Trinity and Christology

Welcome to the teaching ministry of Kungsvinger Lutheran Church. Kungsvinger is a beacon for the gospel of Jesus Christ and is located on the plains of northwestern Minnesota. We proclaim Christ and Him crucified for our sins and salvation by grace through faith alone.

And now.

Here's a message from Pastor Chris Roseberg. The Holy Gospel is found in John chapter 3 verses 1 -15. Now there was a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews. This man came to Jesus by night and said to him, Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher from God, for no one can do these signs that you do unless God is with him.

Jesus answered him, Truly, truly I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. Nicodemus said to him, How can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter a second time into his mother's womb and be born?

Jesus answered, Truly, truly I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.

Do not marvel that I said to you, you must be born again. The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear its sound, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit.

Nicodemus said to him, How can these things be? Jesus answered him, Are you the teacher of Israel, and yet you do not understand these things? Truly, truly I say to you, we speak of what we know and bear witness to what we have seen, but you do not receive our testimony.

If I have told you earthly things and you do not believe, how can you believe if I tell you heavenly things? No one has ascended into heaven except he who descended from heaven, the Son of Man. And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in Him may have eternal life.

For God so loved the world that He gave His only Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish, but have eternal life. For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through Him.

This is the Gospel of the Lord.

The Athanasian Creed and the First Commandment

In the name of Jesus, Amen. Ah, that Athanasian Creed, whoever desires to be saved must. Oh man, we push back when people start talking like this. Are you saying that I have to conform my thoughts to this thing called the Athanasian Creed?

It was quite ponderous, right? Yeah, actually you must, because this is what Scripture says. So whoever desires to be saved must, above all, hold the universal or the Catholic faith, that's what Catholic means.

Whoever does not keep it whole and undefiled will, without doubt, perish eternally. And the Catholic faith is this, we worship one God in Trinity and Trinity in unity, neither confusing the persons nor dividing the substance.

Hmm, we must worship God in Trinity. Yeah, that's right. And there's a reason for it, the first commandment. Remember that catechism, that small catechism when you were confirmed? Think back to that first commandment.

What is the first commandment? You will have no other gods. What does this mean? That we should fear, love, and trust in God above all things. But that means we must trust in the God who is, not the God that we've created, that we've concocted, that we think is reasonable, rational, or that we can somehow control via our understanding.

Yeah, God is different than we are. And so you'll note that the Church, well, we dedicate one Sunday every year to the doctrine of the Trinity, to Trinity Sunday. Hear the words of the prophet Isaiah as it relates to the sin, the breaking of the first commandment, the sin of idolatry.

Isaiah writes in Isaiah 44, all who fashion idols are nothing and the things they delight in do not profit. You see, the general consensus nowadays among the spiritual is that, well, we just need to learn how to coexist.

That's right, you want to believe in Shiva, Vishnu. You want to believe in Allah. In fact, you might want to worship Shiva, Vishnu, Allah, and even throw in Yahweh to boot, you know, and claim that you are a follower of God in the way of, well, whatever the deity is, right?

No. God is clear. The one true God has spoken, all who fashion idols are nothing, and the things they delight in they don't profit. They cannot save you. Isaiah goes on, their witnesses neither see nor know so that they may be put to shame.

Who fashions a god or casts an idol that is profitable for nothing? Behold, all of his companions shall be put to shame and the craftsmen are only human. Let them all assemble. Let them stand forth. They shall be terrified.

They shall be put to shame together. And then he goes on to describe the foolishness. This is a straight out, well, utter tomfoolery of fashioning an idol. God almost speaking in Babylon B-esque satire says, the ironsmith takes a cutting tool, works it over the coals, he fashions it with hammers, works it with his strong arm.

He becomes hungry. His strength fails. He drinks no water and is faint. The carpenter stretches a line. He marks it out with a pencil. He shapes it with a plane, marks it with a compass. He shapes it into the figure of a man with the beauty of a man to dwell in a house.

He cuts down cedars or he chooses a cypress tree or an oak and lets it grow strong among the trees of the forest. He plants a cedar and the rain nourishes it and then it becomes fuel for a man. He takes part of it, warms himself.

He kindles a fire and bakes bread. He also makes a god and then worships it. He makes an idol and then falls down before it. How did he know to cut that particular part to fashion it into a deity rather than the other part that he used for fuel to make bread?

It's just foolish. He makes a god. He worships it. He falls down before it. Half of it he burns in the fire. The other half he eats meat and then he roasts it and is satisfied. He also warms himself and says, I am warm.

