greek culture, by the philosopher Heraclitus, it was to designate the divine
reason or plan which coordinates a changing universe. This was a term that would be familiar to
both Jews and Greeks speaking of the master plan of the deity in control of the
universe.
John says three things about “the Word”. He says that He was in the beginning (Gen.
1:1). That must also mean if He was
around in the beginning, He must have also been around before the beginning TO
BE AT THE BEGINNING. Also, John tells us
that He was with God (theos). We have seen this word, theos, used before in reference to the Father. So now we have the Son in the beginning and
we have Him along side His Father. Now,
John’s final statement says that Jesus Christ, the Word, was God (theos).
He makes no bones about it. Far
from the claims of the Jehovah’s witnesses, there is no “a” in the Greek at
all. John’s claims are simple. Jesus was in the beginning, He is the second
member of the Trinity, and He is one with His Father: He is God.
Again, we can cross reference the claims of Christ
Himself. For instance, John 10:30, Jesus
plainly says that He and His Father are one.
We don’t even have to look deep into the Greek to find out what He means
by that. It is a simple present tense
indicative verb that simply states fact.
On top of that, we can find out just what Jesus was saying by checking
out the reaction of those He spoke to.
The following verses show us that the ones He spoke to were outraged and
took up stones to stone Him (vs. 31), not for any good works or miracles (vs.
32), but because He made Himself equal with God (vs. 33), or as the NKJV says,
“You, being a Man, make Yourself God.”
Again, the fact that the Son is God and the Father
is God is referenced in John 14:9. Jesus
patiently instructs His disciples about His deity and equality with the
Father. It is simple instruction that
they fail to grasp and tragically so do we at times. However, He can be no plainer and direct than
He is when He says, “If you have seen Me, You have seen the Father.” However, in this passage, though He and the
Father are equals, He does hint at the roles within the Godhead. That being that He is submissive to the
authority of His Father (vs. 10).
Thomas even used the very terms for God the Father
after seeing the resurrected Christ. He
called Him his Lord (kurios) and his
God (theos). Again, unlike Jehovah’s witnesses, who
pervert the plain reading of the text.
Thomas, the so called doubter, who now affirms his belief clearly states
that Jesus is no mere mortal man, but that He is deity, He is God!
DAY 3: Acts
5:3-4
The context of the passage is the church caring for
one another. They are described as selling their possessions
and lands and bringing it and laying it at the apostles feet to distribute to
everyone as they had need. In the midst
of the tremendous generosity of the church, there crept in hypocrisy. A husband and wife had some land and decided
to use the opportunity for self aggrandizement and profit. Ananias and Sapphira were their names.
As Ananias comes in, he is asked whether or not the
money he is giving is all of the money that he received for the land. This is a simple question. It appears that he had informed the apostles
that he would be giving all of the money from the sale of the land to the
church. Being led by the Holy Spirit,
Peter asks him about the sale. Notice
the interchangability of the terms Holy
Spirit and God.
Once again, we do not need to dig deep into the
language to ascertain what the Scriptures are saying. The Holy Spirit is the third person of the
Godhead. In contrast with Satan, the
Holy Spirit does not have the purpose of people lying to Him. Therefore, we can conclude that Satan is not a fourth person of
the Godhead. They are indeed opposites.
But Luke, let’s us see that Ananias’ heart was
filled by Satan to lie to the Holy Spirit.
Ananias wanted to look godly in the sight of all who saw him give the
money, and so did his wife, but they also wanted to be able to retain something
for themselves.
Peter, moved by the Holy Spirit, confronts the plot
to deceive and lie and says, “You have not lie to men, but to God (theos)” (vs. 5). Peter was not giving Ananias a lesson on
theology that the Holy Spirit is God.
That was not his intent.
Although, we can very easily see that is the case. Peter’s intent was to let Ananias know that
God knew what he had done and that though Ananias thought he was deceiving
Peter and the whole church, he could not hide it from the Holy Spirit.
What is our conclusion then? Again, simple statements confirm the third
person of the Godhead, the Holy Spirit, is indeed God.
DAY
4: Colossians 2:9
Paul writes Colossians to confront the errors of the
Gnostic type teachings which have infiltrated the church and have become a
source of idolatry and the toppling of the deity of Jesus Christ. In doing so, he wants to make sure that the
church knows that Jesus, while being fully man in the incarnation, was also
fully God.
For instance, in chapter one he writes that Christ
is the image of the invisible God (vs. 15), that He is the creator of all
things (vs. 16), that He is the head of the church, the beginning, and the
firstborn from the dead (vs. 18). Also,
verse 19 tells us that “all the fullness should dwell” in Him. The heresy that sprang up had elements of
Greek dualism. One of those was that
God, or spirit, was good and matter was evil.
