Some say that in order to be a Christian you need to believe in The Trinity. But I wonder how many people have truly used the scriptures to delve into the mysterious, non-biblical idea. The belief that God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit are one God, yet 3 separate personages yet the same being is confusing to say the least. It’s necessary to understand that the concept of the Trinity is based off interpretation of scripture by leaders of the early Christian church. Even when talking with friends of mine they don’t even understand the concept enough to explain it to me clearly.
They try to explain that Jesus is different from God but yet the same. I feel even more confused and wondering what they believe after.
The scripture that many use to support the idea of the Trinity is John 1:1
“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.”
With the understanding that the Word is Jesus this makes perfect sense. In the beginning was Jesus, and Jesus was with God and Jesus was God.
Another scripture that is used to support the Trinity is John 10:30
Jesus said: “I and the Father are one.”
One can also mean one in purpose and unity. Jesus clearly wasn’t telling us He and the Father are one personage.
On the other hand, scriptures used to show that the Trinity is a manmade idea is simple. If you are Christian and you don’t believe in the Trinity you believe in something similar yet very different. You believe that God the Father is the father of our spirits, that Jesus is the literal Son of God and as such is a God who suffered for our sins and rose up again so that we too will be immortal, and that the Holy Spirit is a God who is a Spirit who can visit and comfort and teach us.
“And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth.” -Genesis 1:26
Notice how God says let us make man in our image, after our likeness. God is not talking to himself. God’s not schizophrenic, with multiple personalities. God is speaking to another in the process of the creation. God was speaking to Jesus Christ who helped in the creation. What a beautiful and simple truth that is.
Another instance that shows that God, Jesus and the Holy Spirit are 3 distinct Gods is in Matthew 3:16-17
“And Jesus, when he was baptized, went up straightway out of the water: and lo, the heavens opened unto him, and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove, and lighting upon him: And lo a voice from heaven, saying, This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.”
Here we see that when Jesus was baptized he went in the water and the Spirit descended like a dove and God spoke to all those present identifying how he was proud of His Son. God, Jesus and the Holy Spirit are in 3 different places at the same time.
There is even more plain evidence that God is not the same being as Jesus. The Great Intercessory Prayer in John chapter 17.
“These words spake Jesus, and lifted up his eyes to heaven, and said: Father, the hour is come; glorify thy Son, that thy Son also may glorify thee…O Father, glorify thou me with thine own self with the glory which I had with thee before the world was”
This shows that Jesus prays to God the Father. Jesus wasn’t speaking to himself. He was praying to His Father as a child speaks to his Father.
The examples continue. When Stephen, one of the apostles, was being stoned for preaching about Christ he said in Acts 7:56
“Behold, I see the heavens opened, and the Son of man standing on the right hand of God.”
8ways2 
Nice article from one LDS blogger to another!
However, the doctrine of the Trinity is a little more complicated than it looks: it’s not that Jesus and the Father are the same person, but that they’re separate manifestations of the same substance/Deity. (You can Google the is/is not triangle on the Trinity to understand better what I’m saying.) As the doctrine goes, the Father, Son and Holy Ghost are separate manifestations so they can definitely interact with each other and be present alongside each other. You could use most of these scriptures to support a Trinitarian or a non-Trinitarian view.
I think the biggest key is John 17: 22 “that they [Jesus’ disciples] may be one, even as we are one.” If we were to read that in a Trinitarian way it would mean that Jesus wants us to physically be the same being with each other! The only way to read it in a way that makes sense is that they are perfectly unified and one in purpose.
Thanks for the good read!
LikeLiked by 1 person
God is so mighty that we can’t comprehend Him. I don’t question too much because MUCH FOR I AM JUST a lowly being compared to Him.
LikeLike
We are supposed to comprehend him if we are to have life eternal……the scripture says this is life eternal to know God!
LikeLiked by 1 person
But isn’t the same substance and different manifestations interpretation another way of saying ‘modalism’, which the ancient church declared a heresy?
LikeLike
Matthew 13: 13-15
13. Therefore speak I to them in parables: because they seeing see not; and hearing they hear not, neither do they understand.
14 And in them is fulfilled the prophecy of Esaias, which saith, By hearing ye shall hear, and shall not understand; and seeing ye shall see, and shall not perceive:
15 For this people’s heart is waxed gross, and their ears are dull of hearing, and their eyes they have closed; lest at any time they should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and should understand with their heart, and should be converted, and I should heal them.
Acts 17:23
23 For as I passed by, and beheld your devotions, I found an altar with this inscription, To the Unknown God. Whom therefore ye ignorantly worship, him declare I unto you—
1 Corinthians 3:2
2 I have fed you with milk, and not with meat: for hitherto ye were not able to bear it, neither yet now are ye able.
________________________________________________________________________
The “Oneness” of the Godhead was given as a PARABLE to three different groups. This parable was meant to obscure the sacred meaning from unbelievers and those who were spiritually unlearned. It was not time for the Gentiles (the unbelieving Romans who “ignorantly worshipped an Unknown God”) to receive this sacred knowledge nor should they receive it directly from Jesus Christ, but they were to receive it after the House of Judah received it first. It was the House of Judah (and Israel’s) Abrahamic birthright that they receive the Gospel message and then they were to preside over administering the Gospel (with Priesthood authority) and teach this sacred knowledge to the Gentiles. The Apostle Paul was the one who was authorized to preach to the Gentiles in their given place and time (Acts 17:23)
For the most part, the religious leaders of the House of Israel were offended by the teachings of Jesus and He was not accepted as a true prophet amongst His own people (Matt 13:57-58). The Scribes, Pharisees, and Sadducees were threatened by Jesus’ miracles and teachings and set out to put Him to death. However, there were also those who were not spiritually dead—who listened, learned, and followed after Christ’s teachings. Jesus authorized 12 Apostles as His Representatives (receiving the Priesthood) to go and preach the Gospel (these men along with others were taught firsthand by Jesus) and they understood the Parable of the Godhead Doctrine. But did the people really want to be taught by these humble servants? Jesus Christ and His Apostles were hunted down and killed by the Roman Leaders, by the Jewish Leaders, and by many converted Christians (called Judaizers) for political reasons.
