The God we worship is the God who is; the God who has revealed himself to us in Creation, in Scripture, and supremely in Christ. One of the first things the church had to face after the age of the Apostles was, “Who is God in light of all that Christ has made known to us by his incarnation, life, death, resurrection, and ascension to heaven?”

 
The way this question of who God is came before the Church was in the necessity of answering the question, “Who is Jesus Christ?”. The question presented itself in this way: “We know from the Old Testament and from Jesus himself that there is only one God. Yet Jesus said things about himself and the Apostles said things about him that tell us he is distinct from God as the Father’s Son, yet that seem to say that Jesus himself is God. How do we make sense of this? Are there then two Gods? Or is it that Jesus is much closer to God than we and so a divine Person, but not himself fully God as God the Father is God?”
 
The conclusion of the Church concerning the Person of Christ was stated at the Council of Nicea (A.D. 325): “We believe in one Lord Jesus Christ, the only-begotten Son of God, God of God, light of light, very God of very God, begotten not made, being of one substance (not similar stuff but the same stuff) with the Father…”
 
This conclusion also forced the church to face the question of the Holy Spirit. There is much less to go on in the Bible to know who he is than there is on the question of the Father and the Son. Nevertheless, the Church was pressed toward acknowledging the Deity of the Spirit so that the same Nicene Creed says, “And we believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord and giver of life, who proceeds from the Father and the Son; who with the Father and the Son is worshiped and glorified…” Calling the Spirit “Lord” and acknowledging him as one who is “worshiped and glorified” along with Father and Son ascribes Deity to the Spirit since only God may be worshiped.
 
There continued to be questions about both how much Deity and how much manhood to ascribe to Christ. In 451 a council at Chalcedon addressed such questions and said this (in part): “We all with one accord teach men to acknowledge one and the same Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, at once complete in Godhead and complete in manhood, truly God and truly man, consisting also of a reasonable soul and body; of one substance with the Father as regards his Godhead, and at the same time of one substance with us as regards his manhood…”
 
Later the Athanasian Creed (called Athanasian, not because Athanasius wrote it, but because it expresses the doctrine taught by Athanasius) stated the full doctrine of the Trinity in a series of carefully drawn statements about the Godhood of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, and the oneness of God. A part of what it says is: “And the catholic faith is this: That we worship one God in Trinity, and Trinity in Unity; neither confounding the persons, nor dividing the substance, for there is one Person of the Father, another of the Son and another of the Holy Spirit. But the Godhead of the Father, of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit is all one, the glory equal, the majesty co-eternal. Such as the Father is, such is the Son and such is the Holy Spirit…So the Father is God, the Son is God, and the Holy Spirit is God; And yet they are not three Gods, but one God.”
 
To use the beautifully concise and accurate language of the Westminster Shorter Catechism: Q. 5: Are there more Gods than one?  There is but one only, the living and true God. Q. 6: How many persons are there in the one God?  There are three persons in the Godhead: the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost; and these three are one God, the same in substance, equal in power and glory. So to put it together: (1) There is one God. (2) Yet there is a real distinction of personalities within the Godhead: the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. (3) All three are made of exactly the same “stuff” and are each other’s equal. (Therefore)There is one God who exists eternally as three Persons. This is the God whom we worship.
 
Now a few observations:
 
(1)     This is a clear example of a principle of understanding the meaning and authority of the Bible: “The whole counsel of God…is either expressly set down in Scripture, or by good and necessary inference may be deduced from Scripture” (Westminster Confession 1:6). There is no text that explicitly teaches the doctrine of the Trinity. (Yes, you do find a text found in the original and New King Versions at 1 John 5:7, but it is almost universally agreed that this text was not part of John’s original. It is not found in the best manuscripts of this letter, and is not included in any of the translations based on the most reliable manuscripts.) This is a doctrine that is demanded in order to account for all the Bible’s teaching about God. Sometimes we hear that this “systematizing” of the Bible’s teaching imposes on it Greek categories of thought that are not part of Biblical thought. No. Greek “thinking about thought” may help us to express the truth, but the issue is whether God reveals to us truth that is consistent with itself. The doctrine of the Trinity comes from the conviction that he does.
 
