God the Holy Spirit, Mentor's Guide, MG14

/ 1 7

G O D T H E H O L Y S P I R I T

I. Introduction

Video Segment 1 Outline

A. The Nicene Creed

1. See Appendix 1 for a copy of the Nicene Creed.

2. Why use the Nicene Creed?

1

3. The Bible is the only infallible source of doctrine for the Church. The Nicene Creed is not authoritative in and of itself but only because it carefully summarizes what the Bible teaches.

4. “Those ancient Councils of Nicea, Constantinople, the first of Ephesus, Chalcedon, and the like, which were held for refuting errors, we willingly embrace, and reverence as sacred, in so far as relates to doctrines of faith, for they contain nothing but the pure and genuine interpretation of Scripture” (John Calvin, Institutes , IV, ix.8).

B. The doctrine of the Trinity

1. The Trinity is the term used by the Church to describe how God is one God, eternally existing in three Persons.

Tri-Unity [trinity] is a shorthand term used to express in a single word what Scripture teaches in many discrete passages but which took the proclaiming church some time to think through and organize in a clear and distinct teaching . . . ~ Thomas C. Oden

2. The Scriptures assert that God is one, and that there is none other than the one God, and yet they also assert that this one God reveals himself as God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit.