LIFE IN THE TRINITY

No one has ever seen God,
not so much as a glimpse.
    This one-of-a-kind God-Expression,
who exists at the very heart of the Father,
has made him plain as day

 (John 1: 18 The Message).

To see the Son is to see the Father.  If we try to look at the Father without looking through the Son we are no longer looking at the Father.  We are simply projecting our own image of the divine being onto the one we are calling Father.

Our imaginary “divine being” is simply the first cause that was needed to get everything started.  The intelligent designer required to account for purpose and order in the world.  A mere concept – abstract, remote and anonymous in splendid isolation.  Our imaginary “divine being” is also likely to be the God of religion whose “otherness” fills people with dread.  The Supreme Judge whose prime concern is that everyone be declared legally right in his court of law.  The contract God who says do this right and only then will I bless. 

We need to stress over and over again that we only see who the Father really is when we keep our eyes on his Son!  Then we see the Father drawing near to relate rather than remote.  We see him among us in lowliness rather than exalted in splendid isolation.  We see him as love wanting to relate rather than the legal God who just wants everything to be declared upright.

Seeing the Father through his Son we are drawn into love relationship with him as dearly loved children with Jesus, the beloved Son.  And by the Spirit of the Son we cry, Abba Father!

The Father of Jesus wants to draw near and relate to us as our personal Father.  He wants to be a living reality in our daily lives.  He comes close to us as Father by the Spirit.  The Spirit of God’s Son makes the Father so real to us that we cry Abba Father, which was the cry of the Father’s Son during his earthly life.

Jesus also wants to draw near and relate to us personally as our brother.  He too wants to be a living reality in our daily lives.  He comes close and relates to us personally by the Spirit.

Jesus said that it was better for his disciples that he go away from them.  For when he returns to his Father he will send the Spirit to them.  The Spirit who would make Jesus real to them.  Indeed, the Spirit who would be the living reality of Jesus himself within them.  With the coming of the Spirit Jesus would be more real to them than when they knew him in the flesh.  We too know Jesus as personal reality by the Spirit within us. And in living union with him we draw near to the Father in personal intimacy.

The mark of being filled with the Spirit is personal relationship with Father and Son as sons and daughters in the Spirit.  By the Spirit we become deeply aware of the Father’s nearness to his Son and the Son’s dearness to him.  And by the same Spirit we become deeply aware of the Father’s nearness to us and our dearness to him in union with his Son.

Can we be so Christ-centred that we forget the Father?  I think we have to say that if  holding Christ at the centre means we forget the Father, we are not looking at the true Christ. Jesus was sent from the Father.  He prayed to the Father.  He lived for the Father in trustful obedience.  He died crying out, “Father, into your hands I commit my spirit.”  He was raised by the Father.  And to the Father he returned.  Jesus said if you have seen me you have seen the Father.  His words and works are the Father’s words and works.  When you look at Jesus you cannot miss the Father.

Can we be so Christ-centred that we forget the Spirit?  Again, we have to say that if  holding Christ at the centre means we forget the Spirit, we are not looking at the true Christ. Jesus served his Father in the power of the Spirit. He was filled with joy in the presence of his Father in the Spirit. If you want to know what a Spirit-filled life  looks like you look at Jesus.  Furthermore, Jesus now pours out the Spirit on his own.  And he continues to work out his mission in the world in and through us by the power of the Spirit.

Furthermore, the Spirit is always taking the things of Christ and making them known in us so that he always glorifies the Son to us. And he does so to transform us into the image of Christ.  The Spirit is the Spirit of Christ.  When you look at Jesus you cannot miss the Spirit.

Can we really be too Christ-centred?

We may feel that we are free when we choose what we want from a number of different options. God is free in an altogether different way.

The Triune God is love and he is free as he expresses who he is as love.  That means The Triune One is free as the three persons are with one another and for one another in love. For in this fellowship of self-giving love the One God is expressing who he is as love.

In the freedom of His love, God became one of us in Jesus in order to bring us back to himself in love.  We did not want to be with God.   But the Triune One is love and so  he still wanted us and refused to be God without us.  He acted in the freedom of who he is as love to become one of us in order to reconcile us to himself. He refused to relinquish us to ruin.

The Father’s Son is himself fully divine and yet he was free to become fully human.  He is free to be with God and for God as one of the Triune communion in love.  He is also free to be with us and for us as one of the human race in love.

Christ is also free in his Spirit to work within us so that we are set free for God.  Apart from his working within us we are not free for God at all.  We are turned in on ourselves pursuing only what we want for ourselves.  God is free for us in Christ, but we are not free for him.  But in the freedom of who he is as love God encounters us personally in Christ by his Spirit setting us free. Now we can be with him sharing in his communion of love.

Christ crucified is God himself  descending deeply into the realm of evil. Even into the depths of its ultimate domain in death itself.  The Crucified One penetrated the realm of darkness at the point of its supreme thrust against himself in order to judge it.    At the same time, the Crucified Christ not only judged evil but also saved the world from its domain reconciling all to God. This is the triumph of the crucified over the powerful rulers of this dark age through his once for all self-offering in weakness.

This triumph over evil has taken place once and for all and cannot be repeated.  And yet God is still active within the world working out the effects of His triumph over evil. He does so through the same crucified One.  He is the lamb enthroned at the right hand of God the Father Almighty.  And he continues to serve his Father in the world by the Presence and Power of his Spirit.

As head over all things Jesus, the enthroned lamb, reigns with supreme authority with his Father by the Spirit. He does so, however, as the true human who has fully aligned himself with us in our desperate condition and is now constantly present with us in all our distress under the menace of evil powers.

