What is trinity and why does it matter?

By Caleb | May 19, 2008

Yesterday was Trinity Sunday, and since I’ve recently been doing a lot of thinking trying to understand the trinity better, I agreed to do a short talk on trinity for the evening communion service in church at Mack.

So with some trepidition at tackling such a topic as trinity, but with plenty of prayer, and the help of Philip and Claire, who were leading the service, and Beverley, who together helped me put together and polish the following piece:

What do you think of when you hear the word “trinity”?

Perhaps you think it’s an obscure piece of theology, only for the clever or the keen. Perhaps you think it’s arrogant to even try and understand God. Perhaps you think trinity is important, but can’t see what difference it makes to your life.

Whatever you may think, trinity isn’t an invention of monks who needed to get out more. Trinity isn’t something the Church voted into existence a few hundred years after Jesus was around. And trinity isn’t a mystery we’re not supposed to even try and understand.

Instead, trinity is a way of putting into words what Christians have known all along, that God reveals himself, and we encounter him, as Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

There’s a sense in which trinity is a mystery. God is far, far bigger than we can ever fully understand. But as Daniel said to Nebuchadnezzar, “There’s a God in heaven who reveals mysteries”.

From the beginning to the end of the Bible, God reveals to us that he is both three and one. When Genesis says “In the beginning, God created…” the word for God, elohiym, is plural, while the action created, bara, is singular. Also, God says “Let us make man in our image”. Unity and plurality, right from the beginning.

When we think of God in the Old Testament, we often think of the burning cloud above Mount Sinai. But we also see the Spirit of God come on people. We see God appear as a man, eating with Abraham, wrestling with Jacob, walking in the fiery furnace.

In the New Testament, have you ever wondered why Jesus doesn’t just come straight out and say “I am God”, even though what he says amounts to that? The Pharisees knew it – and tried to kill him. His discipled realised it – and worshipped him. But instead of talking about “God”, Jesus always talks about his relationship with the Father. “I am in him, and he is in me”, “I and the Father are one”.

How do we make sense of all this, then? How do we understand God revealing himself both as one and three?

We try hard to explain the trinity with images we understand, but our images, explanations and comparisons aways fall short. Have you heard the one about the egg? You have the shell, the yolk, and the white, all in one egg. But does this make you want to worship God, comparing him to an egg? Does something we eat for breakfast really show us what God is like?

Father, Son and Spirit aren’t three slices of one divine pie; they aren’t three gods who happen to like each other a lot; they aren’t three different masks God wears one after another.

Trinity, simply explained, is this: God is Father, Son and Holy Spirit loving one another. More than that, God is the love that exists between Father, Son and Spirit.

These three persons are one God, not because all three happen to be made of some kind of “god stuff”, but because these relationships are God. What are those relationships? To use the language of the creeds, the Son is eternally begotten of the Father, and the Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son. Love and relationships are basic to the very nature and being of God.

This means that love isn’t just another attribute of God alongside his power and knowledge and justice and mercy… All that God is and all that God does overflows uncontainably from the love between Father, Son and Holy Spirit!

Trinity, then, is not an intellectual conundrum, but shows us that our God is a God of love and relationships. Love is the very fabric of the universe. Relationships are fundamental to our human nature.

When we see this, we begin to see how trinity is relevant to everything. If we start reading the Bible and looking at the world more through the lens of trinity, I suspect we’ll be pleasantly surprised how well things come into focus.

But more that that: isn’t our God beautiful? Don’t you just want to love a God who is love? This is the real point of understanding trinity: not to solve theological puzzles, but to worship and delight in God more and more.

To Him be the glory, forever and ever, Amen!

Some of the online resources I found helpful in thinking about trinity include some talks by Mike Reeves from Theology Network and some blog posts on Christ the Truth about the trinity in the Old Testament. eSword was useful, as usual, for Bible study. Some discussions on the Ship of Fools forums in the last couple of months on trinity were also helpful in stimulating my thinking on the subject, and sent me scurrying off to read things like the Athanasian Creed.

If you’ve any feedback, suggestions, criticisms, accusations of heresy and so on, feel free to comment!

