Can the Trinitarian Doctrine in Its Fullest Form Truly Maintain Monotheism?

[Matthew6:33]

My JW/LDS senses are tingling.

 

[Andy C]

Im not going to add my own views, as they have already been expressed by others on this thread. I 100 percent believe in the trinity as one God.

The below link is about a 2-3 minute read from Got Questions on the Trinity:

What does the Bible teach about the Trinity? | GotQuestions.org

What does the Bible say about the Trinity / Triunity? Is the doctrine of the Trinity found in the Bible? How is the trinity not tritheism?

www.gotquestions.org

 

[Tall Timbers]

This Board operates with some Scriptural Truths.

Thread 'Scriptural Truths'

Jun 3, 2023

Scriptural Truths

This board will operate on a scripturally sound basis…for your protection and that of the Kingdom of God on this earth. We hope you respect that. If not, we reserve the right to remove offending posts. And, as in any church, continual offenders will be dealt with—using the disciplinary measures outlined in the epistles.
Being a scripturally sound Christian board means some doctrines are foundational and not up for discussion. You may ask questions, but you cannot post material attempting to negate these doctrines. We will contend for the faith once delivered...

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You may ask questions for your own edification, but you may not argue against these truths.

The OP was an argument against one of our Scriptural Truths:

God is One God. (Deuteronomy 6:4; Deuteronomy 4:35; Mark 12:29) However, He is a Trinity of Persons. Although the word “trinity” does not appear in the bible, the reality of the Trinity does, perhaps nowhere more evidently than at Christ’s baptism, where we read “After He was baptized, Jesus came up immediately from the water; and behold, the heavens were opened, and he (John the Baptist) saw the Spirit of God (the Holy Spirit) descending as a dove and settling on Him (Jesus) and behold, a voice from the heavens (the Father) said, “This is My beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased.” (Matthew 3:16-17)

 

[Hol]

I believe I have already answered this. The verses to which you refer simply reveal one God having different persons, each containing the fullness of God ... which is significantly greater than one God manifesting Himself in different ways at different times.

Is this oneness view a version of that old Manichaeism?

reveal. I take every verse seriously, including those that emphasize the singular pronouns God uses of Himself—“I,” “Me,” “Mine,” never “We” or “Us” when speaking personally. I see Jesus as the visible manifestation of that one invisible Spirit, not as a second divine consciousness beside Him. So it’s not disbelief in Scripture, but a different interpretation of what the same verses teach about God’s identity.

Your view sadly sounds so much like the false Allah of the Quran. Allah is singular and is not love. Our triune God is love and has always been love.

Islam invented a god that never had love, and couldn’t because there was no one to love.

The doctrine of aseity helps us understand that God in three Persons has always loved and freely extends that love to His creation.

[Mod note: Aseity means that God does not depend on any cause other than Himself for His existence, realization, or end, and has within Himself His own reason of existence.]

Here’s a much better explanation of God’s Aseity:

All creation is dependent upon God (Acts 17:25-28)​

Thus there is a Creator-creature distinction that will never be crossed.​

What Differences Does His Aseity Make?​

So hopefully by now you are convinced that this doctrine of the aseity of God is a Biblical doctrine. I want to look next at what difference it should make in how we live.

Obviously we can’t imitate aseity itself or we would be God. Systematic theology books group God's attributes under two groupings: communicable attributes (like love, holiness, mercy, patience, etc.) and incommunicable attributes (like aseity, infinity, omnipresence, etc). Communicable attributes are attributes that God can reproduce in us. He can give us His divine love, mercy, holiness, patience, etc. But incommunicable attributes are attributes that are unique to God and cannot in even the least bit be communicated into the creature. Aseity is one of God’s incommunicable attributes. That means that it is unique to God, and therefore we will never have any aseity. It is the nature of Godhood to have aseity and it is the nature of creaturehood to not have aseity - to be dependent. So we can’t imitate the aseity itself. But it is still a very practical doctrine.

