One God in Three Persons: Unity of Essence, Distinction of Persons, Implications for Life
Overview
How do the three persons of the Trinity relate to each other? Evangelicals continue to wrestle with this complex issue and its implications for our understanding of men’s and women’s roles in both the home and the church. Challenging feminist theologies that view the Trinity as a model for evangelical egalitarianism, One God in Three Persons turns to the Bible, church history, philosophy, and systematic theology to argue for the eternal submission of the Son to the Father.
Top Highlights
“But as Erickson attempts to escape from patripassianism, he has to admit that the Son was suffering on the cross in a way that the Father and Spirit were not suffering. It was the Son who bore the penalty for our sins, not the Father and not the Spirit. It was the Son who bore the wrath of God the Father that we deserved against our sins, not the Father and not the Holy Spirit.” (Page 23)
“Emphasizing likeness in deity only, while failing to specify any distinction between the persons of the Trinity, is a failure to affirm any distinction between the three persons, which is one important aspect of the doctrine of the Trinity. This failure alone is a significant doctrinal deviation.” (Page 19)
“When faced with many biblical texts that show that the Son is always subject to the Father” (Page 19)
“This view holds that God reveals himself in Scripture as one God in three persons, such that the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are fully equal in their deity as each possesses fully and eternally the one and undivided divine nature; yet the Father is revealed as having the highest authority among the Trinitarian persons, such that the Son, as agent of the Father, eternally implements the will of the Father and is under the Father’s authority, and the Holy Spirit likewise serves to advance the Father’s purposes fulfilled through the Son, under the authority of the Father and also of the Son.” (Pages 237–238)
“So it would seem natural to conclude that by continuing to depict Jesus as the Lamb in Revelation 22:3, John is saying in a different way what Paul said in 1 Corinthians 15:24 and 28—that Christ has rendered the kingdom to the Father and been subjected to him. Thus, Christ’s kingdom is everlasting, but he reigns in the kingdom he has delivered to the Father, in which he is subject to the Father.” (Page 107)