What does the Trinity tell us about God?

Without the Trinity love was not known, righteousness, holiness - the spiritual nature of God and purity as such. That is, He never was revealed as He is and always was. All the true nature of God, that is, what He is, without the Trinity is unknown. The Father wills; the Son quickens whom He will; but because we have separate wills, why necessarily have the Father and the Son? The Spirit distributes to whom He will; but this is not separate from the will of the Father and the Son. They have not the same counsel but one counsel, mind, purpose, thought; yet they act distinctly in the manifestation of that counsel. The Father sends the Son, and the Son the Spirit. Yet when the Son comes, He is not thereby separate from the Father. "The Father that dwelleth in me, he doeth the works." So He casts out demons by the Spirit of God; yet He casts them out. There is unity in all that constitutes oneness when we speak spiritually - not unity as one by arriving at the same things, or union, or by being united, as we are by having only one Spirit dwelling in all, but - by being one in eternal being; so that all else flows from that one will and counsel, yet so as that distinction in action in that will is revealed to us: not distinct will, but distinct willing.

Thus we see that there could be no full revelation of God, but through the Son by the Spirit, and thereby of the Father. The full revelation of the one God is only thus - Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. This, this only, is what the one God is, one identity of will and being, so that they are essentially one and one only, yet distinct in willing and acting (and we can distinguish them in willing and acting: hence we commonly speak of persons), yet never willing or acting but in the common will and unity of nature.

I fear much human language on this. But I affirm that the only full revelation of the one true God is the revelation of Him in the Trinity. Our prayers rise up the same. Through Him (Christ the Son) we have access by one Spirit unto the Father.

How then does God reveal Himself? The answer is as Father, Son and Holy Spirit—ONE God.

Our title at the head of this paper is one such. Yet there is abundance of teaching in the Holy Scriptures that God reveals Himself as Father, Son and Holy Spirit, not three Gods, but a Triune God, though Scripture teaches that the Father is God, the Son is God, the Holy Spirit is God, yet one God indivisible.

So we must be careful in using the terms, first, second and third Persons in the Trinity, not to think there is any difference in importance. The Father is God; the Son is God; the Spirit is God—the Spirit equal in nature and substance to the Father and the Son. If the three Persons of the Godhead are each of them God, it does not follow that there are three Gods. That were impossible. There can be only one God, supreme and unique. Orthodox Christendom believes in three Persons in the Godhead, yet one God, indivisible and unique—the three Persons in the Godhead with one will, one purpose, each sharing to the full every thought and desire and purpose in the minds of the others. We may not, nay cannot, comprehend this. It is a mystery hidden in the Godhead, yet the Godhead is pleased to reveal Itself as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

"The Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters, and God said, Let there be light." There are three persons in the Godhead. They are the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. The Father is He Who is often called "The Heavenly Father". If we are His children we may call Him, "Abba, Father". That is something like, "Dear Father." The Son of God is Jesus. If we belong to Him, we call Him, "Lord Jesus". He is God, but He once became a Man, and lived on the earth. He died to put away our sins and rose again from among the dead and went up to heaven. He is truly God and truly Man, the risen Man in the glory. The Holy Spirit is also God. He lives on the earth in those who belong to the Lord Jesus. He also speaks to people.

There are three divine persons: the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. Each of them is ‘God’.

This baptizing is "unto the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost." The name, not the names, of the Triune. This is the Christian revelation of God; and what is not done in this way is not Christian. The "name" in Scripture gives the real character of what it stands for; and the name here is the truth of the Godhead as now made known to us: thus "baptism" and the "faith" are once more, as in Eph. 4 ("one faith, one baptism,"), connected together.

Here in this very majestic declaration of the Oneness of the Godhead, care is taken to state it consistently with the truth afterwards revealed concerning the Three Persons of the Godhead—Father, Son and Spirit. These Three Persons, of one Substance, completely united in thought, will, purpose, counsel, are not three Gods, but One God, not a tritheism, but a Holy Trinity. We cannot understand the mystery of all this, but this truth lies at the very foundation of the Christian faith.

We are speaking of our Lord Jesus Christ as “the Son,” and not of His distinctive glories as “the Son of David,” “the Son of Man” and “the Son of God,” nor even of Him as “the Son of the Father,” but rather of His deity as God the Son. The Father is God, the Son is God, and the Holy Spirit is God; yet there are not three Gods, but one God, “God is one” (Gal. 3:20; 1 Tim. 2:5, N.Tr.). Baptism is to the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit,” we are told in Matthew 28:19. This indicates for us the trinity of Persons in the Godhead, all of whom share in that supreme glory.