It means we can never accuse God of being selfish or seeking His own needs since He has no needs (1 Chron. 29:14; John 3:35; 13:3; 17:7; Mark 9:7; Acts 17:25; Rom. 8:32; 2 Cor. 5:18; Philippians; 1 Tim. 6:17; 2 Pet. 1:3; etc.)​

First, the more you understand this attribute, the more you realize how unselfish God is and how absolutely selfless God's love and other attributes are. And I am going to take the first three subpoints together because I think they answer a frequent objection of atheists (that I began this service with), and they also give us incredible comfort.

If you have listened to very many debates of atheists with Christians, you are probably familiar with their accusation that the Christian God is a narcissistic, self-absorbed, and selfish God. They might say, “Your God is selfish. All he wants is recognition, glory, attention, worship, and service. What kind of a God is that?! It's all about Him and His desires. He commands you to be self-sacrificing, but Him? - no, He wants everything for Himself.” Here is a quote from an atheist's blog:

I am having trouble seeing the Christian God as anything other than totally narcissistic and self-centered. Here is a quick outline of why... God values his own glory and honor over the well-being of humans… God chooses himself over people for his own benefit. God is selfish.

What are we to think of that? I have read ill-informed Christian blogs that have had questions about what appears to them to be selfishness in God. One blog said, “So God is selfish. Get over it.” But I don’t think that’s a good answer. Selfishness is one of the great sins that ruin humans and that God warns us against. In fact, in the book of Philippians he calls us to imitate God’s lack of selfishness. Just read the book of Philippians sometime and you will see that it wants us to imitate God's selfless concern for others. So if, as some people assert, God is selfish to the core of His being just like we humans tend to be, we have a major problem.

And the Scriptures in the first three points give some good answers. The first answer is that God is not a solitary Person, but a Trinity. The Islamic God is a solitary person, and if he had love at all, there would have been no one to love before creation except himself. There would have been no other person to love. And thus it is no surprise that the Islamic god has a self-oriented love leading to selfishness.

But since God is a Trinity, we see a radically different character to His love. His love is agape love, which is self-giving and self-sacrificing love. Agape love is the exact opposite of narcissistic love. The Father loves the Son and Spirit, not Himself. Likewise the Father praises and glorifies the Son and Spirit, not Himself. You see examples of the Father deflecting praise to the Son. “This is My beloved Son, hear Him.” (Mark 9:7). And on another occasion He said, “This is My beloved Son in whom I am well-pleased” (Matt. 3:17).

Likewise the Father is represented as giving the Son glory, and giving Him a people, a world, and all things. His love is always out-going and sacrificial. In fact, there was nothing that the Father did not give into the Son’s hands. He gave His all to the Son.

Well, the Son’s love is the same. He gives all things to the Spirit and at the Second Coming will give them all back to the Father. The Son's intense desire is to glorify the Father and please Him. Hebrews 5:5 says, "So also Christ did not glorify Himself to become High Priest, but it was He who said to Him: 'You are My Son, Today I have begotten You.'" Acts 7:55 is one of many passages that shows that the Holy Spirit glorifies the Son and Father. The Son so honors the Spirit that He promises that any sin or blasphemy against Himself or the Father would be forgiven, but not the blasphemy against the Holy Spirit. And what is the Spirit’s passion? To lift up the Son and the Father.

So you can see that the Father, Son and Holy Spirit are always flowing outward to each other in their fellowship, praise, glory, and gifts. Why does the Son want you to glorify the Father? Because that is the passion of His heart. Why does the Father want you to glorify the Son? Because that is the passion of His heart. And if you are indwelt by the Holy Spirit, you cannot help but glorify the Son and the Father, because that is the passion of the Holy Spirit. It is because the Holy Spirit fills you that you want to worship and to sing God's praises. It brings you great joy just as glorifying Son and Father brings great joy to the Holy Spirit.

And it is because Father, Son and Holy Spirit are so God-focused, that they created all things to be God-focused. That is not selfishness. That is considering the interests of each other Person in the Trinity to be better than their own. That is the antithesis of selfishness. Humility and meekness are actually two of the communicable attributes of God. Did you know that? God is the most humble and meek Being in the universe.

