What’s with the Trinity?

Steve Brown:
Hey, what’s with the Trinity. The answer to that and other questions on Key Life.

Matthew Porter:
Key Life exists to communicate that the deepest message of Jesus in the Bible is the radical grace of God to sinners and sufferers. Life’s hard for everyone. So grace is for all of us, but there is a lot of confusion about how grace applies to real life. So here’s seminary professor and author, Steve Brown and Pete Alwinson to answer your questions.

Steve Brown:
Hi Pete.

Pete Alwinson:
Hey man. How you doing?

Steve Brown:
Will you explain the Trinity to me in 30 words or less.

Pete Alwinson:
And give three examples. [Laughing]

Steve Brown:
And give three examples. Right. We’re going to deal with a very, very difficult, but at the same time, very simple and wonderful truth of the Christian faith. And by the way, that’s Pete Alwinson. Go check ForgeBibleStudy.com You’ll be glad I told you about it. And Pete comes in every Friday and we spend the broadcast answering your questions. You can, you can submit a question in a lot of ways. You can call 1-800-KEY-LIFE. That’s 24 seven, mash the right button, and you can record your question. And sometimes we put that on the air. Then write to

Key Life Network
P.O. Box 5000
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In Canada, it’s

Key Life Canada
P.O. Box 28060
Waterloo, Ontario N2L 6J8

Or you can email us at Steve@keylife org. And if you’re can help us financially, please do. You can use your credit card include it in the envelope. And I promise we’ll be as faithful with your gift as you were in giving it. If he can’t, we understand say a prayer for this ministry, if you would. Pete, why don’t you pray for us? And then we’ll answer some questions.

Pete Alwinson:
Alright. Let’s do it. Father. We come to you today on this Friday as your children. And thank you, Holy God, for being our father, father, son, and Holy spirit, all because of the work of Jesus. And, and because of the, the, the drawing and the internal work of the Holy spirit, we praise you. And we ask that you would help us to understand you more worship you more, love you more and just live out of the grace energy that you give to us. So we give you praise, Lord, you know, us, you know, our needs, you know, those of us that have health needs and financial needs, relational needs, Lord, you know, us, you know everything about us. We’re not playing a game. We need you. And so come into our lives in a really powerful way to show us your power and us and set us more free. Help us to influence others that are, that are really searching and need to know you. Father, we pray for our pastors and teachers and leaders and priests and oh my goodness, children’s workers and all of our worship directors and leaders as they stand in front of us this week, how important they are. And we pray that you would bind the hands of the evil one, protect our leaders and use them in a powerful way to draw us into your presence. Now we give you this time of Q and A and ask that you be glorified in it. Give Steven and me wisdom, and we just commit it now in Jesus name. Amen.

Steve Brown:
Amen. Alright, let’s go to the easy part. Let’s talk about the Trinity.

Pete Alwinson:
Yeah. Right.

Steve Brown:
And we got an email and, uh, and, uh, it, I’m trying to find it. Oh, here it is. What does scripture teach about the Trinity? Was Jesus eternally submissive to the father while equal in all ways?

Pete Alwinson:
Yeah. That and you know, the Trinity. Well, first of all, we know the word Trinity is not found in the Bible. Right?

Steve Brown:
Yeah.

Pete Alwinson:
It’s the theological term. We find the reality, but not, not the word. And so what we find in scripture is three persons of infinite perfection, same qualities who are all worshiped and given divine names and actions.

Steve Brown:
That’s right. And there’s one God.

Pete Alwinson:
And there’s one God. Bible’s clear about that.

