What is your view on the Trinity?

[CopticChristian]

I’ve grown up Protestant and then had about 2 years where I believed in the LDS faith and 8 months of that, I took lessons from missionaries and attended an LDS church. I kind of still have a unique belief they have…I don’t believe exactly in the Trinity. I don’t believe God is Jesus, and Jesus is God in the flesh, and so on. I believe God is God and is His own unique individual, and that Jesus is his Son but is also a unique, separate individual, and same with the Holy Spirit. So I was just wondering, am I alone in this belief? Even growing up I always had an extremely difficult time with the “egg” story of how an egg has a yolk and a shell but is still an egg, etc. and how God came down as Jesus but then God had to turn his back on Jesus, or in that case himself, because he could not look at himself with the sin he had taken…etc.

Anyone else? What’s your view on the Trinity? Anyone else have the same belief as me?

I start with Mystery. I believe what has been revealed. I read and study what others say and then I realize that I am a creature with a finite mind, created to know and understand certain things and understand that there are things I cannot understand and just accept. I end with Mystery.

Perhaps considering the depth and extent of the Universe is an example of what we know with the limited knowledge we have. Perhaps it is not a good example. There are certain things I just cannot know and understand and just accept.

 

[jediliz]

When I said God turned his back on Jesus, I was referring to when Jesus was on the cross and God turned his back because he couldn’t look at sin.

What Church taught you THAT?

That is not what the Church taught.

The trinity: Well, saint patrick used a clover to explain it…with three leaves. One clover, three leaves. One God, three unique persons…but all the same God.

Father: Our Creator
Son: Our Savior Christ Jesus
Holy Spirit: The advocate

 

[CopticChristian]

I think some do…all theological treatise fail eventually…we are dealing with Mystery afterall. In my own experience discussing with many Christians, I get the impression that many seem to believe that somehow Jesus “saves” us from God…that it’s Jesus vs God…that somehow Jesus is “protecting” us from the wrath of a vengeful God…like they are two entities entirely different…yet somehow “one”.

We claim we believe in “one God” but this God we sometimes describe needs propitation somehow…“God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself…” God’s very nature and love for humanity is revealed in Jesus of Nazareth…God Himself entered our humanity to save us…yet sometimes…we tend to separate the two as though the “vengeful wrathful God” was “satisfied” by a debt paid by Christ on the cross…His love and mercy is overshadowed by this very “punative” concept as though we need to be “protected” from God by Jesus…I can see how Muslims…and others…could get a very “polytheistic” concept of the Trinity.

It sort of sounds that way as you put it and in some respect I understand your point of view. I don’t want to get into a long discussion about it however attributes of God is what we look at in terms of Perfect Justice, Perfect Mercy, and after all this is His creation and how He created it to redeem. That too is a mystery.

God could have created a perfect world to enjoy. God could have created a world that went wrong and then just waved His hand and made it all better. He chose to do it the way He did it. Go figure.

 

[Peace_of_cake]

I think some do…all theological treatise fail eventually…we are dealing with Mystery afterall. In my own experience discussing with many Christians, I get the impression that many seem to believe that somehow Jesus “saves” us from God…that it’s Jesus vs God…that somehow Jesus is “protecting” us from the wrath of a vengeful God…like they are two entities entirely different…yet somehow “one”.

We claim we believe in “one God” but this God we sometimes describe needs propitation somehow…“God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself…” God’s very nature and love for humanity is revealed in Jesus of Nazareth…God Himself entered our humanity to save us…yet sometimes…we tend to separate the two as though the “vengeful wrathful God” was “satisfied” by a debt paid by Christ on the cross…His love and mercy is overshadowed by this very “punative” concept as though we need to be “protected” from God by Jesus…I can see how Muslims…and others…could get a very “polytheistic” concept of the Trinity.

Thanks for the reflections

 

[Peace_of_cake]

For the Record, Jesus was an Asian Jew. Christianity is an Eastern Religion. I see you speak of Western Christian Literature. What is it you speak of?

The Western Church or Latin Church literature has a different flavour to The Eastern Church or Greek literature. The former generally starting at God’s oneness and then explaining the threeness the latter tends to be in the opposite. Arab and Syriac Christians perhaps have a more modalistic interpretation owing to their use of the style of the Muslim mutakallimun (theologians). As a few have said and as St Augustine affirms: ‘the total transcendence of the godhead quite surpasses the capacity of ordinary speech.’

 

[Lapey]

When I said God turned his back on Jesus, I was referring to when Jesus was on the cross and God turned his back because he couldn’t look at sin.

This is a very sad and incorrect view of the triumphant mission of Jesus on the cross. Jesus nor His Father were ashamed of being on that cross. This act has saved the world, no Christian should be ashamed of Jesus being on the cross either.

 

[BartBurk]

I’ve grown up Protestant and then had about 2 years where I believed in the LDS faith and 8 months of that, I took lessons from missionaries and attended an LDS church. I kind of still have a unique belief they have…I don’t believe exactly in the Trinity. I don’t believe God is Jesus, and Jesus is God in the flesh, and so on. I believe God is God and is His own unique individual, and that Jesus is his Son but is also a unique, separate individual, and same with the Holy Spirit. So I was just wondering, am I alone in this belief? Even growing up I always had an extremely difficult time with the “egg” story of how an egg has a yolk and a shell but is still an egg, etc. and how God came down as Jesus but then God had to turn his back on Jesus, or in that case himself, because he could not look at himself with the sin he had taken…etc.

Anyone else? What’s your view on the Trinity? Anyone else have the same belief as me?

If you believe that Jesus is God and that he is a separate person from the Father and the Holy Ghost, but they are all God and there is only one God then you are stuck with the Trinity. If you reject the divinity of Jesus then you can believe whatever you want and it won’t make any difference.

 

[Gabriel_of_12]

Who was God talking to?
When God (first person) spoke His Word (second person) (Jesus the Word of God made flesh) that the Spirit (third person) made all creation possible including man and woman created in “OUR IMAGE”.

What is the Image of God? = Trinity

Genesis 1:26 Then God said: Let us make* human beings** in our image,** after our likeness. Let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, the birds of the air, the tame animals, all the wild animals, and all the creatures that crawl on the earth.

27God created mankind in his image;

in the image of God he created them;

male and female* he created them.

Phillipians 2:6 Who, though he was in the form of God*,
did not regard equality with God something to be grasped.*

7Rather, he emptied himself, taking the form of a slave,
coming in human likeness;
and found human in appearance,*
8he humbled himself,
becoming obedient to death, even death on a cross.*
9Because of this, God greatly exalted him

and bestowed on him the name*
that is above every name,g
10that at the name of Jesus

every knee should bend,*
of those in heaven and on earth and under the earth,h
11and every tongue confess that

Jesus Christ is Lord,*
to the glory of God the Father.

God the Father, Fathers creation, God the Son (Jesus) saves creation, God the Spirit created creation, three distinct persons all “One God” united in Love, for God is Love.

Trinity is a mystery that no mortal will ever exhaust the revelation of God’s mystery in the Blessed Trinity. “**Faith is called for **here in Jesus Christ who reveals the Father and the Spirit.” by His Word of God made flesh (incarnation) to our humanity.