The doctrine of the Holy Trinity is clearly laid out in the Scriptures and we aren’t being unfaithful when we admit that this doctrine is something difficult to grasp with our finite minds. The sacred mystery of the Holy Trinity is something that evades our understanding. However, because this truth is beyond our total understanding, we should not be doubtful of the essence contained in this mysterious truth. In the exactness of mathematics, one plus one plus one equals three. But where God is concerned this same equation always equals one and not three God’s.
The late Dr. Lockyer wrote, “The Trinity is a subject that has engaged the greatest minds during the centuries of the Christian era, but even Christian philosophers have utterly failed to explore its profound depths. Augustine gave the study of this mystery of the Trinity the best powers of his great mind. It is related of him that walking along the seashore one day, absorbed in deep contemplation, he came across a lad digging a trench. Asking the lad what he meant to do, he told Augustine that he wanted to empty the sea into his trench. Whereupon Augustine said to himself – Am I not trying to do the same thing as this child in seeking to exhaust with my reason the infinity of God and to collect it within the limits of my own mind?” (1)
There is a certain fullness, a completeness, to God that draws us to consider our own incompleteness apart from him. Living outside of a relationship with God leaves us incomplete as spiritual human beings. Without God as a part of our lives we are spiritually undeveloped. Only when we yield ourselves to God do we begin to enjoy a sense of completion that develops as we grow in the grace of God and in our understanding of him. Though we have entered into God, there is also the possible tragedy of choosing to remain underdeveloped.
Our childlike faith accepts him as he is without wrangling over things that we don’t understand about him – we accept that he is the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit just as the Scriptures declare him to be. We accept him as he has revealed himself to us and we don’t try to remake him after our own designs or personal preferences.
What we do instead, as heirs of God and joint heirs with Jesus Christ, is work toward remaking ourselves as the adopted children of God. We yield ourselves to the leading of the Holy Spirit as he walks us along the path of life that meanders by thousands of mirrored reflecting pools where we see our own reflection of imperfection against a backdrop of his own reflection of holiness. And, like children, we confess our weaknesses and imperfections to God who cares for us with an eternal love.
As we embrace God’s love and relinquish our inordinate self-love we discover life in the Spirit. Life in the Spirit is a life of growing. We are never content where we are. We desire to grow deeper in the things of God. We hunger for more intimacy with God. In this process of spiritual development we realize that there is nothing material in this world that is more important than the communion we have with God.
Open our eyes, dear God, to see you as you are and ourselves as we are and draw us through the power of your Holy Spirit to greater depths of personal surrender as we seek your divine will in our lives, centered in Christ. Amen.
(1)Herbert Lockyer, “All the Doctrines of the Bible”, 1964, Zondervan
©David Kralik Ministries, Inc. 2003
Email: matthewfivesix@hotmail.com |
