Simply Trinity (part 27)

Well, we left off at number 15. If there's anybody who doesn't have a quiz from last week, chapter 9, speak now or forever hold your peace.

Okay, you don't really have to forever hold your peace. It's not just a phrase that we just threw out there.

They're free, no cost or obligation, although there is a shipping and handling fee.

Oh, Chuck declines to pay that. Okay, well, he is the finance guy.

So there's that. Okay, so we left off at number 15, and we like to start off with true or false questions.

So we're going to start off with an easy one. True or false, the

Holy Spirit is both a gift and a person. True and a nod.

Okay, we're going to go with true. Barrett says,

John says the Spirit is given by Jesus to be received. He is, in other words, a gift.

We already know he's a person, so now he's a gift. And what a gift he is to us needy sinners, sent by the

Father and the Son. The Spirit is a gift of life for all those dying of thirst.

So just, it's a good place to just pause for a moment here, and let's talk about something that is on the lips of everyone this morning.

Eternal properties. What's the eternal property of the

Father? In other words, what's his personal property? How is he identified to separate him from the other persons of the

Trinity? He is, well, yeah, he's the Father, but he's also unbegotten.

Or we could say he's the principal. But to say the Father is the Father, I'm going to have to bat.

What's the personal property, or the eternal property of the Son? Eternally begotten is correct.

And the eternal property of the Spirit is, he's spirated.

He's eternally spirated by the Father and the Son. Okay, so. I mean, even as we just think about that, that he is spirated or breathed out by the

Father and the Son, we get the idea that he's a gift from the Father and the

Son. So, Barrett goes on to say, is this not what

Jesus says about the Holy Spirit being a gift? Is this not what Jesus says to the

Samaritan woman at Jacob's well? If you knew the gift of God and who it is that is saying to you, give me a drink, you would have asked him, and he would have given you living water.

The gift Jesus extends is nothing less than eternal life. But eternal life comes only through the

Spirit. How appropriate is it, then, to title him gift? Then he says,

Jesus not only refers, or is not the only one who refers to the Spirit as a gift. In the book of Acts, right after Jesus ascends into the heavens, in Acts 1, this language appears more than once more.

Remember, Jesus promised to send the Spirit, a promise fulfilled at Pentecost, when the

Spirit descended on the disciples like tongues of fire. Such a miraculous mystery invokes speech from Peter, who explains the advent of Jesus and the descent of the

Spirit as both being promised by God through the prophets, promises now fulfilled in their very midst.

And then he says in Acts 2 .38, after they are cut to the heart, they hear the sermon of Peter, they're cut to the heart, and then

Peter says in Acts 2 .38, repent, they say, what shall we do? And he says, repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ, for the forgiveness of your sins, and then what?

What does he say after that? And you will receive coffee.

Caffeine. A transfusion. The gift of the

Holy Spirit. We need to leave that coffee bar open,

I guess. The gift of the Holy Spirit. So again, referred to as a gift. He's both a gift and a person.

Number 16. In what sense is the Holy Spirit a witness? You ever been a witness?

What does it mean to be a witness? He saw something?

Okay. That's a witness. Yeah. I mean, you saw something and you're willing to testify.

And that's, you know, in our context, he says, well, I mean, in my former line of work, there were a lot of people who saw things, but if they weren't willing to say anything, were they really a witness?

I ultimately know. Barrett says, later Peter will say something similar, calling the

Spirit not only a gift, but a witness. When pressured not to speak about Jesus, Peter says he cannot stay quiet.

They may have crucified Jesus, but the God of our fathers raised Jesus and exalted him at his right hand as leader and savior to give repentance to Israel and forgiveness of sins.

That's 531. Let's look at Acts 532 for a moment.

Acts 532. The context of this is what?

That the disciples are, I mean, they're being persecuted.

They've been arrested, been released, and then they get to, let's go back to 27.

And when they had brought them, well, they were released, but they were miraculously released.

And when they had brought them, they set them before the council and the high priest questioned them saying, we strictly charged you not to teach in this name, in the name of Jesus.