I have seen the fire. And then the rest he makes into a god, his idol. And then he falls down to it and worships it. He prays to it and says, Oh, deliver me for you are my god. They know not, God says to the prophet Isaiah, nor do they discern for he has shut their eyes so they cannot see their hearts so that they cannot understand.

No one considers nor is there knowledge or discernment to say, half of it I burned in the fire. I also baked bread on its coals. I roasted meat and have eaten. And shall I make the rest of it into an abomination?

Shall I fall down before a block of wood? He feeds on ashes. A deluded heart has led him astray and he cannot deliver himself or say, is there not a lie in my right hand? And so you'll note, God here is saying that that's how far we've fallen in sin.

Don't trust your heart. Don't trust your reason. And don't sit there and say, well, you know that doctrine of the Trinity. You know, it's just so it doesn't make any sense. Yeah. Knock that off. Okay?

Because when you start talking like that, you inadvertently, quite ironically, make it very clear. You're an idolater. The deity you believe in isn't the one who is. The deity you believe in is a deity of your own making.

Might as well be a block of wood that you fashion into an idol and are bowing down. Oh, block of wood, save me. You remember Elijah on Mount Carmel? There's the prophets of Baal. Oh, they're limping around the altar.

Oh, Baal, hear us. But there was no one to hear them, right? And what did Elijah say to them? Oh, cried louder. Cry louder. He's a god, you know. I'm sure he is. Maybe he's on a journey and he can't hear you.

Forgot to bring his walkie-talkie. Forgot to plug in his iPhone. Yeah. Oh, I know. Maybe he's on the toilet reading the morning paper. That's pretty much what Elijah said. And he said that to shake them out of their stupor.

Oh, I don't know about that doctrine of the Trinity thing. Wake up. There is no other god except for the one god who has three persons. That's the god who exists. It doesn't matter if you understand it or not.

Don't let your reason dictate whether or not you're going to accept whether or not this is true. This is true whether you accept it or not. In fact, we need to pay close attention. It is idolatry to deny the god who is.

And the deity that you then believe in is a deity of your own making. A deity who cannot see. A deity who cannot hear. A deity who cannot save you or answer your prayers. A deity is well, just a foolish nonsensical thing that you've made up.

And God says, you feed on ashes. A deluded heart has led you astray. And your god cannot deliver. In fact, you can't even deliver yourself. And is there not a lie in my right hand? You can't even recognize, oh, this is a lie.

But ah, the word of God is living and active. You're convicting us and calling us back to a true faith in the real god who is. Isaiah in 43 says, you are my witnesses, declares Yahweh, my servant whom I have chosen so that you may know and believe me and understand that I am he.

Before me, no god was formed, nor will there be any after me. I, even I am Yahweh. And besides me, there is no savior. I declared and saved and proclaimed when there was no strange god among you. And you are my witnesses, declares Yahweh.

And I am God. Also, henceforth I am he. There is none who can deliver from my hand. I work and who call and who can turn it back. Thus says Yahweh, your redeemer, the holy one of Israel. For your sake, I send to Babylon and I bring them all down as fugitives, even the Chaldeans and the ships in which they rejoice.

You see, there is no other god. The foundation of the doctrine of the trinity is that there is only one god. Yet scripture so clearly teaches that there are three called god. And not that there are three gods.

Again, there's only one. Isaiah 44 makes this very clear too, that there is only one god. Thus says Yahweh, the king of Israel, and his redeemer, the lord of hosts. Hmm. Interesting way of talking, right?

And that's the way the Old Testament works. All these interesting little pluralities as it relates to God. And yet there is only one god. God says, I am the first and I am the last. Beside me there is no god.

Who is like me? God challenges. Well, let him proclaim it. Let him declare and set it before me since I am appointed an ancient people. Let them declare what is to come and what will happen. Fear not, nor be afraid.

Have I not told you from of old and declared it? And you are my witnesses. Is there a god besides me? There is no rock. God says, I know not any. So the foundation of a right understanding of the true god is, well, based in this idea that there is only one god.

There's none besides. And like I've said, yet there are three in scripture who are called god. And we're going to note here, there are no heretics who deny that the Father is God. Not a single one. Always the action when it comes to the doctrine of the Trinity is, who is Jesus?

Well, let me just throw this in so that we're complete. The doctrine of the Trinity claims that there is one god. Yep, check. We've got biblical texts that say that. The Father is God. Let me give you one example so that you can say, alright, yeah, I can see that.