(2)     This is an example of “ecumenical” or “catholic” doctrine. What this means is that the doctrine of the Trinity is accepted by all churches that have any claims to be Christian and by all persons who have any claims to be Christians. In a sense, the doctrine of the Trinity is the ticket that admits a church or individual into the world of Christianity. The God Christians worship is the one God who is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
 
(3)     The doctrine of the Trinity takes its stand in distinction from other views of who God is. (a) Unitarianism: there are no distinctions within God; he is not only one God, but one Person. (b) Modalism: the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit are not three distinct and eternal Persons, but three modes (ways) of conceptualizing God or three modes (forms of existence) that the one God successively took as he related to man and his salvation.
 
(4)     There is another view that the full doctrine of the Trinity stands apart from. That is “Subordinationism.” This is the view that, while we may legitimately call Father, Son, and Holy Spirit each God, nevertheless there is a rank within the Trinity in which the Son is subordinate to the Father, and the Spirit is subordinate to the Father and the Son.
 
Here we have to introduce a “technical” theological concept. Theologians talk about the “ontological Trinity” and the “economic Trinity.” Don’t let the language bother you, and don’t dismiss it as unimportant. The “ontological Trinity” speaks of the relations of Father, Son, and Spirit as eternal Persons (the persons they were, are, and will be among themselves for eternity). The “economic Trinity” speaks of the relations of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit in the works of creation and redemption. In their eternal relations, the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are equal. There is no rank. However, in their relations to creation and redemption the Father is the initiator, the Son the doer, and the Holy Spirit the executor. For instance, the Father planned our salvation and sent the Son. The Son came in obedience to the Father and accomplished our salvation. The Father and the Son then sent the Holy Spirit to apply the salvation planned by the Father and accomplished by the Son to those whom the Father chose and gave to the Son.
 
This is the way we understand that great passage about what will happen at the resurrection: “Then comes the end, when he delivers the kingdom to God the Father after destroying every rule and every authority and every power. For he must reign till he has put all his enemies under his feet. The last enemy to be destroyed is death. For ‘God has put all things in subjection to his feet.’ But when it says, ‘all things are put into subjection,’ it is plain that he is excepted who put all things in subjection to him. When all things are in subjection to him, then the Son himself will be subjected to him who put all things in subjection under him, that God may be all in all” (1 Corinthians 15:24-28).
 
The context of all this is the work of salvation which will come to consummation and conclusion when the dead are raised. The Father sent the Son to defeat Satan, sin, and death and to establish the kingdom of salvation. As of his resurrection and ascension, God has put all things under Christ’s rule as the Savior – King. He will go on ruling everything in real and practical submission to him. When he comes and raises us, even death will be defeated, and his rule will be universal. At that time the work of Christ as Messiah-Savior-King will be complete, and the kingdom of salvation will have triumphed over every foe. Then the Son as Messiah-Savior-King will hand the whole kingdom of salvation over to the Father and submit himself to the Father. Christ, who as the full equal of the Father, agreed to come to the world to do the work of salvation, and in doing so voluntarily to submit himself to the Father. Now all that is done, and he gives it all back to the Father as “mission accomplished.” But the purpose is that “God (not just the Father but the one God who is eternally three Persons) may be all in all.”
 
What does it matter? (1) This is who God is; there is no other God who exists. (2) This is the God who saves us; there is no other salvation than the salvation of the Triune God. (3) This is the God we worship; we worship one God who is three distinct, eternal, and equal Persons; we worship no other God than this One.
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William H. Smith is pastor of Covenant Presbyterian Church in Louisville, Miss.