Yet here you have filled Jerusalem with your teaching, and you intend to bring this man's blood,

Jesus' blood upon us. But Peter and the apostles answered, we must obey

God rather than men. The God of our fathers raised

Jesus, whom you killed by hanging him on a tree. God exalted him at his right hand as leader and savior to give repentance to Israel and forgiveness of sins.

And then verse 32, and we, the apostles, are witnesses to these things, and so is the

Holy Spirit, whom God has given to those who obey him. I mean, right there, we see several things about the

Holy Spirit. What can we say about the Holy Spirit that's based on that verse alone? Okay.

He's given to those who obey him. Correct. What else can we say about the Holy Spirit?

He's a person. Why would he have to be a person? Okay. So he is a witness like they are.

So how can he be a witness if he's not a person? Okay. Anything else? God -given, absolutely.

So back to the gift idea, yes. When we think about the idea of him being a witness, in this context, what would that say to the

Pharisees, the Jewish leadership? If the Holy Spirit is a witness to these things that Peter's talking about, then what?

It's undeniable that they happened. He was there. And maybe they ought to believe.

Right? It's one thing if Peter says something, they don't agree with it, and they don't particularly care for Peter, so they might feel free to reject it.

But if the Spirit of God says something, if he testifies to something, then it's really kind of a condemnation of the

Jewish leadership. You should be believing this too. It's implied there. Barrett goes on to say, in a sense,

Acts 5 elaborates on Acts 2, what Jesus has accomplished the Spirit has borne witness to, but not merely in some external sense.

The witness, the witness, the Spirit, has borne witness to the gospel by uniting the believer to Christ.

And all those whom the Spirit has united to Christ, those who are believers, those who obey, have been given the

Spirit of Christ. Okay. Number 17.

What was the sin of Simon the magician? Okay.

He thought he could buy the Holy Spirit. I like what Barrett says here. He says, going to 820, he says, may your silver perish with you, because you thought you could obtain the gift with money.

What did Simon do wrong? He failed to understand that the Spirit is a gift. He is not for sale. We see him, you know, if you ever watch

TV, so -called Christian TV, he's kind of for sale.

Number 18. True or false, eternal relations constitute missions.

In other words, the eternal relations of the Trinity show us what they do in, what do

I want to say, in reality, in our, yeah, in our material world, which, am

I the only one, and I probably am the only one here, I'll just tell the truth and shame the devil. Am I the only one here, when

I say material world, that I start thinking, George Harrison.

George Harrison. why would I think George Harrison? Because he has an album called, Living in the

Material World. You know, he came before Madonna. And, the real problem with Harrison is, you know, he has that whole

Hindu kind of mindset. material world. Okay.

Anyway, eternal relations constitute missions. True or false? What in the world does that mean, first of all?

Secondly, is it true or false? Does it have to do with the economic and the, and the what?

Eminent. Yeah. Eminent. Eminent. Missions, add extra.

See, you're throwing out all these terms. You have to define them. All you scholars in here, you know, and people are just throwing around these terms.

What does it mean, add extra Dave? Okay. So, inside the realm of the

Trinity, the inner Trinitarian, stuff would be add, intra.

And what they do in creation, there's the word I was looking for, material world.

You know, maybe I need more coffee. What they do outside of themselves, what they do in the created world, that is add extra, which is

Latin for, you know, outside of themselves. what was the other one?

Economic and eminent. So let's just think about this for a minute. Eternal relations, in other words, what they do within the

Trinity, or add, intra, reflects what they do, what the persons of the

Trinity do, what he does, what the triune God does, add extra in creation.

Okay. So now that we've explained that, true or false? And the answer is, and we'll wax eloquent a little bit about this, and take some questions.

Just as the sending of the sun in history does not constitute the sun's generation in eternity, right?

He's generated before time began. He's eternally begotten. That's what that means.

So just as the sending of the sun in history, in other words, his incarnation does not constitute his eternal generation.