This is Jesus talking in John chapter 6. When they found Jesus on the other side of the Sea of Galilee, they said to him, Rabbi, when did you come here? Jesus answered them, truly, truly, I say to you, you seek me not because you saw signs, but because you ate your fill of the loaves.

Do not work for the food that perishes, but for the food that endures to eternal life which the Son of Man will give to you. For on him, God the Father has set his seal. Ah, Jesus says the Father is God.

Nobody denies this. Always, always the action is where Jesus is. Who is Jesus? And that's the hard part. But don't let your reason or what you think is rational delude you. Jesus is none other than the God of the Old Testament in human flesh.

And see, even though there is one God, there are three persons within the one God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. And they are all co-equal, co-eternal. Yet there are not three co-equals, there are not three co-eternals, there are not three Almighties, there is only one Almighty.

So when we talk about Jesus, just a simple survey of biblical text will kind of help us out here. You remember at Christmas time, the prophecy of Isaiah in Isaiah chapter 9, for unto us a child is born, to us a son is given, and the government shall be upon his shoulder and his name shall be called Wonderful Counselor, the Mighty God.

And isn't that exactly what Isaiah 7 says about Jesus? That the virgin will conceive and bear a son and shall call his name Immanuel, God with us. That's who Jesus is. John 1, which you should all be familiar with, says in the beginning was the Word.

Jesus is the Word because in verse 18 of chapter 1 it goes on to say that the Word became flesh and dwelt among us. But listen to the words. In the beginning was the Word, the Word was with God, the Word was God.

Not a God. Jesus is God. And we're sitting there going, well, how does that work? I couldn't tell you. I don't need to know. When I think about my truck, I've got a Ford F350. I have no clue how a diesel engine works.

I just know that if I put diesel in it and I turn the ignition on, it starts up and it runs and it takes me places. Couldn't even begin to tell you how much torque it has and exactly how the finer points of a diesel engine works compared to a gasoline engine.

I care less. I just know that it's going to get me from point A to point B and I don't have to sit there and understand exactly how it works. Nor do you. Jesus is God. In the beginning was the Word. The Word was with God.

The Word was God. He was with God in the beginning and the Word became flesh and dwelt among us. That's the very reason why Jesus accepted worship from people. Remember when Jesus was asleep in the back of the boat?

How about that time when Jesus walked on the water? At both times, he hushes a storm with a word and the biblical text says that his disciples worshiped him. There was the apostle Thomas, the guy we call Doubting Thomas.

He missed the first meeting when Christ was there. That first Easter morning when Jesus rose from the grave, he said, I'm never going to believe unless I put my hands in his wounds. Jesus shows up a week later, Sunday, the Lord's Day, the day of the resurrection.

What does he do? He says, Thomas, put your hand here. Touch my side. Do not be disbelieving, but believe. What does Thomas say of Jesus? You are my Lord and my God. That is who Jesus is. Well, how can that be?

How can God take on human flesh? Well, we confessed it in the words of the Athanasian Creed. Just like a human being has a body and a soul, there's not two of you, there's only one of you. In the same way then, when Christ was fashioned in the womb of his mother, Jesus, who is the one Christ, is the coming together of body and soul, human body and human soul, and the divine nature into the one Jesus.

That's how that works, right? In fact, kind of interesting, now that Christ, God, the Son, has taken on human flesh, you can say things about God that you couldn't say before. Acts chapter 20, verse 28, Paul warning the pastors of the congregations in the city of Ephesus, he says, take heed therefore of yourselves and of all the flock over which God the Holy Spirit has made you overseers to feed the church of God which he has purchased with his own blood.

Acts 20, 28 makes it clear that God has purchased his church with his blood? When did God bleed on the cross? Because that's who Jesus is. And you go, I don't understand it. You don't have to understand it.

You gotta believe it. Romans, in Titus chapter 2 verse 13, we hear of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ, looking for that blessed hope, Paul writes, the glorious appearing of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ.

Colossians says that in Christ the whole fullness of the deity dwells bodily. Are you starting to get the point? Yeah, the point is that Jesus is none other than the Son of God, second person of the Holy Trinity in human flesh.

The Father didn't bleed and die for you. The Holy Spirit didn't bleed and die for you, but only Christ. Romans chapter 10, very important section of scripture. Remember that the name for God in the Old Testament, the one that he gives for himself is Yahweh.

What does that mean? Well, Yahweh is the third person masculine singular from the verb hayah. Hayah means to be. What happens is when God gives his name to Moses in the burning bush, he says, he says, I am that I am.

