The Trinity is on the Move to Save You

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 Pentecost Reading from Acts 2

Our second reading is taken from the book of Acts, chapter 2, and you'll notice it's a little bit broken up. Acts, chapter 2, starting at verse 14, we'll read the first part of 14 and then skip down to verse 22 and read through 36.

And you can find this in your pew Bible on page 771. Then Peter stood up with the eleven, raised his voice, and addressed the crowd. Verse 22. Men of Israel, listen to this. Jesus of Nazareth was a man accredited by God to you by miracles, wonders, and signs, which God did among you through him, as you yourselves know.

This man was handed over to you by God's set purpose and foreknowledge, and you, with the help of wicked men, put him to death by nailing him to the cross. But God raised him from the dead, freeing him from the agony of death, because it was impossible for death to keep its hold on him.

David said about him, I saw the Lord always before me, because he is at my right hand, I will not be shaken. Therefore, my heart is glad and my tongue rejoices. My body also will live in hope, because you will not abandon me to the grave, nor will you let your Holy One's seed decay.

You have made known to me the paths of life, and you will fill me with joy in your presence. Brothers, I can tell you confidently that the patriarch David died and was buried, and his tomb is here to this day.

But he was a prophet and knew that God had promised him on oath that he would place one of his descendants on his throne. Seeing what was ahead, he spoke of the resurrection of the Christ, that he was not abandoned to the grave, nor did his body see decay.

God has raised this Jesus to life, and we are all witnesses of the fact. Exalted to the right hand of God, he has received from the Father the promised Holy Spirit and has poured out what you now see and hear.

For David did not ascend to heaven, and yet he said, The Lord said to my Lord, Sit at my right hand until I make your enemies a footstool for your feet. Therefore, let all of Israel be assured of this.

God has made this Jesus, whom you crucified, both Lord and Christ. In the name of Jesus. From Acts 2 -33. Being therefore exalted at the right hand of God and having received from the Father the promise of the Holy Spirit, he has poured out this that you yourselves are seeing and hearing.

Trinity Sunday and the Athanasian Creed

Today is Trinity Sunday, otherwise known as Theological Brain Cramp Sunday. After today's sermon, we will confess the red-headed stepchild of the three ecumenical creeds known as the Athanasian Creed.

It may have been a while since that's been confessed here. And believe me when I tell you, it does not coddle us with simplistic and easy-to-digest morsels of rational theology. In fact, on the contrary, it's somewhat ponderous, and dare I say it, those of you who've read it, you know that it's incomprehensible.

Sorry, it's a little inside Athanasian Creed joke there. Some of you will get it later. Now, some of you may be tempted to ask, why is it necessary to spend any time in church, let alone an entire Sunday morning, considering the doctrine of the Trinity?

After all, it's a difficult doctrine to wrap your brain around, and we live in a society where everything is dumbed down, and those things that are considered difficult and hard to understand, well, they have been conveniently hidden from sight so that we can skate by without having to be stretched.

Well, I assure you that the doctrine of the Trinity was not fabricated by dead white men in order to make themselves look smart, nor was it created to vex us today. No, it was forged from the Word of God, which reveals that God is not like us.

In fact, Scripture reveals that there is one God, but that in the one God there are three persons. Now, many people are tempted to ask, and you may be asking, well, how is it possible? And my answer is, I don't know.

Scripture doesn't try to explain how the Trinity works. Instead, Scripture simply reveals that this is how God is. Yeah, something to consider. Now, many people throughout the history of the church have ended up shipwrecking their faith and the faith of their followers on the rocks of heresy by trying to rationalize God's nature and make it conform with human experience and human reason.

And that's not a good thing to do. By rationalizing God's nature, they've ended up forging an idol for themselves and have worshiped a figment of their imaginations as if it were God. So I warn you that idolatry of this kind puts a person outside of the Christian faith, regardless of whether or not they say they believe in Jesus.

And the reason for this is simple. There is only one genuine Jesus, and there are many false Jesuses running around out there. The genuine Jesus is God the Son, second person of the Holy Trinity. Jesus is not the first and greatest creation of God the Father or a godlike being or Michael the archangel incarnate as those who teach the Arian heresy would have you believe.

And by the way, if you're not familiar with the Arian heresy, if you ever have the Jehovah's Witnesses come knocking on your door, the Jehovah's Witnesses are today's Arians. Keep that in mind. Scripture says this,.

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God, and all things were made through Him, and without Him was not anything made that was made.

And then verse 14 of John 1,. And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen His glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth. Yeah, that's right. Scripture teaches that Jesus, the Word, the Logos, was already with God in the beginning and was God when the beginning began.

He already existed. Now you might be saying, but Pastor, Scripture says that there's only one God, but John 1 makes it sound like there are two gods. All right, so let's raise the stakes on that.

The Trinity Revealed in the Baptismal Formula

Jesus said,.