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An Evangelical Manifesto

By Caleb | May 8, 2008

A group of American Evangelical Christians have published An Evangelical Manifesto, which makes excellent reading. It seeks to express what it means to be Evangelical, rescuing it from both conservative fundamentalism and liberal revisionism.

I’ve often wondered whether the word “evangelical” has gone the way of “fundamentalist”, with the popular derogatory meaning of “right-wing bigot” eclipsing the original theological meaning so that it becomes useless in communicating anything meaningful about your beliefs to the world at large.

But names are powerful identity-markers, and this confusion over the meaning of “evangelical” has led many to reject not just the label, but the theology that it stands for. I’ve struggled with evangelicalism, because some of the actions, practices and beliefs of those who call themselves evangelical can be pretty ugly, so I can really understand that.

However, I’ve also seen that there are many evangelicals who have a mature, intelligent, compassionate faith, and through struggling with different questions about my faith, have become more confident that an evangelical understanding is the right approach to the Bible and to theology. So I welcome the attempt to reclaim the word “evangelical” as both a term that should be theologically-defined and also as something that should mean good news.

Os Guiness, one of the writers of the manifesto, is one of those people who helped show me the possibility of being a thinking evangelical. He used to be a L’Abri worker and has written books such as Fit Bodies, Fat Minds on the importance of recovering the evangelical mind. Recently, he’s written The Case for Civility, which is about the kind of issues raised in the manifesto.

The manifesto doesn’t speak for all evangelicals, and nor does it claim to. The signatories tend to be more from the evangelical left than right, so it’s been signed by the likes of Ron Sider (author of Rich Christians in a World of Hunger) and Jim Wallis (President of Sojourners, which campaigns primarily on issues of peace and social justice, but not by major figures like Dr James Dobson, head of Focus on the Family, who is one of the most influential evangelical leaders in America and very politically conservative.

The manifesto opposes both the sacred public square (where one religion is established to the exclusion of others) and the naked public square (where all expressions of religious belief are excluded by coercive secularism), instead arguing for the civil public square:

We promote a civil public square, and we respect for the rights of all, even those with whom we disagree. Contrary to those who believe that “error has no rights,” we respect the right to be wrong. But we also insist that “the right to believe anything” does not mean that “anything anyone believes is right.” Rather, respect for conscientious differences also requires respectful debate.

I agree wholeheartedly with this, and argued the same point about “the right to be wrong” in one of my ed-op pieces for Gair Rhydd. But I think the terms in which the manifesto rejects “theocracy” betrays a misunderstanding of the relationship between God and State.

The manifesto equates “theocracy” with imposition, coercion, the curtailment of freedom and all sorts of other horrors:

Let it be known unequivocally that we are committed to religious liberty for people of all faiths, including the right to convert to or from the Christian faith. We are firmly opposed to the imposition of theocracy on our pluralistic society. We are also concerned about the illiberalism of politically correct attacks on evangelism. We have no desire to coerce anyone or to impose on anyone beliefs and behavior that we have not persuaded them to adopt freely, and that we do no not demonstrate in our own lives, above all by love.

I agree with the affirmation of religious liberty and the rejection of coercion. But a consistently Christian theocracy (that is, a political system where Christianity is the basis for law) would allow religious liberty, the right to convert, and forbid the coercion or imposition of beliefs because that’s what God commands.

“In any culture, the source of law is the god of that society” said R J Rushdoony, and while he was spectacularly wrong on many things (such as the idea that the Old Testament Law, including the death penalty for homosexuality, adultery, apostacy and other sins, should be applied directly to modern society), on this point I think he was right. Or as Doug Wilson put it: “Every society is a theocracy. The only question is, ‘Who’s Theo?'”

If we’re to be faithful to the Lordship of Christ over the whole world, including politics and including the public sphere, then “lots of us have very different beliefs, and we can’t really be sure who’s really right, so we’d better just try and agree a way of playing fair” is not a reason we can give for not imposing our beliefs and for having a civil public sphere.