But we pronounce it back to God, Yahweh, he is. That's right. He is the God who is, who was, who is to come, the God who is with us. The name Yahweh definitely refers to Christ. Paul writes in Romans chapter 10, Moses writes about the righteousness that is based on the law, that the person who does the commandments will live by them.

That means you have to obey them perfectly. But the righteousness that is based on faith says, do not say in your heart, who will ascend into heaven? That is to bring Christ down. Or who will descend into the abyss?

That is to bring Christ up from the dead. But what does it say? The word is near you. It's in your mouth and in your heart. That is the word of faith that we proclaim. Because if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.

What does it mean to confess that Jesus is Lord? Well, Paul goes on to say, for with the heart one believes and is justified, and with the mouth one confesses and is saved. For the scripture says, everyone who believes in him will not be put to shame.

For there is no distinction between Jew and Greek. For the same Lord is Lord of all, bestowing his riches on all who call on him. And then Paul quotes the prophet Joel, chapter 2, verse 32. For everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.

But here's the funny bit. You look it up in the Old Testament. For everyone who calls on the name of Yahweh will be saved. But here in Romans 10, Paul is referring to Jesus. The one who believes that Jesus is Lord will be saved, and everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.

Quoting Joel 2 .32, there's only one person that Joel 2 .32 can be referring to, and that's Yahweh. But Paul in Romans chapter 10, verse 13 makes it clear. That is who Jesus is. He is the Yahweh of the Old Testament.

And so with that little framework, and note then, if you want to know how the Holy Spirit is God, you just go to Acts chapter 5. And that poor account of Ananias who was trying to pull a fast one on God.

Peter rebukes him and says, you've lied to the Holy Spirit and by doing so you have lied to God. Right? God the Holy Spirit is equated with being God, and that's a clear passage of Scripture that says that the Holy Spirit is God.

But all that being said then, you have the groundwork, you have the framework through the Scriptures. One God, three persons are called God, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. And now you're ready to hear our Gospel text.

And here, listen to the Trinitarian revelation in it. Because all three persons of the Holy Trinity appear in our Gospel text. It says this, now there was a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews.

This man came to Jesus by night and he said to Jesus, Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher come from God. For no one can do these signs that you do unless God is with him. Now a little bit of a side note.

So, remember back to the burning bush, right? So there's God. He's talking to Moses, commissioning him to set the people of Israel free. And Moses is saying, what if they don't believe me? What if they don't believe that you sent me?

God gives him three signs. And what's really interesting in the Hebrew, in the Hebrew in that passage, in the book of Exodus, God says that these signs have a voice. The literal translation is that if they will not believe the voice of these signs, right?

Then you are to do this sign, right? God says the signs have a voice. It's kind of a fascinating way to think. But here's the reason why signs have a voice. It's because God is the one who gives those signs.

God is the one who has to work them. Remember when Moses was given the ability, the sign of turning water into blood? Did Moses turn that water into blood? Nuh-uh. No, he didn't. Who turned it into blood?

God did. And that was the hand of God operating and the signs, therefore, according to the Hebrew, they have a voice. And so Jesus has been performing signs. What has he been doing? Healing the sick, giving sight to the blind, giving hearing to the deaf.

Jesus will go on to raise the dead. All of these signs have a voice because God is working. And Nicodemus there slinking in to see Jesus under the cover of darkness says, ah, you know, we know that you have come from God because no one can do these signs.

The signs are speaking. No one can do them unless God is with them. And so Jesus then answers him. He says, all right. Truly, truly, I say to you unless one is born from above. Yeah, that's what anothen means in this context.

I know that the ESV says again, but unless one is born from above, he cannot see the kingdom of God. Nicodemus hearing the word anothen thought that Jesus said that he needed to be born again. And he thought kind of in the crass physical fleshy way, right?

Well, he says, well, how can a man be born when he's old? Can he enter a second time into his mother's womb and be born? Jesus answered, truly, truly, I say to you unless one is born of water and the spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God.

Water and the spirit. What does that invoke? Oh, all the way back to Genesis, right? Genesis chapter one, there was the ruach the ruach of Elohim, the ruach of God hovering over the face of the deep, over the tahom, over the waters.

Ah, that's what that's referring to, right? So this is a baptismal reference. And then you remember that dove that Noah had sent out of the ark that was just kind of fluttering over the floodwaters. We couldn't find a place to rest.

That's invoking of the work of God, the Holy Spirit. When Jesus, when he was baptized by John the Baptist, coming up out of the water, the heavens open and you can hear the voice of the Father in heaven say, this is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased.