And besides, how could God be selfish when He needs nothing? He can’t. Acts 17:25 says, "Nor is He worshiped with men’s hands, as though He needed anything, since He gives to all life, breath, and all things." Because God doesn’t have needs, it is impossible for Him to be selfish or to serve His own needs. If He doesn’t have any needs He can’t logically be said to serve His own needs, right? And yet it would be a mistake to say that because God doesn’t need us that He doesn’t love us. There could be no greater love than God has demonstrated toward us. God values us and delights in us not because we are good or because we contribute anything additional to Him, but because it is of His nature to be self-giving. So it would be a mistake to say that because God doesn’t need us, He doesn’t love us as much. It is precisely because He doesn’t have any needs that He has the most selfless, highest degree of agape love (or self-giving, sacrificial love).

Biblical Blueprints

Study with Dr. Phillip Kayser's works of Biblical Commentary.

biblicalblueprints.com

From a blog: “It’s common for people to think that God created us because He was lonely without us, but this isn’t true. He would eternally have perfect communion within His triune nature even if He had never created us. Again, He didn’t create out of need or obligation of any kind but because He deserves to be glorified.” God Does Not Need Us; His Love Is Perfect and Unmanipulated

 

[mattfivefour]

What our sister Hol has posted above is part of what I meant earlier in the thread when I accused Unitarianism/Oneness of not only denying the accuracy and plain sense of God's Word but robbing Him of the magnificence and glory of His unique Being! There is such profound depth and significance in the following passage from her post above:
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God is not a solitary Person, but a Trinity. The Islamic God is a solitary person, and if he had love at all, there would have been no one to love before creation except himself. There would have been no other person to love. And thus it is no surprise that the Islamic god has a self-oriented love leading to selfishness.

But since God is a Trinity, we see a radically different character to His love. His love is agape love, which is self-giving and self-sacrificing love. Agape love is the exact opposite of narcissistic love. The Father loves the Son and Spirit, not Himself. Likewise the Father praises and glorifies the Son and Spirit, not Himself. You see examples of the Father deflecting praise to the Son. “This is My beloved Son, hear Him.” (Mark 9:7). And on another occasion He said, “This is My beloved Son in whom I am well-pleased” (Matt. 3:17).

Likewise the Father is represented as giving the Son glory, and giving Him a people, a world, and all things. His love is always out-going and sacrificial. In fact, there was nothing that the Father did not give into the Son’s hands. He gave His all to the Son.

Well, the Son’s love is the same. He gives all things to the Spirit and at the Second Coming will give them all back to the Father. The Son's intense desire is to glorify the Father and please Him. Hebrews 5:5 says, "So also Christ did not glorify Himself to become High Priest, but it was He who said to Him: 'You are My Son, Today I have begotten You.'" Acts 7:55 is one of many passages that shows that the Holy Spirit glorifies the Son and Father. The Son so honors the Spirit that He promises that any sin or blasphemy against Himself or the Father would be forgiven, but not the blasphemy against the Holy Spirit. And what is the Spirit’s passion? To lift up the Son and the Father.

So you can see that the Father, Son and Holy Spirit are always flowing outward to each other in their fellowship, praise, glory, and gifts. Why does the Son want you to glorify the Father? Because that is the passion of His heart. Why does the Father want you to glorify the Son? Because that is the passion of His heart. And if you are indwelt by the Holy Spirit, you cannot help but glorify the Son and the Father, because that is the passion of the Holy Spirit. It is because the Holy Spirit fills you that you want to worship and to sing God's praises. It brings you great joy just as glorifying Son and Father brings great joy to the Holy Spirit.

And it is because Father, Son and Holy Spirit are so God-focused, that they created all things to be God-focused. That is not selfishness. That is considering the interests of each other Person in the Trinity to be better than their own. That is the antithesis of selfishness.
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I hope the richness of the above passage causes our Unitarian/Oneness friends to reconsider their view of the nature of God. In their erroneous reading of Scripture and their resulting understanding that leads them to portray a God with an internal nature and form as singular as their own, they are missing so, so very much of the glory and power of God! They think their views do Him justice; sadly they do the opposite. Unitarian belief robs Good of His extraordinary uniqueness that is unlike anything we have ever known in Creation.