Go and make disciples, baptizing in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Doesn't that sound like there are three gods to you? Well, there's only three gods if you're not paying attention to the text.

Jesus said, In the name, singular, of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. He did not say in the names, plural, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. In other words, the math of the Trinity is not 1 plus 1 plus 1 equals 3.

Instead, the math of the Trinity is 1 times 1 times 1 equals 1. Keep that in mind. Now another false Jesus is the Jesus of the Modalists and the Oneness Pentecostals. This is the Jesus of the televangelist T .D. Jakes.

Modalism teaches correctly that there is only one God, but their God apparently is a quick-change artist and he's a ventriloquist.

Let me explain.

Modalism teaches that the one God manifests himself in different modes. So sometimes God appears or manifests as the Father, and then he quickly goes and hides and changes his clothes, and then he appears as the Son, and then he quickly goes and changes his clothes, and again appears as the Holy Spirit.

The Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit are not three distinct persons in modalism. Instead, they are three modes or ways that God manifests himself. Well, now we have a problem. When Jesus was baptized by John the Baptist, the Scripture tells us that the Spirit descended like a dove and the voice of the Father was heard saying, This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased.

If the Modalist God is the real God, was Jesus using a hologram to create the false impression that the Spirit was descending from heaven? And was he throwing his voice like a ventriloquist in order to create the false impression that the Father was in heaven speaking?

So Jesus is baptized,.

This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased.

You know, right? That would basically make Jesus guilty of a deception. Then we ask this. When Jesus was praying in the Garden of Gethsemane sweating drops of blood as he's getting ready to go to the cross, saying, Father, if it be your will at this cup, pass from me, who was he praying to?

If the Father isn't really a person that he could be praying to? And then when Jesus cried out on the cross, My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Who was he crying to? You must ask the Modalist. If the Father is merely a costume that God wears, and the Son is a costume that God wears, so God was wearing his Jesus costume on the cross and saying, My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?

This doesn't make a lick of sense unless God is totally unhinged and a stark raving mad and prone to talking to himself. All of these heresies, like the Arian heresy and Modalism, they cannot account for what Scripture says because Scripture reveals that, yes, there is only one God and that within the one God there are three persons, and they speak to and communicate with each other.

Furthermore, we believe that only the second person of the Trinity became flesh. We do not believe that the Father or the Holy Spirit were suffering on the cross for our sins, but only the Son. But, but, but, but, Pastor, you need to explain to us how this works.

No, I don't. We're not called to explain how the Trinity works. We're called to believe and confess what the one God has revealed about his triune nature. If God expected you to understand how his nature works, then he would have explained it to us in the Scripture, and because he hasn't, he doesn't expect you to understand how.

He just expects you to understand that this is how it is. Make sense? So with that, we return to our text from the book of Acts this morning, and notice how Peter, in his preaching on the day of Pentecost, does not confuse the members of the Trinity.

He is a Trinitarian through and through, all the way back there at the beginning of the church. And we begin at verse 14, Then Peter, standing up with the eleven, lifted up his voice and addressed them, Men of Judea and all who dwell in Jerusalem, let this be known to you and give ear to my words.

Then verse 22.

Hear these words.

Jesus of Nazareth, a man attested to you by God with mighty works and wonders and signs that God did through him in your midst, as you yourselves know, this Jesus delivered up according to the definite plan and the foreknowledge of God, you crucified and killed by the hands of lawless men.

God raised him up, loosing the pangs of death because it was not possible for him to be held by it. For David says concerning him, I saw the Lord always before me, and he is at my right hand that I may not be shaken.

Therefore my heart was glad, my tongue rejoiced, my flesh also will dwell in hope. For you will not abandon my soul to Hades or let your Holy One see corruption. You have made known to me the paths of life, and you will make me full of gladness with your presence.

So brothers, I may say to you with confidence about the patriarch David that he both died and was buried, and his tomb is with us to this day. Being therefore a prophet and knowing that God had sworn with an oath to him that he would set one of his descendants on his throne, he foresaw and spoke about the resurrection of the Christ, or you can say the Messiah, that he was not abandoned to Hades, nor did his flesh see corruption.

This Jesus, God raised up, and of that we are all witnesses, being therefore exalted at the right hand of God, and having received from the Father the promise of the Holy Spirit, he has poured out this that you yourselves are seeing and hearing.

Notice right there in verse 33, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are all recognized as three distinct persons. Right there in the text. David did not ascend to the heavens, but he himself says, The Lord said to my Lord, Sit at my right hand until I make your enemies a footstool, and let all the house of Israel therefore know for certain that God has made him both Lord and Christ, this Jesus whom you crucified.

The Trinity Working for Your Salvation

And we'll pause right there and notice something. Because it is all three members of the Trinity, the one God, who are acting, who are speaking, who are empowering and emboldening the apostles to preach this message, you can deduce from that that all of God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, each and every person, all of them united, are working for your salvation.