And God, the Holy Spirit, descends on Christ. The Trinity makes the appearance. And we then recognize well, what Jesus is saying here, because we know from the biblical text throughout the New Testament that baptism is a washing of water with the word and the way in which we receive God, the Holy Spirit.

That which is born of the flesh is flesh, Jesus said. That which is born of the Spirit is Spirit. So do not marvel that I said to you, you must be born anothen from above. The wind blows where it wishes.

You hear it sound, but you don't know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit. Ah, talking about the salvific, rejuvenating, revivifying, is that even a word?

You know, work of God, the Holy Spirit who raises us from the dead. Nicodemus, mind blown. I mean, you could take the mind blown emoji here and just, you know, this is describing what's going on and he doesn't understand.

Right. Nicodemus said, how? How can these things be? Jesus said, are you the teacher of Israel and yet you don't understand these things? Truly, truly, I say to you, we speak of what we know. We bear witness of what we have seen and you do not receive our testimony.

If I had told you of earthly things and you do not believe, how can you believe if I tell you of heavenly things? Ah, we all suffer from the same problem, right? So no one has ascended into heaven except he who descended from heaven.

That's the Son of Man, Jesus referring to himself. And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up that whoever believes in him may have eternal life. And now, Jesus pulls on one of the most enigmatic and most interesting stories of the Old Testament.

Children of Israel wandering in the wilderness, grumbling against God again. Are we there yet, God? We hate this man. And so God sends the Nechashim Seraphim into the camp, the fiery serpents. They're envenomating people.

People are dying and they come and they repent. Oh, we have sinned against God. Moses pray that God takes away these serpents and Moses prays and God says, make a bronze serpent. Put it on a pole. Anyone who looks to that serpent, if he's envenomated by a snake, he will live.

She will live. And so that's a picture of Christ who takes your sin and mine inside of himself. The envenomation of Satan into his body so that now that we look to Christ on the cross, bleeding and dying for our sins rather than perish as we deserve because of the great abomination and heresy and sin and muck that we've participated in.

God has mercy on us because Christ has bled and died for our sins. So just as Moses has lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up on the cross so that whoever believes in him may have eternal life.

And then we hear these words, for God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son. Note that in John chapter 3, the Holy Spirit is there. The Son is speaking and teaching. And here Jesus is referencing God the Father himself.

For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son. Father, Son, Holy Spirit, all there in John chapter 3. So that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. God didn't send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.

Whoever believes in him is not condemned. Whoever does not believe is condemned already. Here are the words of Jesus. Whoever does not believe is condemned already. Here, the Trinity is in full display.

And you have eyes to see it because you've seen how the doctrine of the Trinity is revealed in Scripture. And Jesus doesn't say to the person who denies him, it's no big deal. No big deal. You'll be fine.

You can believe in whatever deity you want to. Whatever rationalized thing that you've created and concocted and imagined in your own heart and mind, that'll do. I'll accept your worship of that thing as proxy worship of me.

Nope. That's not how this works. And here's the reason why. The first commandment, again, you shall have no other gods. By having a God other than the God who exists, we condemn ourselves, and we call upon a deity that cannot hear or save us, who hasn't bled and died for our sins, and we stand condemned.

Rather than believe in the vicarious work of the one whom the Father sent to bleed and die for your sins and mine because of his great love, we instead make a God of our own making and reject God. We reject his love.

We reject the Savior, the Son of God whom he has sent. And if you do that, there is no deity who can save you. But God so loved you, you, that he gave his only begotten Son, that even you believing in him should not perish as you deserve for your idolatry, for your, like I said, heresies, all the false doctrines you've believed in, all the rejectings of his word and his commandments you've participated in.

God has punished Christ in your place so that you do not have to perish, all because of the great love that God has for you, for me, for the whole world. God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world might be saved through him.

So whoever believes in him, the one true God in human flesh, second person of the Holy Trinity, he's not condemned. Whoever believes in him is not condemned. Whoever does not believe, well, he's condemned already because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God.

So this is the judgment. Light has come into the world. Well, people love darkness rather than the light because their works are evil. And that evil lies in you and in me as well. We need to repent, confess that this is true of us.

Everyone who does wicked things hates the light and doesn't come to the light lest his work should be exposed. That's the reason why people deny the doctrine of the Trinity, because they love their sin.

They love the darkness. They love the illusion of freedom that being able to choose your own way and choose your own sin appears to give. But sin isn't freedom. Sin is slavery. And sin isn't light. Sin is darkness.

Idolatry isn't light. It always fascinates me that the Gnostics always describe their beliefs in reincarnation and all of this nonsense and their initiation ceremonies are all about illumination and getting more light.