What is the Trinity Part V
Monotheism
Essential to the Trinity is that there is one and only one God. It is essential because it was the conviction of monotheism – that there is one God – that drove the early Christians to formulate the doctrine of the Trinity from Scripture. More importantly, monotheism is the teaching found in the Bible.
Scripture is clear that there is only one God: ‘There is no other God besides me, a righteous God and a Savior; there is none besides me. Turn to me and be saved, all the ends of the earth! For I am God, and there is no other (Isaiah 45:21-22; see also 44:6-8; Exodus 15:11; Deuteronomy 4:35; 6:4-5; 32:39; 1 Samuel 2:2; 1 Kings 8:60).
Fundamental to the Judaism of the OT (and of today) is the shema. It is found in Deuteronomy 6 and part of it says, “Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one,” (Deut 6:4). The understanding of monotheism is at the heart of this passage, and it was at the core of the early Christians understanding of the nature of God.
Each person of the Trinity is God
The doctrine of the Trinity must remain grounded in God’s Word. Roger Olson sums it up when he says,
- “While it is true that no passage of Scripture spells out the doctrine of the Trinity, it is also true that the whole of Scripture’s witness to who God is and who Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit are makes no sense at all without the model of the Trinity and that all alternative concepts end up doing violence to some essential aspect of revelation, Christian experience and possibly even reason itself,” (The Mosaic of Christian Belief, p. 139).
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