Thus, we can see that problem that if God decided to incarnate Himself
in human flesh, their entire structure of theology would come crashing
down. Paul addresses this by using the
term “fullness”. The word fullness
is pleroma. It simply means, “full, that which has been
filled, fulfilling”. Fullness is a term
that, in the context, references the fullness of the divine nature, power and
attributes. The heresy in Colosse held
close ties to Gnosticism in that it believed that the “Christ” could not be
totally in one person. This is what Paul
seems to attack in the passage.
Now, in 2:9, Paul takes it a step farther. He says, “For in Him dwells all the fullness
of the Godhead bodily.” While the
Colossian heresy said that matter was evil and spirit was good, Paul, under
inspiration of the Holy Spirit, says that in the person of Jesus Christ, the
fullness of the Godhead existed, BODILY.
He says that the very thing they could not believe, which it appears
that John confronted in his epistles, that God came in the flesh, really did
happen. John goes so far as to say if
someone says that Christ did not come in the flesh, he is antichrist (1 John
2:22-23; 4:2-3; 2 John 1:7).
We use the term Godhead, theotes, which simply means “deity”. Paul is reminding those believers in Colosse
that Jesus Christ, though being a physical man, was housing the total divine
nature. His flesh was just the dress for
his person. While He had certain
limitations placed upon Him in the flesh, He never ceased to be the God He was
before the incarnation. The body was
simply a covering for His deity. So,
unlike the heresy Paul was confronting, he says that the total power,
attributes, and presence of deity was in the person of Jesus Christ, the second
person of the Godhead.
DAY 5:
Matthew 28:19
The end of our answer this week is, “the same in
essence, equal in power and glory” may seem to some to be a problem. For instance, how can the Son be equal to the
Father, yet in submission to Him? How
can the Spirit be equal with the Son and yet He must speak, not of Himself, but
of the Son? Let’s ask the question of a
husband and wife. How can they be equal,
yet the wife is told to submit herself to her own husband? The answer lies not in the equality, but the
roles of each. Just as a married couple
have different roles, yet are equals, so goes the Godhead.
Though their roles are different, the persons of the
Godhead are the same in essence. For
instance, Jesus says that if you have seen Him, you have seen the Father (John
14:9) and then He says that the Comforter, Who is to come, which is the Holy
Spirit, is the same as Himself (John 14:16).
In the John 14:16 passage the word another, allos in the Greek, means, “another of the same kind”. In other words, the Spirit is of the same
essence as the Son and the Son is of the same essence as the Father.
Are they equal in power and glory? Yes.
Again, though their roles are different, yet they are of the same
essence. Therefore, they are equally
powerful and glorious. The Father, the
Son, and the Holy Spirit are worthy of our worship. They are all actively involved in
creation. They are all actively involved
in salvation. They are all actively
involved in judgment and in the history of man.
It is the part of salvation that we address in the passage known as “The
Great Commission.
Matthew tells us that Christ Himself taught us that
we are to go into all the world and make disciples. We are to teach others all that He has
commanded (vs. 20). In doing so, those
who would identify as Christ’s disciples are to be baptized. Feel free to discuss baptism with your
family, though it will be discussed later in the catechism. The focus then comes down to whose name
disciples are to be baptized in. Jesus
says they are to be baptized in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy
Spirit. This simple statement affirms
the doctrine of the Trinity. It equates
all the members of the Godhead. Does it
define their power as equal? Let’s see.
In ancient times, as well as, today people were
given authority be those who were superior to them to do things in their
superiors name and on his behalf. Today
we may use a “power of attorney” to make decision for a loved one or business
partner on their behalf. We exercise
their authority on their behalf. This
does not make us that person. What I
mean is that we do not possess their status, possessions, family, and so
on. What it does mean is that whatever
they have given us power over, is what we represent them on. Jesus said in the previous verse that all
authority in heaven and earth was given to Him.
Then He specifically gives a “power of attorney”, if you will, for us to
make and baptize disciples. How? Because we are to do it in His name, and not
His only, but also in the name of the Father and the Holy Spirit.
Each person of the Godhead is involved in
salvation. We could cross reference many
texts, but one we recently looked at in 1 Peter clearly demonstrates that in
just one short verse. First Peter 1:2
tells us that God the Father was the initiator because of His foreknowledge (or
foreordination) of us, that the Holy Spirit is the One who sanctifies, and that
it is made possible through the death of the Lord Jesus Christ. Again, this is a simple overview of the working
of salvation within the heart of EVERY believer. Each member of the Godhead is involved. They work together in unity and for the same
purpose. In the end, the purpose for
every thing the Godhead does is so that their glory is displayed before their
creation.