So too, the spirit's sending, or giving in history, does not constitute the eternal spiration or procession.

It's actually the other way around. In other words, it's the eternal sending of the spirit that reflects his sending in time.

Or it's the eternal generation that reflects his sending in time, his incarnation.

As we learned in chapter four, relations constitute missions. So it's 100 % true.

Eternal relations constitute missions. Missions do not constitute relations.

That's clear. If the latter, in other words, if missions necessarily reflect who they are, ad intra, within themselves, within the

Trinity, then God does not become a Trinity until he acts in history.

So, here's their point. Their point is

God is eternally triune, and he reflects that triunity by what the persons do within history.

It's not what they do in history constitutes who they are eternally. I don't understand what he said.

I'm gonna need a translator. Okay. Good. That's always good.

Helpful. Stack the questions on top of each other. Yes. This is your mission, should you choose to accept it.

We've gone from the transcendent triune God to Tom Cruise.

Your mission... Okay. I think we're gonna...

You know, I hate to cancel anybody in class, but... What do we do on Saturday mornings?

We self -obliterate. So... Okay. Well, I'm going to obliterate

Jonathan. And... Let's get back to your question if I can possibly unravel that knot.

Is it reductionistic? Okay. What's the definition of missions?

That question maybe I can handle. It is, what does the triune God do in time?

Okay. What, in particular, do the persons of the

Trinity do? What are their missions? What are their works in creation in time?

Okay. So, when we say, well, how does...

Let's do it this way. How does the eternal property of the sun reflect what he does in time?

Well, his eternal property is he's eternally begotten. He's the eternal son of the father.

So, how does that reflect what he does in time? Well, in time, he does what? He's incarnated.

He takes on flesh. He lives among us. And he perfectly obeys the father.

So, how does that reflect his eternal relationship? Because he's eternally the son.

And so, in time, he, I guess we could say, he is the perfect son.

Oh, yeah, well. Except, well, I, and I guess we could, you know, that's the other part of Berta's point, isn't it?

Thank you for making that point, Dave. Because if we say then, well, he's perfectly obedient, and this is what the

EFS people do. If he's perfectly obedient in creation, on earth, therefore, he must have been perfectly obedient in eternity.

Okay, in fact, one man has even said this, that it's the essence of a son, and for all you kids here, listen up and think about this carefully.

It's the essence of a son to perfectly obey his father, to be submissive to his father. And it's the essence of a father to essentially rule over his son.

And I think the problem with that is what? You know, our thoughts of God become too human, as Luther said to Erasmus.

So, here's the point. What they are in eternity reflects what they do in time, but what they do in time does not necessarily tell us, or does not constitute,

I guess, better to say, does not constitute who they are in eternity. In other words, we can extrapolate too much from what they do in time and say, aha, therefore,

Jesus was always submissive to the father. Jesus was always obedient to the father, etc.

And we wind up with EFS, or some kind of hierarchy in the Trinity. Dave, I see that hand.

He is definitely not using it in the sense of evangelism.

That is correct. Yes, task. Yeah, jobs. I mean, you could substitute any number of things there.

Okay. Yes, I see that hand. When is somebody, by the way, going to walk the aisle instead of just raising their hand?

Okay, go ahead, John. Okay. How about this? How about the eternal relations of the

Trinity inform, or specify, or direct what they do in time?

Do you like that better? Okay, maybe. Okay, John.

Moving on. Yeah, they're similar.

Are we dancing around the EFS line?

No, because I think, you know, I think we're just taking a little bit of care to make sure that what we don't do is say that on the basis of what they do in time, we can understand who they are in eternity.

Okay. Yeah, that's the guardrail.

Okay, number 19. True or false? While each person of the Trinity has the same attributes, they may use them differently.

Yeah, you know, sometimes as I read them after I've written them, I'm like, I do what you guys just did.

Inseparable. Yeah, and I only know that because that's what's next.

That's the next chapter. Okay. While each person of the

Trinity has the same attributes, true, right? They may use them differently. See, I'm having a little bit of trouble with what word?