Any Christian theocracy that excluded other beliefs would be inconsistent with the teachings of the Bible and not genuinely Christian. It seems to me that Christians should want a Christian theocracy in this sense, firstly because Jesus is exalted to the highest place, and one day every knee will bow and every tongue confess he is Lord, and so what he commands should be the basis for law in society, and secondly because only Christian theocracy can give a genuine and secure basis for liberty and freedom of religious belief.

For more on God and State, you might want to read David Field’s essay on “Rutherford and the Confessionally Christian State“. I also just checked Doug Wilson’s blog and see that he’s commented on the manifesto, making similar points to what I’ve just said, but clearer and better written!

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My Doctor Who short story book

By Caleb | May 2, 2008

Last year, I entered a Doctor Who short story competition, and was one of the 25 winners whose tales of the Time Lord are being published in a collection later this year, published by Big Finish Productions, who also make very good Doctor Who audio dramas starring the actors for the classic series.

And now, the official announcement about the book, including blurb and the cover, is online, and you can pre-order it from Big Finish. It’s published in September and will also be available in all good bookstores.

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Do all religions worship the same God?

By Caleb | April 25, 2008

I’ve been discussing this question recently on Ship of Fools, and also just read a very good blog post on the subject on the Christ the Truth blog.

A popular illustration is a group of blind people all trying to describe an elephant – one feels its trunk and thinks it’s a snake, one feels its leg and thinks it’s a tree, and so on. Are all religions just different attempts to make sense of the same being?

I don’t think so. The Bible speaks of the true God, and false Gods: the choice is between Yahweh and the idols. The idea that we’re all basically in agreement fails to do justice to the different and varied beliefs that people hold, and rests on some pretty shaky assumptions.

We tend to have in mind a philosophical conception of God, usually in terms of being a first cause with a few “omnis” thrown in (omniscient, omnipotent etc.), as our template, and then think that different religions are simply suggesting various tweaks and modifications to this basic idea.

But the Bible reveals God as trinity, which is very different to that. The trinity isn’t just an afterthought we add onto a general template of what people think God is like, but foundational to the Biblical revelation of God. Zeus is very different from the God of Islam, who is very different from Vishnu, and so on, and all of them are very different to the Triune God of the Bible. Just because Zeus, Allah, Vishnu and Christ are all referred to as a god or the God doesn’t mean that they have anything in common of necessity.

You could say the word “God” is more like a title, like “king”. It doesn’t carry any necessary content (although it has acquired certain baggage, as mentioned above), and doesn’t necessarily refer to the same thing. When we ask “Who is God?”, we aren’t trying to describe the same being but in slightly different ways. We’re asking “Who is king?” and proposing different beings to fill that role. If someone asks “do you believe in God?” the first answer should be “which God?”

Let’s just switch the analogy from “king” to “Prime Minister” for a moment. If I ask “who is the Prime Minister of Great Britain?” and someone answers “Gordon Brown” and another person “David Cameron”, then the first person is right and the second person is wrong. Despite this, there will be similarities in what they think the Prime Minister is like. Both will say that the Prime Minister is male, has dark hair, is leader of a political party and so on, despite referring to different people. Both are talking about the Prime Minister, but about different people.

So I think it’s fair to say that different religions talk about “God” in the sense that both people are talking about the Prime Minister. But different religions are talking about a different God (talking about Dave Cameron rather than Gordon Brown!), and so in that sense are completely wrong. But some of what they say about their God is actually true of the real God, so in that sense can be said to contain elements of truth.

But let’s get away from semantics to the real, vital issue: how do we worship the true God? We need two things: true knowledge of God, and hearts inclined to worship him. Sin deprives us of both, and salvation involves receiving both true knowledge and a change of heart.

To have true knowledge of God, we need the revelation of the Father through the Son attested to us by the Spirit, particularly through the God-breathed, Spirit-inspired Scriptures. To have changed hearts, we need the work of the Spirit to give us the resurrection life of Christ to restore us to fellowship with Father, Son and Spirit, just as they are in fellowship.

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Thoughts on masculinity and femininity

By Caleb | April 18, 2008

I’ve always been a bit bemused and sceptical about the twin ideas of “masculinity” and “femininity”. For a long time, it just seemed like so many gender stereotypes: Real Men go out into the wilderness to hunt bear with pointy stick; Ladies, on the other hand, like flowers, the colour pink, and fluffy things. And I get the impression that some Christian books merely repackage these stereotypes with a Christian veneer.