Steve Brown:
And it’s, it’s kinda cool. And nobody likes for me to say this, but I don’t care. Paul Young is a friend of mine. And I like him. I love him. Uh, and he’s been criticized in a lot of ways that really aren’t appropriate. I can understand not liking the book, The Shack, but there’s something that draws you into the shack about the idea of these three people who are actually individuals themselves and yet, are one. And, you can’t do that in fiction. And that’s where he got into trouble, but he tried to, and the winsomeness of that book is good theologically because if you believe in one God, and that’s it. And he talks about love that doesn’t work, because for all of eternity, no love’s gone on. But the great thing about the Trinity is that love becomes a manifestation of what has been present in the Trinity from the beginning,

Pete Alwinson:
That’s right.

Steve Brown:
absolute and total love.

Pete Alwinson:
Sure.

Steve Brown:
It’s a wonderful doctrine. And we are invited by Jesus to join.

Pete Alwinson:
That’s right. That’s right. Isn’t that amazing.

Steve Brown:
That just blows me away. Every time I see it.

Pete Alwinson:
And the Trinity answers a lot of questions, it answers a lot of questions how God could, could deal with his justice.

Steve Brown:
It really does. It really does.

Pete Alwinson:
Um, by pouring it out on Jesus, it answers a lot of where did love come from? It answers a lot of questions, even though, it doesn’t make sense to our human minds.

Steve Brown:
Yeah.

Pete Alwinson:
It is. It is divine revelation.

Steve Brown:
And it’s so easy as Paul Young has found. And a lot of other people have tried to explain it, every time you talk about the Trinity, for more than 30 seconds, you’re going to slip into some kind of heresy.

Pete Alwinson:
Yeah.

Steve Brown:
because there are about 8 billion of them

Pete Alwinson:
That’s right.

Steve Brown:
that have to do with the Trinity.

Pete Alwinson:
That’s right.

Steve Brown:
But it’s a reality to be experienced, to be accepted, rejoiced in, and to, to be amazed at. And I, uh, and it’s a wonderful doctrine.

Pete Alwinson:
Yeah.

Steve Brown:
And it’s true. And the Bible teaches it very clearly.

Pete Alwinson:
Yeah.

Steve Brown:
All right. This is an email. The Bible shows Jesus getting tempted. I’m going to let you answer this one, being tempted in multiple areas. It also States that he was tempted in every way. Why then would the Bible admit Jesus being tempted sexually?

Pete Alwinson:
Well, I think it’s included in there. I, as, as, as horrible as that, that might be for some to admit he was tempted in every way, which is great for us to hear. I mean, that causes problems.

Steve Brown:
Yeah. And if you’ve got a problem with that, as Grady Wilson said, I didn’t say it. God said it. [Laughing]

Pete Alwinson:
That’s exactly right.

Steve Brown:
You know, I remember the first time a single in our church, asked me about that and, and put it in a pretty upfront way, said, pastor, did Jesus have a lust problem? And I want to say, are you crazy?

Pete Alwinson:
Yeah.

Steve Brown:
You know, and then I realized there’s something neurotic about even being bothered by that question. We’re so afraid to talk about sex. And that’s one of the problems in our culture. The church needs to talk about sex. We need to talk about a biblical sexual ethic.

Pete Alwinson:
Right.

Steve Brown:
We need to talk about what the Bible says about gender, what it says, well, it goes on and on. And we don’t and all of a sudden everybody else, but us is talking about sex. Did Jesus, was he tempted sexually? Of course he was.

Pete Alwinson:
In every way as we are, but without sin.

Steve Brown:
That’s true.

Pete Alwinson:
So there it is. And that’s important for us to understand, and we can be tempted without sin too. I mean, yeah.

Steve Brown:
But not as long, not very often.

Pete Alwinson:
That’s right. That’s right.

Steve Brown:
I mean, we kind of a, it’s an if right? Yeah. It’s kinda iffy. Uh, what, if any, is the difference between backsliding being out of fellowship or falling away from Christ, are they all the same thing? If not, what are the differences?

Pete Alwinson:
Boy, that’s a, that’s a denominational theological study there

Steve Brown:
It really is, it really is.