Nope. Yes, use. Well, and here's why, because what we're going to see in the next chapter, you know, this is a preview cheat, you know, hack.

This is a life hack for chapter 10. The word is they appropriate them.

And so, you know, I'm sort of wrestling with the term use, but I mean,

I'll just tell you what the Inspired Highlighter says. It says true, and I'm scratching my chin a little bit, not completely convinced that the

Inspired Highlighter is inspired. This is close to self -obliteration, but not on a

Sunday morning. They may use them. See, but if I said they may appropriate them differently, so then

I have to decide do I really mean use in a different sense? No, I do not. So I'm sticking with true. So we'll read this and we'll keep going.

Whatever attribute we have in mind, it must be true of each person of the Trinity. That is the case with love.

To confess God is love is to confess that the triune God is love. You know, not that the

Father is love, the Holy Spirit is love, but Jesus maybe isn't love. They're all love,

Father, Son, and Spirit. And then he says, yet we cannot forget that the persons of the

Trinity are distinct according to their personal properties, paternity, affiliation, and inspiration.

That's another way of sending or saying their personal properties.

There is a sense in which certain works and attributes, and here's the word, can be appropriated, and that's why

I'm kind of letting myself off the hook here, can be appropriated by specific persons of the

Godhead in a special way that is consistent with each person's eternal relation of origin.

Okay. And this is what we're going to see next chapter, so I'm going to sort of preview it for you.

What does it mean, for example, if we say, well,

I'll give you the easy one because it comes right to mind. When we read in Scripture that the

Holy Spirit descends like a dove, okay, what are we meant to understand there?

That the Holy Spirit is physically descending like a dove? Okay, there is definitely symbolism there.

Well, let's put it this way. In the situation where the

Holy Spirit is said to descend like a dove, what else is happening there? The Father speaking, and Jesus being baptized.

So what really ought we to pull out of that? Okay, the whole

Trinity is involved in the baptism of Jesus. So, and what we're given here is a picture of them, of the persons, according to their own personal properties.

The Father, basically the initiator or the principal, and in this case,

He's speaking and telling us that He's pleased with His Son. The Son submitting, obeying, okay, in His humanity.

And the Holy Spirit descending, you know, well, I've said it in other ways.

Who's operating in the... Okay, let's back up for a second.

We talked about it in John 15 and 16. The Holy Spirit takes up residence in us.

Who else does Jesus say resides within us? Himself and the

Father. Okay, so, true or false,

Jesus in His humanity is empowered only by the

Holy Spirit. False, true, okay, on a scale of 1 to 10.

But if I say that, if I say He's empowered only by the Holy Spirit, then what am I saying? That He's yielded some of His authority.

You're really on the right track here, because what I'm really saying is the Holy Spirit is kind of the

Lone Ranger. He's out there roping and riding by Himself. You know, and the

Father and the Son are going, that's a nice piece of roping over there. Is that possible?

The answer is no. Let's go back to John 5 for a minute.

Is He roping and riding all by Himself? What do you think? The Father didn't die on the cross, the

Spirit didn't die on the cross, but who sustains Him on the cross? Is He just self -sustaining?

Is it just the man Christ Jesus who's taken the wrath of God for three hours?

Butner's excursus, sorry for this little aside here, says it's not the

Father who does what? Suffered for sins.

Is that the same as sustain the Son while He suffers for sin? No. Okay, and that's the issue.

Can the Father act independently of the Son or the Spirit? That's interesting.

Okay, there we go. I don't know if that was an elbow, some coffee thrown. I don't know what happened. There it goes again.

John 5, and Barrett stresses this chapter, and he will stress it in the next chapter of our book, so I think

I will do the same thing. This is, let's look at John 5, 18, and Jesus has just healed a man at the pool at Bethesda, and the

Jewish leaders are very upset with Him. And verse 18, this is why the Jews were seeking all the more to kill

Him. Because not only was He breaking the Sabbath, but He was even calling

God His own Father, making Himself equal with God. So Jesus said to them,

Truly, truly, I say to you, the Son can do nothing of His own accord, but only what

He sees the Father doing. Now here, listen to this carefully. For whatever the

Father does, well, what does the Father do? What does the

Father do? Does He create? Does He sustain?

