IN CREATION:
"In the beginning
God created the heaven and the earth." (Gen. 1:1)
The Hebrew word here
translated God is Elohim. The singular form of God is El, the plural
form
is Eloah (referring to 2), while the multiple form (referring to 3 or
more)
is Elohim. [Note here that this word is also used to denote the
multiplicity
of gods, but here the context denotes that this is the true God.]
The sense of Gen.
1:1 is then: "In the beginning the Godhead (Father, Son, and Spirit)
created
the heavens and the earth."
Let's follow this thought on through
this first chapter. In verses 26 and 27: "And God said, Let us make man
in our own image, after our likeness ... So God created man in His own
image, in the image of
God created He him." Man is a tri-unity (body
soul, and spirit) because we were created by God who is a trinity.
JUST TWO MORE
REFERENCES FROM GENESIS BEFORE
MOVING ON.
"And the Lord God
said, Behold, the man is become as one of us, to know good and evil."
(Gen.
3:22)
"Go to, let us go down, and there confound
their language, that they may not understand one another's speech."
(Gen.
11:7)
In Isaiah we hear
the seraphims crying one to another: "Holy, Holy,Holy, is the Lord of
hosts."
(Isaiah 6:3) Who is it that is Holy? The Holy Father (John 17:11), the
Holy Son (Luke 1:35), and the Holy Spirit.
LATER IN THAT
CHAPTER WE FIND A GLIMPSE OF
THE HEAVENLY COUNCILS.
"Also I heard the
voice of the Lord, saying, Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?
Then
said I, Here am I; send me." Christ came on behalf of the Godhead, yet
was fully God at the same time.
When she was told
that she should bear a son, Mary questioned how that could be, having
never
known a man. The angel replied: "The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee,
and
the power of the Highest [the Father] shall overshadow thee: therefore
also that holy thing which shall be born of thee shall be called the
Son
of God." (Luke 1:35) All three had a part in the birth of Jesus Christ.
The Godhead acts in unity.
When He was ready
to return to the Father, our Lord said: "I will pray the Father, and he
shal give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you for ever;
even
the Spirit of truth. ... But the Comforter, which is the Holy Ghost,
whom
the Father will send in my name, he shall teach you all things, and
bring
all things to your remembrance, whatsoever I have said unto you." (John
14:16, 26) Here we see the Son asking the Father to send the Spirit to
be our Comforter.
Two chapters later we read:
"It is expedient for you that I go away: for if I go not away, the
Comforter
will not come unto you; but if I depart, I will send him unto you. ...
Howbeit when he, the Spirit of truth, is come, he will guide you into
all
truth: for he shall not speak of himself; but whatsoever he shall hear,
that shall he speak: and he will shew you things to come. He shall
glorify
me: for he shall receive of mine, and shall shew it unto you. All
things
that the Father hath are mine: therefore said I, that he shall take of
mine, and shew it unto you." (John 16:7,13-15) Here it is the Son who
sends
the Spirit of God to us. And all that the Father has belongs to the
Son,
and the Spirit will take what belongs to the Son and shew it unto us.
In
everything the Godhead works in unity.
UNITY IN OUR
SALVATION:
"How much more shall
the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself
without
spot to God [the Father], purge your conscience from dead works to
serve
the living God?" (Hebrews 9:14)
NOW TO LOOK AT THE
RESURRECTION:
" Christ was raised up
from the dead by the glory of the Father" (Romans 6:4)
"Destroy this temple, and in three days I
[the Son] will raise it up. But he spake of the temple of his body."
(John
2:19,21)
"For Christ also hath once suffered for sins,
... being put to death in the flesh, but quickened by the Spirit." (1
Peter
3:18)
ONCE AGAIN ALL
THREE ACTED IN UNITY TO RAISE
CHRIST FROM THE DEAD.
Finally, let's look
at Luke 15. Here we find three parables, all well known to us, that
speak
again of the unity of the Godhead in redeeming us to God.
In the first parable
we see the shepherd seeking the lost sheep.
"For the Son of man is come to seek and to
save that which was lost." (Luke 19:10)
The second parable
is of the woman who lights a candle, and sweeps the house until she
finds
the lost coin. "The wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the
sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh, and whither it
goeth:
so is every one that is born of the Spirit." (John 3:8)
The last of these
three parables is that of the prodigal son. The beauty of this
parable
is that the Father was watching and waiting for the son to
return,
and he ran to meet him. Is our Father not still waiting for one
lost
sinner to turn to Him?
Everyone of us who
has been redeemed by the blood of Christ can say that the Son
sought
and found us, we were born by the Spirit, and embraced by the Father!
I apologize for being
so long with this posting, but if you can bear with me for just a bit
more
I'd like to share the dying words of a young Scottish boy:
I see, I see,
What do I see?
The three in one,
And one in three.
All the three are all for me,
All for me!
Your brother in
Christ,
Kenn Heslop
Used by permission
Mar. 4th 2003
Updated Aug. 3nd 2002, by Harold Smith