Pete Alwinson:
So, in one sense, maybe there’s overlap and similarity. Um, you know, but again, how long being out of fellowship, falling away from Christ, pretty close they are. But, um, and we, and we, I think that the Christian life is not one linear line toward heaven, straight up where we’re doing great all the time.

Steve Brown:
Right.

Pete Alwinson:
We fall, we slipped back. We go through periods of time where we doubt we are unfaithful and we have to repent.

Steve Brown:
Have you ever heard the teaching? And I guess I’ve taught it myself, that sin doesn’t cause you to lose your salvation, that’s covered, but it, it destroys the fellowship you have with God?

Pete Alwinson:
Yeah. I’ve heard that.

Steve Brown:
And I don’t believe that.

Pete Alwinson:
Doesn’t destroy.

Steve Brown:
Do you know.

Pete Alwinson:
If you’re thinking that the oneness and the actual relationship.

Steve Brown:
In fact, if, if where sin abounds, grace abounds, the more it could be that in our sin and our repentance, our understanding about it, Jesus is more real than at any other time in our lives. You know, I, one time preached a sermon after I’d done something really bad. And Pete, I want to be as humble as I can be about this, but it was truly one of the great sermons, man, I sounded like Billy Graham and Spurgeon combined, I was so good. I was taking notes on myself. And when I when I walked away from the pulpit, I thought, how about that? And God said, I wanted to show you something, but don’t let it go to your head and don’t take advantage of it.

Pete Alwinson:
Yeah.

Steve Brown:
But God is present in our faithfulness and he’s present in our sin. And His love doesn’t change for all of that.

Pete Alwinson:
Yeah. Yeah.

Steve Brown:
And this question also presupposes the loss of one’s salvation.

Pete Alwinson:
It does. It does. Yeah. That’s wrapped up in there. And we don’t believe that can happen.

Steve Brown:
Yeah, we really don’t. And we have a lot of brothers and sisters who do, but they don’t believe it can happen easily.

Pete Alwinson:
That’s right. That’s right.

Steve Brown:
So they’re close to the truth, but they’re just not quite there yet.

Pete Alwinson:
Yeah.

Steve Brown:
Let’s see, uh, uh, how do you know when you can claim a verse as a promise and when it isn’t applicable?

Pete Alwinson:
Oh, that’s great.

Steve Brown:
That’s a good question.

Pete Alwinson:
Yeah. Really, because a context is, is important. And we have to study the context to see who the, to whom was the promise made. And was that promise or is that error fulfilled? A lot of times you can get into problems. If you take everything as normal, that story, like in the book of Acts, we gotta be careful.

Steve Brown:
That we build doctrine

Pete Alwinson:
Right.

Steve Brown:
on something that wasn’t meant for that.

Pete Alwinson:
Best, best to interact with somebody that might be a little bit further along with you, bounce that around.

Steve Brown:
That’s true. But the promises of God, however they’re used and are made in scripture, give us an understanding of God’s attitude of the promises that he does make. For instance, it may be a promise about faithfulness in battle in the older Testament, but it does allow us to say, that’s a God of faithfulness.

Pete Alwinson:
That’s right.

Steve Brown:
And he’ll be faithful to me also.

Pete Alwinson:
So what’s the principle,

Steve Brown:
What’s the principle behind the promise. Do you think that sometimes, uh, the Holy spirit, when we’re studying scripture and have a particular need, will lift up something that may not even be relevant in terms of a promise that fits us and yet apply it in our lives?

Pete Alwinson:
I, I, I think he does sometimes. And then when we do deeper study, we say, well, I understand the whole context now.

Steve Brown:
Yeah.

Pete Alwinson:
But he used it in our life.

Steve Brown:
Yeah. So I kind of agree with you. Don’t send us letters. You know, we’re doing the best we can, we don’t have time to sing a hymn, but we don’t have time to start a question either.

Pete Alwinson:
That would destroy your listenership.

Steve Brown:
We’re out of here guys. But before we go, one thing to remember Key Life is a listener supported production of Key Life Network.