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By Jo Gamm Witt Copyright 2025
In pondering the Trinity Concept, we first examine the relationship between God and people. In pre-Jesus times in the bible, God seemed mostly inaccessible to the “common people” and rather instead perhaps exclusively accessible to the priests and prophets. However, in post-Jesus time, God is now accessible to all. So, what changed?
We know from the bible that Jesus’ Mother Mary became pregnant by the Holy Spirit (“while she was still a virgin she became pregnant by the Holy Spirit.”—Matthew 1:18c TLB). Two relevant points stand out from this verse: first, the Holy Spirit was referenced as existing prior to Pentecost Sunday when the Holy Spirit descended upon the disciples; and secondly, Jesus’ conception via the Holy Spirit with a human made him half human and half of God. As such, Jesus could relate both to that which was godly and that which was human, enabling him to serve as an intermediary or bridge between God and people. The prophet Jeremiah foretold that Jesus would serve as a new covenant between God and people: “’The days are coming,’ declares the Lord, ‘when I will make a new covenant with the people of Israel and with the people of Judah. This is the covenant I will make with the people of Israel after that time,’ declares the Lord. ‘I will put my law in their minds and write it on their hearts. I will be their God, and they will be my people. No longer will they teach their neighbor, or say to one another, ‘Know the Lord,’ because they will all know me, from the least of them to the greatest,’ declares the Lord. ‘For I will forgive their wickedness and will remember their sins no more.’” – Jeremiah 31:31,33-34 NIV In these verses, Jeremiah was foretelling that in the new covenant between God and people, that there would be greater connectedness with God, not only due to forgiveness of our sins from Jesus paying the price for our sins via his death, descension into hell, and resurrection, but also through the Holy Spirit being in our hearts and minds.
But in relation to the Trinity concept of Jesus being intricately God, reportedly there are 25 times in the bible where Jesus prayed to God: seeking God's will, in intercession for others, seeking unity, expressing his own anguish, asking forgiveness for others, etc. In relation to the Trinity concept, if Jesus and God were “one,” it would have been absurd for Jesus to pray to God. Jesus also stated in John 16:23: “At that time you won’t need to ask me for anything, for you can go directly to the Father and ask him, and he will give you what you ask for because you use my name.” (TLB). In saying those words, Jesus distinguished God as a higher authority than he himself.
Further in relation to whether Jesus and God are one, there are discrepancies in what we read in John 14: 9b-10. Although Jesus said, “Whoever has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, ‘Show us the Father’ Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me?” NRSV, Jesus also states, “The words that I say to you I do not speak on my own; but the Father who dwells in me does his works.” NRSV A distinguishing phrase in these verses is “the Father who dwells in me, who does his works,” Jesus giving credit to God and to God’s Spirit who dwells within him.
Last Sunday we observed the Day of Pentecost, the day when the Holy Spirit descended upon the disciples, enabling them to speak in languages they did not know, so that they could communicate the message of salvation to those gathered in ways they could more easily understand. Jesus had told the disciples that God would be sending the Spirit: “’ I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Advocate [the Holy Spirit], to be with you forever. This is the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees him nor knows him. You know him, because he abides with you, and he will be in you.’” –John 14:16-17 NRSV I do believe the Holy Spirit and God are one, God with us, God speaking to us (if we listen). The Holy Spirit is God in spirit form, as we ourselves consist of both spirit and body; and while the life of the body is finite, the life of the spirit is eternal.
So in terms of the Trinity concept of God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit all being one in the same, rather there is greater validity of each instead representing separate entities that each have an interconnectedness with God.
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