"TRINITY. The word Trinity is not found in the Bible, and, though used by Tertullian in the last decade of the 2nd century, it did not find a place formally in the theology of the Church till the 4th century. It is, however, the distinctive and all comprehensive doctrine of the Christian faith and gathers up into the seam of a single grand generalization with respect to the being and activity of God all the major aspects of Christian truth' (Lowry). Theology seeks to define the subsistence of God by stating that God is one in His essential being, but that the divine essence exists in three modes or forms, each constituting a Person, yet in such a way that the divine essence is wholly in each Person. I. DERIVATION: a. In the Old Testament: Though the doctrine is not developed in the Old Testament, it is implicit in the divine self disclosure from the very beginning. But in accordance with the historical character or the divine revelation it is presented at first only in a very rudimentary form. this is found not only in isolated passages but interwoven in the entire organism of the Old Testament revelation. The earliest foreshadowing is contained in the narrative of the creation, where Elohim is seen to create by means of Word and Spirit (Gn. i. 3). Here we are for the first time introduced to the Word put forth as a personal creative power, and to the Spirit as the bringer of life and order to the creation. There is revealed thus early a threefold centre of activity. God as Creator thought out the universe, expressed His thought in a Word, and made His Spirit its animating principle, thus indicating that the universe was not to have a separate existence apart from God or opposed to Him. It is thought that Gn. i. 26 ('And God said, Let us make man in our image and after our likeness') implies that a revelation of the Triune God had been given to man when first created, inasmuch as he was to be given the divine fellowship, but that the consciousness was afterwards lost with the loss of his original righteousness. Both the creative activity of God and His government are at a later stage associated with the Word personified as Wisdom (Pr. viii. 22 ff.; Jb. xxviii. 2327), and with the Spirit as the Dispenser of all blessings and the source of physical strength, courage, culture, and government (Ex. xxxi. 3; Nu. xi. 25; Jdg. iii. 10). The threefold source revealed in creation became still more evident in the unfolding of redemption. The revelation of redemption was entrusted to the tnal'ak Yahweh, the Messenger of Yahweh, sometimes referred to as the Angel of the covenant. We do not claim that in every Old Testament passage in which it appears the designation refers to a divine being, for it is clear that in such passages as 2 Sa. xxiv. 16; 1 Ki. xix. 5; 2 Ki. xix. 35, the reference is to a created angel invested with divine authority for the execution of a special mission. In other passages (e.g. Gn. xvi. 7, xxiv. 7, x1viii. 16) the Angel of Yahweh not only bears the divine name but has divine dignity and power, dispenses divine deliverance and accepts homage and adoration proper only to God. The Spirit of God is also given prominence in connection with revelation and redemption, and is assigned His office in the equipment of the Messiah for His work (Is. xi. 2, x1ii. 1, Ixi. 1) and of His people for the response of faith and obedience (Joel ii. 28; Is. xxxii. 15; Ezk. xxxvi. 26, 27). Thus the God who revealed Himself objectively through the Angel Messenger revealed Himself subjectively in and through the Spirit, the Dispenser of all blessings and gifts within the sphere of redemption. The threefold Aaronic blessing (Nu. vi. 24) must also be noted as perhaps the prototype of the New Testament apostolic blessing." ... "c. In the New Testament: Preparatory to the advent of Christ, the Holy Spirit came into the consciousness of God fearing men in a degree that was not known since the close of Malachi's ministry. John the Baptist, more especially, was conscious of the presence and calling of the Spirit, and it is probable that his preaching had a trinitarian reference: he called for repentance towards God, faith in the coming Messiah, and spoke of a baptism of the Holy Spirit, of which his baptism with water was a symbol. The agency of the Spirit in the incarnation is disclosed to Mary (Lk. i. 35), together with the intimation that the Son born of her would be called 'the Son of the Highest', and that 'the Lord God (would) give unto him the throne of his father David'. Thus the Father and the Spirit were disclosed as operating in the incarnation of the Son. At the baptism in the Jordan the three Persons can be distinguished: the Son being baptized, the Father speaking from heaven, and the Spirit descending in the objective symbol of a dove. Jesus, having thus received the witness of the Father and the Spirit, received authority to baptize with the Holy Spirit. John the Baptist would seem to have recognized very early that the Holy Spirit would come from the Messiah, and not merely with Him. The third Person was thus the Spirit of God and the Spirit of Christ. In His public ministry, as well as in His private teaching of the Twelve, Jesus constantly directed attention to the Father as the One who sent Him on His mission and from whom He derived His authority (Jn. v. 19, 20). In His disputation with the Jews He claimed that His own Sonship was not simply from David, but from a source that made Him David's Lord, and that it had been so at the very time when David uttered the words (Mt. xxii. 43). This would indicate both His deity and preexistence. Christ bore ever clearer testimony to the Person and office of the Spirit as His own ministry was drawing to a close (Jn. xv, xvi), and He designates Him as both the Spirit from the Father and the Spirit from Himself (Jn. xv. 26). This is the basis of Christian belief in the 'double procession' of the Spirit. The fellowship of the Father and the Spirit appears in the work of redemption as revealed by Christ, the Father sending the Son to undertake the work, and the Father and the Son sending the Spirit apply the salvation which Christ wrought. It thus became evident why the God of the covenant was revealed as triune, since salvation was seen to rest upon each of the Persons in the Godhead. Christ's trinitarian teaching received its most clear and concise expression in the baptismal formula: baptizing into 'the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost' (Mt. xxviii. 19). Baptizing 'into the name' is a Hebrew form of expression, rather than a Greek, and it carries with it what would seem a complete break with Judaism in including under a singular name not only the Father, but the Son and the Holy Ghost. The outpouring of the Spirit at Pentecost brought the personality of the Holy Spirit into greater prominence and at the same time shed new light from the Spirit upon the Son. The apostolic conception of the Holy Ghost and of His relation to the Father and the Son is clear from Acts. Peter, in explaining the phenomenon of Pentecost, represents it as the activity of the Trinity. 'This Jesus ... being by the right hand of God exalted, and having received of the Father the promise of the Holy Ghost, he hath shed forth this, which ye now see and hear' (Acts ii. 32, 33). It is not too much to say that the apostolic Church was built upon faith in the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost. In the Epistles of Paul, Peter, John, James, and Jude, as well as in the Epistle to the Hebrews, redemption is uniformly traced to the threefold Source, and each Person appears as the object of worship and adoration. The apostolic benediction, 'The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Ghost, be with you all' (2 Cor. xiii. 14), not only sums up the apostolic teaching, but it interprets the deeper meaning of the Trinity in Christian experience, the saving grace of the Son as that which gives access to the love of the Father and the communion of the Spirit. II. FORMULATION: As already indicated, Scripture does not give us a fully formulated doctrine of the Trinity, but it contains all the elements out of which theology has constructed the doctrine. The teaching of Christ bears testimony to the true personality of each of the distinctions within the Godhead and also sheds light upon the relations existing between the three Persons. It was left to theology to formulate from this a doctrine of the Trinity. The necessity to formulate the doctrine was thrust upon the Church by forces from without, and it was, in particular, its faith in the deity of Christ, and the necessity to defend it, that first compelled the Church to face the duty of formulating a full doctrine of the Trinity for its rule of faith." (New Bible Dictionary, J. D. Douglas & F. F. Bruce, Trinity, p 1298)

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Written By Steve Rudd, Used by permission at: www.bible.ca