But as I’ve grown in my relationship with Beverley, certain patterns of relating to one another as man and woman have come naturally to us. It’s something more subtle than the crass stereotypes I mentioned above, but there is something wonderfully feminine about her. I don’t think we can extrapolate a universal scheme from our individual experience, of course, but it’s made me more receptive to the notion that masculinity and femininity aren’t just social constructs.

Various parts of the Bible also seems to say there’s more to gender than just human social categories. The only aspect of humanity that the Bible specifically identifies with being made “in the image of God” is that God made us “male and female” (Gen 1:27); maleness and femaleness are part of the very nature of what it means to be human.

In 1 Corinthians 11, Paul draws an analogy between the relationship of headship between Father and Son, Christ and the Church, and a husband and wife. The relationship between Father and Son is one of mutual love and giving, and both are equally God, but the relationship is not symmetrical: the Son is begotten of the Father, and not vice versa; the Son obeys the Father’s will, and not vice versa.

The cultural expression of our femininity and masculinity is likely to be distorted by sin, of course, and so we need to evaluate whether our social categories are good reflections of this order or not. But the above passages from the Bible seem to me to imply that there is a basic level of masculinity and femininity rooted in our human nature, in reflection of the divine nature.

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Film Review: The Spiderwick Chronicles

By Caleb | April 15, 2008

Some friends of mine were going to the cinema the other evening to watch The Spiderwick Chronicles, and having heard generally positive reviews of the film, I went along to see it.

The film is based on the series of five books written by Holly Black and illustrated by Tony DiTerlizzi, which were published in smallish hardbacks similar to those by Lemony Snicket. I haven’t read them, so I won’t be able to complain “It’s not as good as the book!” (though it probably isn’t).

It was a decent piece of entertainment, with some good action and excitement, nice monsters and creatures that weren’t all pinched from Lord of the Rings, and some refreshingly true-to-life sibling bickering.

It had its weaknesses, though, such the nebulous nature of the threat. We repeatedly told that if the villainous Mulgrath succeeded in getting his hands on the Field Guide, then he’d be able to use it to kill everyone, but it was never explained how exactly. With no explanation of how he actually intended to use the Book, the film became a simple game of “Chase the MacGuffin”, and the themes of the power, danger and responsibility of knowledge remained sadly underdeveloped.

The ending was also a little unsatisfying, combining both anticlimax and Hollywood sentimentality. In all, a pleasing enough way to spend a couple of hours, but not really worth going to see in the cinema.

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Wrestling with Elvis

By Caleb | April 15, 2008

In the Mack student group, we’re going to be discussing Velvet Elvis by Rob Bell, subtitled “Repainting the Christian Faith”.

Some of it is very, very good. Some of it is pretty bad. A lot of it just seems confused, though it raises some good questions.

All this makes it ideal for a group of students to get their teeth into, testing it, thinking about it, wrestling with it, as the book commendably recommends that we do.

To help us see how it measures up against what the Bible says, I’ve put together a few questions. This week we’ll be looking at the introduction and first “movement” (chapters aren’t cool enough, apparently).

Introduction

  • Does the Christian faith always need repainting, as Rob Bell argues?
  • Are there non-negotiables that are fixed and unchanging?
  • “The pursuit of Jesus is leading us backwards as much as forwards”. What essentials do we need to return to? What elements of how we live out the Christian faith need repainting?

Movement 1: Jump

  • Does everyone follow someone? If so, what difference does this make?
  • Is Jesus’ way just “a better way to live”, or is there more to it?
  • If God reveals himself, can we say that the “springs” emerged over time?
  • Should we “invite people to jump on the trampoline”, rather than “defend the wall”? What does this look like in practice?
  • Are all questions good? What’s the difference between a good and a bad question?
  • Is “our joy” the point of the Christian faith? Is this what “Delight yourself in the Lord” means?
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Doctor Who: Partners in Crime Review

By Caleb | April 7, 2008

Updated again: My podcast commentary with my friend Peter on Partners in Crime is now online. Give it a listen!

