Deut 6:4-5 say's Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God is one LORD: And
thou shalt love the LORD thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul,
and with all thy might.
Deuteronomy 6 :4-5 speaks of a fundamental truth in the Old Testament of the
message needed to Israel and the world at a time when many false gods were
worshipped. What does it mean that God is one when we have the New Testament
truth of the Trinity? In the Old Testament the Trinity was hinted at and spoken
of in many ways but the New Testament clarify it. What does it mean here O
Israel our God is one Lord?
The oneness of God speaks of a unity between three distinct persons in the
Godhead. The fact that the word "our God" is plural (Elohim), speaks of this
truth. I cannot imagine the Son saying to the Father no I will not, I refuse to
do what you say, or the Spirit denying Christ help and witnessing to the truth.
When we read that man and wife shall be "one flesh" (Gen 2:24) it speaks to
unity. The Scripture in Ezra 3:1 speaks of Israel as one man also Ezekiel
37:15-17 and other scriptures verify this truth of one, meaning unity.
To the finite human mind the Unity of God and the Trinity
of God are contradictions, but both doctrines are clearly taught throughout the
New Testament. The Tri-unity of God is, in fact, the foundation stone of the
Christian faith. Every time in Church history that the doctrine of the Trinity
has been compromised, the other major Bible tenets have also been compromised or
abandoned. Those who have denied the Trinity have also denied the Deity of
Christ, the Virgin Birth, the Vicarious Atonement, the Personality of the Holy
Spirit; or else, they have made God a stage player wearing three different
masks.
By the beginning of the fourth century it became incumbent
upon the church to convene a council of leaders and pastors to formulate the
Apostolic doctrines to which they held. They felt the need for a formal creed
to which the Church at large could subscribe.The
first council met at Nicea in 325 A.D., where Athanasius prevailed against
Arius and the Deity of Christ was confirmed. Controversy continued and other
councils were held: at Chalcedon in 351 A.D. and at Constantinople in 381 A.D.
At this last council, the doctrines of the Deity of Christ and that of the
Trinity were upheld and formulated into what we call the Nicene Creed:
We believe in one God—And in one Lord Jesus Christ, the Son
of God, begotten of the Father, light of light, very God of very God, begotten
not made, being of one substance with the Father—And we believe in the Holy
Ghost, who is the Lord and giver of life, who proceedeth from the Father, who
with the Father and Son, is worshipped and glorified, who spake by the
prophets.
The major Protestant bodies have closely followed this
ancient creed of the fourth century. The best known of the reformation
creeds is the Westminster Confession,
which reads as follows:
There is but one living and true God. In the unity of the
Godhead there are three persons, of one substance, power, and eternity—God
the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit. The Father is one, neither
begotten or proceeding; the Son is eternally begotten of the Father; the
Holy Ghost eternally proceeding from the Father and the Son.
These creeds and confessions rightly do not attempt to
remove the mystery of the Trinity or to reconcile the scriptural statements
with finite reasoning. The compilers tried to include all that Scripture
teaches about the Three Persons of the Trinity without any effort to show
how God can be both One and Three. The creeds are human documents, and are
not infallible; nevertheless, the main stream of the Church has followed the
wording of the Nicene and Athanasian creeds with very little variation.
It was absolutely essential that, in the Old Testament,
the UNITY of God should be clearly revealed and emphasized. Israel was
surrounded by tribes and nations which had departed from the original
knowledge of God Almighty, the Creator, to embrace polytheism. The Gentile
nations worshipped a variety of gods and goddesses represented by images.
Duffield, Guy P. ; Van Cleave, Nathaniel
M.: Foundations of Pentecostal Theology. Los Angeles, Calif. :
L.I.F.E. Bible College, 1983, S. 87