So we are always confident, not in ourselves, but only in the Crucified One who was raised in triumph over all for our sake.  In this confident trust there is no place for triumphalism!  We always follow the lamb as his cross-shaped servants in the way of power through weakness by his Spirit.

In Jesus, the Sovereign power of God was demonstrated in human weakness  He did not remain aloof from us ordering his royal will from a distance.  He actually became one of us to work out his sovereign will within our frail human existence.

In Jesus, the Sovereign power of God was demonstrated even in dying our death.  This kind of power is entirely different from any that we can ever imagine.

• It is power that is absolutely supreme over death for it accomplishes the actual death of death.  And yet it does so in lowly weakness submitting to death in order to destroy its power from within.
• It is power that demolishes anything that attempts to oppose God’s purpose of fellowship with us.  And yet it does so through lowly weakness in the dark abyss of forsakenness.

Such power we can never even begin to imagine.

In Jesus, God’s kingly power now guides the world to its final destiny.  For  God has appointed Jesus as head over all things. Yes, the same Jesus who demonstrated God’s kingly power in human weakness now reigns in power as the exalted man at God’s right hand.  There he moves all things to their final destiny and he does so as the end to which all things now move.

As we await this future with expectation, he is able to do in us immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us.

In the beginning, Our Father created all things though his Son (the Word) as the Spirit of God moved over the face of the waters.  The three moved as One in their creative activity.

Our Father continues to work within his creation upholding it through his Son as the Spirit of God breathes life within all. There is  always Oneness in the ongoing activity between the three within creation.  Each one in his own way engages in the ongoing Creative work.  The activities of the three are not separate from each other, they rather overlap and interpenetrate one another.  All is done from the Father, through the Son and in the Spirit.

The Triune God continues to act within his creation to bring it to his intended destiny. What is creation’s destiny? Right from the start God’s creation was ruined.  We might now think that Creation’s destiny is to be restored to its original and unspoiled condition.  But the Triune Drama from creation to new creation shows us that the destiny towards which all creation is moving will be vastly different from what was first made.

Through Jesus, the new man, God will liberate the whole of his creation from disease, death, decay and deformity. And He will liberate it to be a new world full of light and life and love in communion with the Triune God.  A new world that will be the home of Father, Son and Spirit in communion with us.

And now we groan with the Spirit for the coming of that new world.

Paul speaks graphically about Creation groaning for its future liberation from bondage into the freedom and glory of the children of God.  Creation yearns to share in our future liberation.  We too are groaning for that day of liberation. We are yearning deeply for our own freedom and the freedom of all creation (Romans 8).

Where does all this groaning come from?  Paul is clear that it comes from God’s Spirit.  We are groaning because the Spirit himself is groaning within us for our future liberation and of all creation.  We groan with the Spirit as he groans within us.

So the Spirit who hovered over the formless and empty earth at the start of creation is now groaning over creation in bondage to decay and ruin.  And His groaning takes place within us as we groan with the Spirit over the brokenness and bondage of all around us. The Spirit’s groaning is expressed in and through us as we pray over the ruined world with sighs too deep for words. 

The Father Almighty moves creation towards its destiny. And we participate in the action.  We don’t simply observe the activity of God within his creation. We participate in the struggle as weak people groaning with the Spirit for our liberation and of all things.  We do so in the sure hope that Jesus, the new man, will finally free the whole of creation by the power of the Spirit.

In the universe many diverse things move and turn and spin. And yet, amazingly, they all hold together and move as one cosmic system. How can such diverse and dynamic things hold together? Well, speaking of Jesus, the Son, Paul says,

“…in him all things hold together”.

Jesus is the “Word”  through whom God first spoke all things into existence and he is the One in whom all things now hold together.

Just one person holding all together!  And the Son who now holds all together is the very One who became flesh. That means the Son who holds all things together is not someone above and beyond creation but rather the one who has become part of his own creation. That is true unless we believe that the exalted Son is no longer human.

As the Word spoke all things into existence the Wind/Spirit of God moved over the waters bringing all to life.  The Spirit is also the breath of God that continues to breathe through all creation giving his life to all living things. Now, God our Father holds all things together in a personal way through the crucified Jesus as exalted Lord and by his Spirit.  Together, the three uphold and sustain creation beyond its own power.

Now, as God’s creatures, we live in wonder before our Father glorifying him with His Son as the breath of God breathes his life through us.

In the past I tried to grasp something of God’s power by imagining His unlimited strength.  Now I see that we only learn what God’s power really is as we see it portrayed in the lowly man Jesus serving his Father under the Spirit. In his story we see the distinctive kind of power that God is, which is the very opposite of what we would ever imagine.

Consider the conception of Jesus.  The Holy Spirit came to a humble girl.  The power of the Most High conceived within her a human embryo that was God himself as human. The almighty power of God that created the entire universe was now acting within human lowliness to bring into being the One in whom the whole universe will be reconciled to God.

The child was born and grew into the man Jesus.  He was the Father’s unique Son who came into the world to serve his Father on behalf of the world.  He did so as a lowly servant in the presence and power of the Spirit.  He healed the sick, drove out demons and even raised the dead by the power of the Spirit.  He offered himself as atoning sacrifice on the cross through the eternal Spirit.  He was declared to be Son of God in power according to the Spirit by his resurrection from the dead. As ascended Lord he poured out the Spirit on his own.  Now they would know him in the Spirit and share in his mission as the Spirit enabled.

The Almighty Father’s purpose for the world continues through weak and frail humans just like us in the power of the Spirit.