Paul one of the Apostles chosen later–preached to the 7 Churches in Asia Minor in the attempt to teach the Godhead Doctrine, however he told these newly converted Christians, “I have fed you with milk, and not with meat: for hitherto ye were not able to bear it, neither yet now are ye able.” (1Corin 3:2). Many times, the Apostles wanted to preach the “meat” to these converts however the Spirit constrained them, even to the point that the Spirit forbid them to go to them—because their lives were in danger to be amongst the people. These converts were not spiritually ready for the sacred “Meat of the Gospel” and we’re not ready for the Apostles to reveal the Parables that Christ taught. Eventually these Apostles were killed off and their sacred teachings (that they were authorized to preach) died with them. No more authorized leaders—who were given priesthood authority to be representatives of Jesus Christ and His teachings.
The Trinity theory was man’s attempt to understand the sacred Godhead Doctrine (which they did not receive by one having authority). Eventually the Holy Roman Emperor Constantine (325AD) ruled that all those who did not believe in this man-made theory were beheaded and burned at the stake (causing the Great Apostasy which was foretold)….this is why modern Christendom (who has only received the milk) do not understand the Godhead Doctrine which is the “meat of the Gospel” and who have instead “turned back” (like their forefathers) to “ignorantly worship an Unknown God” as the Romans did before them.
THE KEY: However the key to understand this sacred PARABLE can be found in Jesus’ Intercessory Prayer (which was His Dedicatory Prayer used to dedicate his body for the sacrifice of our sins) as He is prayed in Gethsamane to His Father. This is the sacred knowledge that allows an individual the opportunity to be glorified “to become ONE with the Father and the Son” and know the same love (that the Son received from the Father when He received Eternal Life) that thereby we can also gain Eternal Life WITH them. The “oneness” (or unity with the Father and the Son) is the process whereby we can become “joint-heirs with Jesus Christ” (Romans 8:17) if we suffer with Him, and eventually we can be glorified to sit WITH the Son on the righthand of the Father (thus gaining Eternal Life).
John 17:1-26
1 These words spake Jesus, and lifted up his eyes to heaven, and said, Father, the hour is come; glorify thy Son, that thy Son also may glorify thee:
2 As thou hast given him power over all flesh, that he should give eternal life to as many as thou hast given him.
3 And this is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent.
4 I have glorified thee on the earth: I have finished the work which thou gavest me to do.
5 And now, O Father, glorify thou me with thine own self with the glory which I had with thee before the world was.
6 I have manifested thy name unto the men which thou gavest me out of the world: thine they were, and thou gavest them me; and they have kept thy word.
7 Now they have known that all things whatsoever thou hast given me are of thee.
8 For I have given unto them the words which thou gavest me; and they have received them, and have known surely that I came out from thee, and they have believed that thou didst send me.
9 I pray for them: I pray not for the world, but for them which thou hast given me; for they are thine.
10 And all mine are thine, and thine are mine; and I am glorified in them.
11 And now I am no more in the world, but these are in the world, and I come to thee. Holy Father, keep through thine own name those whom thou hast given me, that they may be one, as we are.
12 While I was with them in the world, I kept them in thy name: those that thou gavest me I have kept, and none of them is lost, but the son of perdition; that the scripture might be fulfilled.
13 And now come I to thee; and these things I speak in the world, that they might have my joy fulfilled in themselves.
14 I have given them thy word; and the world hath hated them, because they are not of the world, even as I am not of the world.
15 I pray not that thou shouldest take them out of the world, but that thou shouldest keep them from the evil.
16 They are not of the world, even as I am not of the world.
17 Sanctify them through thy truth: thy word is truth.
18 As thou hast sent me into the world, even so have I also sent them into the world.
19 And for their sakes I sanctify myself, that they also might be sanctified through the truth.
20 Neither pray I for these alone, but for them also which shall believe on me through their word;
21 That they all may be one; as thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee, that they also may be one in us: that the world may believe that thou hast sent me.
22 And the glory which thou gavest me I have given them; that they may be one, even as we are one:
23 I in them, and thou in me, that they may be made perfect in one; and that the world may know that thou hast sent me, and hast loved them, as thou hast loved me.
24 Father, I will that they also, whom thou hast given me, be with me where I am; that they may behold my glory, which thou hast given me: for thou lovedst me before the foundation of the world.
25 O righteous Father, the world hath not known thee: but I have known thee, and these have known that thou hast sent me.
26 And I have declared unto them thy name, and will declare it: that the love wherewith thou hast loved me may be in them, and I in them.
Romans 8:17
17 And if children, then heirs; heirs of God, and joint-heirs with Christ; if so be that we suffer with him, that we may be also glorified together.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I can answer the question with one example—-ICE, WATER, STEAM. The three can not exist in the same sphere at the same time without changing form
LikeLike
But when they exist all together at one time….they are separate completely…..ice is ice…water is water and steam is steam……all h2o but existing in 3 separate entities. Independent of each other in physical conception.
LikeLike
You are descibing the man-made theory about God…the Trinitarian “mystical vapor of smoke.” But this magical description would be better applied to priestcraft (instead of priesthood) which is the medium that Satan uses to accomplish his ends (not what God uses or with which He uses to describe Himself).
LikeLike