Cornerstone Curriculum, Official Certification Edition - Mentor's Guide

1 1 4 / C O R N E R S T O N E C U R R I C U L U M M E N T O R ’ S G U I D E

no human explanation can fully comprehend the glory and splendor of the nature of the persons of the Godhead, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. As you and your students explore the Word of God in this lesson, I trust that you will allow both your humility and your diligence to express themselves in this study. Undoubtedly, both will be needed! This devotion focuses on the absolute mystery in seeking to comprehend the Lord as a tri-unity. Although the term trinity is not found in the Bible, it has become the term coined to make plain the teaching of Scripture of God’s unity subsisting in three distinct Persons. This term comes from the Greek word trias, and was first used by Theophilus (A.D. 168-183). Another use came from the Christian apologist and advocate Tertullian (A.D. 220), who was the first to use the Latin term trinitas to lay out this doctrine. While in the immediate post-biblical era believers in the Church sought to explain the doctrine of God’s tri-unity in terms and language that was compelling and coherent philosophically, the use of various Greek ideas helped only some to make sense of God’s nature. It appears that the Church has tended to shift from the plain confessions of the New Testament on how the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit act in salvation to more abstract discussions about the precise nature of the Godhead’s very inner working. While such efforts are valiant, they cannot possibly provide final understandings of the Trinity. I believe that there is another way, a simpler way. We can appeal to mystery and faith. The Trinity as a doctrine is not the result of trying to use Greek ideas to explain the God of Abraham. Rather, it comes from wrestling with the meaning of the Old and New Testament Scriptures which speak of a God who manifests himself in three persons, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, and yet does not in any way assert himself as three gods, or as one God who takes three different forms for various purposes. This great God of Scripture reveals himself in Christ, who by the Holy Spirit fulfilled the purposes of his Father for the sake of saving the world.

& 2 page 197 Devotion

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