Defending the Holy Trinity

Defending the Holy Trinity – the doctrine of the Trinity is neglected by Christians. We may defend our eschatology with a degree of confidence; the Trinity not so much.

What sometimes complicates matter is that there are organizations which claim to be Christian, yet deny the doctrine of the Trinity, and the person of the Holy Spirit. The best known two are the pseudo Christian cults: Jehovah’s Witnesses and The Church of Latter-day Saints (Mormons).

Perhaps lesser known is T. D. Jakes’ Modalisic Heresy. While the modern Seventh-day Adventist Church affirms the Trinity, founders and early writers rejected the doctrine. Herbert W. Armstrong’s World Wide Church of God also denied the doctrine; and many of its offshoots, following the great schism, still do.

Jason Lisle

Christian astronomer (and presuppositional apologist) Jason Lisle has written several non-academic, but helpful articles on the Trinity:

The Trinity Part 1: Monotheism,

Many unbiblical positions can be traced back to a misunderstanding of the nature of God. God has revealed to us in His Word some aspects of His nature. If we are to have a correct understanding of God, then we must accept what God has said about Himself. This is why the Trinity is an essential Christian doctrine. Many people deny what the Bible says about God’s nature, and instead place their faith in a god they have produced from their own imagination – a god that is easier to understand.

Tabletalk Magazine

Robert Letham on the Holy Spirit,

The Holy Spirit subsists in the indivisible Trinity as one of the three hypostases (persons). As such, He is fully and exhaustively God, one in being eternally with the Father and the Son, one in power and glory. Whatever God does, the Spirit does, since in all God’s works all three persons work together inseparably, whether in creation, providence, or salvation. Therefore, when we speak of the Spirit at work, we must always remember that the Father and the Son are also involved.

Nevertheless, the Holy Spirit is not the Father, and He is not the Son either, for the three are eternally distinct. There is but one God, so the Spirit is identical in being or essence with the Father and the Son, but in terms of personhood, He is irreducibly distinct. Thus, there are actions attributed (or appropriated) peculiarly to the Spirit—only He was sent at Pentecost—but even here He was sent by the Father through and in the Son…continue reading

For reasons stated in the links above and below, the doctrine of the Trinity is vitally important to Christianity. Let’s not neglect it.

Maranatha!