Updated: My review of Partners in Crime, the Doctor Who series premiere, is in today’s Western Mail, and also available to read on their website. They’ve edited it down a bit, so here’s the uncut version:

Doctor Who, one of Wales’ finest exports, returned to our screens on Saturday with one of its silliest and funniest episodes yet.

Partners in Crime had all the classic ingredients of an opening episode of the show: a sharp script from Russell T Davies, a contemporary setting, some topical themes given a sci-fi twist (in this case, obesity and supernannies), and of course, David Tennant on fine form.

Catherine Tate returns as Donna Noble after her one-off appearance in the 2006 Christmas special, The Runaway Bride. She turned down his offer to be his companion, a decision she now regrets, and so sets out to find him.

Wherever there are strange goings-on, the Doctor is sure to follow, so Donna investigates the mysterious Adipose weight-loss pill. Their parallel investigations criss-cross, always just missing each other to comic effect. But before long, the two of them find themselves up against the sinister Miss Foster, played with relish by Sarah Lancashire, and her hordes of Adipose…

If you’re one of those people that thinks that quality drama has to involve lots of “darkness” and gloomy people arguing over kitchen sinks, then this wasn’t for you. Go and watch EastEnders, or if you prefer science fiction gloom, the remake of Battlestar Galactica instead.

Nothing wrong with preferring a darker style, of course. I love the occasional dark and scary Doctor Who episode as much as the next fan. But the show is a rare example of genuine family viewing, and its variety in tone and its humour is vital to its appeal and success. This was light and frothy Doctor Who done at its laugh-out-loud best.

This was due in no small part to Catherine Tate. When I heard that she was the new companion, I was a little worried, not being a fan of her particular brand of comedy. But I need not have feared. Russell T Davies’ deft script gives her chance to shine. When the Doctor and Donna finally spot each other across an office while undercover, they have to communicate in mime in a bravura performance by the two leads. Doctor Who always has lots of jokes, but has rarely been such out-and-out comedy, and rarer still so successfully.

There are also quieter moments, like scenes between Donna and her grandfather Wilf, played by Bernard Cribbins, showing more depth to the character. Her no-nonsense approach is also a welcome contrast to Rose and Martha’s romantic infatuations with the Doctor.

The season premiere is often more about bringing together the Doctor and his companion than about the notional alien threat. In Partners in Crime, the aliens’ evil plot is even more slight than usual.

Miss Foster’s weight-loss pills “make the fat walk away” – literally. They turn fat people into a pile of cute little Adipose creatures. The Adipose go on the march in their thousands, thanks to the wonders of the same CGI technology that created the armies in Lord of the Rings.

It makes a nice change for the villains not to be invading the Earth – Miss Foster is just playing nanny, and doesn’t care if humans die. But it doesn’t make for great conflict. I was waiting for the little critters to turn evil, but they just floated happily up to their mothership, and it all seems a little flat.

But there was an unexpected twist in the tale. Rose Tyler, played by Billie Piper, was last seen trapped in a parallel universe – so how could she appear briefly at the end, before vanishing into thin air? A taste of things to come no doubt, and we’ll have to keep watching. I know where I’ll be on Saturday evening from now on!

This evening I’ll be recording a commentary on the episode with my friend Peter as the first Podcast of Impossible Things, so listen out for that!

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Zimbabwe elections

By Caleb | April 7, 2008

One of the items in the news recently that I’ve been particularly interested in is the elections in Zimbabwe. Back home in North Wales, I know a family through church who fled the country because of the troubles there, and so it’s recent woes have all the more immediacy for me knowing some of those affected.

Unfortunately, but unsurprisingly, Robert Mugabe looks set to cling on to power with all the might he can muster. The results, which have still to be officially released, and the future of that country, hang in the balance.

The High Court judge has ruled that he can hear a petition from the opposition party for the results of the presidential vote to be released immediately, and has set the case for tomorrow. The Guardian has a live blog of the latest developments.

On another note, Doug Wilson, whose views I often have a lot of time for, while discussing how Christians should respond to globalisation, says of Zimbabwe “The actual problem is that the natives are not capable of running their country responsibly” – oh dear.

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