I mean, in every way that you think about God and what it means to be God, the

Father is God and does all the things of God, right? So for whatever the

Father does, all that encompasses being God, every activity, that the

Son does likewise. That's pretty bold talk.

Whatever the Father does, that the Son does likewise. For the

Father loves the Son and shows Him all that He Himself is doing. And greater works than these will

He show Him that you may marvel. For as the Father raises the dead and gives them life, so also the

Son gives life to whom He will. He has the same power.

He has the same authority. He has the same essence. For the

Father judges no one but has given all judgment to the Son. I mean, imagine that you're sitting there listening to Jesus say that and you don't believe in Him.

You believe that there's a God. You believe that He's going to judge. And then Jesus says,

The Father judges no one but has given all judgment to Me, essentially. That all may honor the

Son just as they honor the Father. If you're going to honor the Son the same as you honor the

Father and you believe the Father is God, then the Son is also

God. Whoever does not honor the Son does not honor the Father who sent Him. Truly, truly,

I say to you, whoever hears My word and believes Him who sent Me has eternal life. He who does not come to judgment but has passed from life to death.

Truly, truly, I say to you, an hour is coming and now is here and is now here when the dead will hear the voice of the

Son of God and those who hear will live. For as the Father has life in Himself, so has

He granted the Son also to have life in Himself. And He has given Him authority to execute judgment because He is the

Son of Man. Do not marvel at this. For an hour is coming when all who are in the tombs will hear

His voice and come out. And those who have done good to the resurrection of life and those who have done evil to the resurrection of judgment.

Verse 30, I can do nothing on My own. As I hear, I judge, and My judgment is just because I seek not

My own will but the will of Him who sent Me. What he's saying here is this.

I see what the Father does and I do the same thing. He's given me all authority, all judgment, all power.

This is an expression of what? The reality of the

Son being eternally begotten. Having the same essence. Being equal with the

Father in every way. When we read that, it's hard to kind of unknow now what we know.

To look at it and just think this is a man just speaking. No, this is the eternal second person of the

Godhead speaking. Instead of saying, well, you know what? You guys got me. Sorry, I slipped up.

He says, nope. That's exactly right. In fact, here. You don't like that? Have another slice.

You know? Okay. In inseparable operations, again, being the idea that anything that the

Father does is done by the Son, is done by the Spirit. Anything the Son does is also done by the

Father and the Spirit. Anything the Spirit does is also done by the Son and the Father. More about that in the next chapter.

How do we reconcile the fact in verse 22 that all judgment has been given by the

Father to the Son? How do we reconcile that with inseparable operations?

What's that? No, but I mean, should you just wait until the next chapter? No, but go ahead,

Dave. Okay. He's the fork in the road. He's the fulcrum for every person ever.

If you have Christ, you have eternal life. If you don't have Christ, you don't have eternal life.

Yes, that's part of his mission. That's part of his begottenness.

You know, what does the Holy Spirit do? He points to him. What does the

Father do? He draws all men to Christ. What does Jesus do? He draws all men to himself.

So, they all work together, but it's reflected or appropriated,

I guess we could say, differently in Scripture. However, who, well, let's put it,

I mean, we could go a number of directions, but because I don't want to just teach the next chapter, we'll kind of pass over this a little bit.

Was there another question? Okay. Yeah, as he hears, he judges. But let's just think about this.

Judgment Day. Jesus making the judgments. You know, does the

Father go, wow, I never would have expected that. you know, well,

I don't know, but I'll concur since I gave you all judgment. I mean, the kind of thing that I would do if I said to my son,

I've given you all judgment on this matter, right? And then he makes a judgment and I'd be like, I didn't see that one coming, right?