They have come up with the plan. They have executed on the plan. In the council of the Trinity, they determined that the Son would become incarnate, born of the Virgin Mary, to live perfectly in your place, to die on the cross for your sins and be raised to life.

And now that the Holy Spirit has come on Pentecost, who is the Holy Spirit emboldening the apostles to preach about? Not themselves, and not even the Holy Spirit, but emboldening them to preach about Christ and everything that he has accomplished for you.

Because this is what the Trinity wants you to believe, to teach, to confess, to hang on to, to cling on to, and be comforted. And if you remember last week's Gospel text, when Jesus said he would send the Comforter, the Comforter, the Holy Spirit, would do several things.

Convict the world of sin and unbelief is one of the primary things that the Holy Spirit does. The Holy Spirit is not active making people bark like dogs and behave weirdly. Instead, the Holy Spirit is active convicting people of their sin and their unbelief.

And we know that the Holy Spirit is moving, because the text says so, but also because of verse 37. Let's keep reading a little bit and watch what happens. So now when they heard this, all the people listening, they were cut to the heart and said to Peter and the rest of the apostles, Brothers, what shall we do?

There's the Holy Spirit convicting them of their sin and their unbelief. And remember the charge against them. Remember what Peter said that they were guilty of. They were guilty of crucifying Jesus, of crucifying the Messiah.

Now, correct me if I'm wrong, but there's crimes, and then there's crimes. There's sin, and then there's really sin. Crucifying the Messiah, I think, ranks way up there. You know what I'm saying? You've got kicking your dog, grumbling about your work, saying a sharp word to your wife, and then crucifying the Messiah.

Way up here, right?

Yeah?

So keep that in mind. They're cut to the heart. They're guilty as charged, and they're confessing it as so. And so what does Peter say to them? Oh, you're doomed. You're doomed, yeah. That crucifying the Messiah sin, there's no hope for that.

That's not what he said. Listen to what he says. Brothers, what shall we do, they asked. Peter said, repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ, for the forgiveness of your sins, and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.

Unbelievable.

Peter says to them they can be forgiven of even crucifying and murdering the Messiah. So when we talk about the forgiveness of sins, and sins being washed away in the waters of baptism, somebody might say, yeah, but which ones?

Which ones can be forgiven? Which ones will God forgive? Will He forgive idolatry? Will He forgive heresy? Will He forgive, you know, grumbling against my parents, or stealing, or adultery, or murder, or coveting?

Can those sins be forgiven? The answer is yes. Every one of those sins, including the guilt of crucifying the Messiah, they're all forgiven. The Trinity wants and wills for you to be saved, so much so that He has sent the Son to bleed and die for every one of your sins.

Nothing is left out. Nothing is excluded. Anything that you have done is included in Christ's atoning sacrifice, even up to murdering the Messiah Himself. And this gives us hope. If those who murdered the Messiah can be forgiven, then truly we can be forgiven.

Because in a very real way, we are also guilty of murdering the Messiah. It was our sins that He was bleeding and dying for. It was our sins that He was being punished for and stricken for. So repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ, for the forgiveness of your sins, and you'll receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.

The Trinity desires to grant you pardon rather than send you to hell. For the promise, Peter says, is for you. The promise is for you and is for your children and for all who are far off and everyone whom the Lord God calls to Himself.

And with many other words He bore witness and continued to exhort them, saying, Save yourselves from this crooked generation. So those who received Peter's word were baptized, and there were added that day about 3 ,000 souls.

Law and Gospel, Sinai and Pentecost

Now by way of pointing out kind of a bookend Old Testament little side note, if you remember when Moses came down from Mount Sinai with the stone tablets that had the ten words of God on it, right? He comes down, and what did he find when he came down from the mountain?

They were worshiping the golden calf. And so when God gave the law, the law came, and as a result of their sin, how many people in the camp of Israel were killed that day as a result of the golden calf?

3 ,000. 3 ,000. Bookended. When the law came, it killed. When the gospel and the Holy Spirit came, there was life. 3 ,000 died, and on this day 3 ,000 were raised to life in Christ because of God's mercy.

That's the difference between the law and the gospel. The law kills. The gospel brings to life. They are both words from God, and they do their job on us. The Holy Spirit killing us through the preaching of the law, nailing us to the wall, and saying we're guilty.

That brings death, and that's good. And we all say with the people of Israel, what shall we do? And we hear the words, repent, be baptized for the forgiveness of your sins. You who are baptized, you are in Christ.

Your sins have been washed away. Your sins have been forgiven. The Holy Trinity has acted, and the Holy Trinity continues to act to sustain you now as He brings you into eternal life. What a great blessing we have from God that He is so merciful and so active to save and redeem and sustain lost sinners like me and like you.

In the name of Jesus, amen.

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