Because he probably wouldn't make the same decisions. Yes, Jonathan? That all may honor the

Son. Yes, Psalm 2, and I was going to say, you know, it does have to do this passage with the

Incarnation, and I'll go even better. How about Acts 17, where Paul's preaching, and what does he say?

That he's appointed a man who's going to judge everyone. So it's that same kind of thing in his

Incarnation. Okay, well, we've talked enough about inseparable operations because that's also going to be the next chapter, so let's see if we have enough time to do one more.

Yes, we do. Number 20, true or false?

Our suffering causes the Spirit to minister to us. Okay, I hear that.

False. And I'll raise it to true. Boo! Let's see what

Barrett says. He says, identifying love with the Spirit is a common scriptural maneuver.

I love it when scripture maneuvers. For example, consider

Paul's letter to the Romans. Paul rejoices that we have been justified by faith and have peace with God through our

Lord Jesus Christ. Romans 5 .1. But then Paul says something, I love what

Barrett says here, Paul says something crazy and seemingly absurd.

Quote, not only that, but we rejoice in our sufferings. That's Romans 5 .3.

Then Barrett says, rejoice in our sufferings. Suffering is hard, agonizing, and torturous, so why would anyone rejoice in their pain?

Because, says Paul, our suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not put us to shame because God's love has been poured into our hearts through the

Holy Spirit who has been given to us. Again, the idea of the Holy Spirit is a gift.

Then he says, the pouring out of love within us is the work of the Holy Spirit.

By pouring out the love of God, the Spirit himself is poured into our hearts as well, indwelling us to make us holy.

This all as a result of suffering. If we just think about it this way,

Jesus said he would send a comforter. Well, when do we need a comforter the most?

When we're suffering. When we're feeling alone. What's that?

When we're on earth. All the human condition, all the sorrows, all the fears, all the things that come upon us, and the more those things increase,

Paul would imply, the more those things increase, the more the ministry of the

Holy Spirit to us increases. Thoughts, questions, concerns, comments?

The word causes, like because we're in control, is that what you mean? Do you think that's right, though?

In other words, do you think that that's a right way of understanding it, because if God knows and God causes all the circumstances in the first place, then is he really responding to us, or is he responding to the circumstances in our life which he sovereignly brought into our life?

Okay, thank you. I have no further questions, Your Honor. Well, sometimes this knucklehead who writes these quizzes is just limited in his...

Yeah, there you go. Our suffering elicits the Spirit to minister to us.

How about this? Our suffering invites the

Spirit to minister to us. No? Okay.

All right. Well, John will spend the next hour in the thesaurus, so we'll see what you're missing if you don't come on Saturday morning, because I really dial it down here on Sunday morning.

On Saturday mornings, we're just brutal. True or false?

True. Yes. Okay, but I'm going to play the thesaurus here.

Rather than rescue, sometimes we don't get rescued out of the suffering, right?

Sometimes all we get is the comfort. Yeah, I mean, and we need to close, but just, even if we just think about this, what do our trials ultimately do?

They sanctify us, right? And so if the work of the

Holy Spirit, and we'll see, it's not just the work of the Holy Spirit. This is one specific thing that we will get into.

Who sanctifies us? And the answer, you know, Father, Son, or Spirit. We all want to say Spirit, but we're going to see via the scripture that it's all three.

How do we get, or, you know, the process of sanctification, you know, a lot of times it's difficult, it's difficulties that are brought into our life, trials that are brought into our life, and the

Holy Spirit comforts us and carries us through often these things. But anyway, we have to close.

Father, we thank you for this time. Thank you for this spirited discussion, for the many things that we struggle with, and we wrestle with, with regard to understanding you better.

Lord, help us to not get caught up in the mere technicalities or the jargon, but to really understand that we have the love of God, Father, Son, and Spirit for us, that you set about on an eternal mission to glorify yourself, yes, but to do that by saving us, by redeeming us from what we deserve.

Father, we are objects of your love, and we find that unfathomable, and we praise you, because we know we don't deserve it, but you lavish your grace and your love upon us anyway, and we thank you and praise you.