4
– The Doctrine of the Trinity (Avoidances in Dealing with the Trinity)
Yesterday,
we talked about the distinctions in the Trinity. Today, we’ll look at Avoidances in Dealing
with the Trinity.
Avoidances in Dealing with the Trinity
There
are a number of concepts that must be avoided when dealing with the Trinity:
1.
Unitarianism. This view teaches that God is one, but does
not accept that Jesus and the Holy Spirit are separate persons who are also
deity.
2.
Polytheism. This view does not accept the oneness of the
Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, but emphasizes that all three are Gods,
but are separate.
3.
Modalism or
Sabellianism. This view affirms that there is one God, but
manifests Himself in three different forms or modes: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. So depending on which hat God happens to
wear, that is the mode He is in. If God
dies on the cross, He is Jesus, the Son.
If He displays grace, He is God, the Father. If He moves about us as a wind or breath, and
indwells us, He is God, the Holy Spirit.
4.
Tri-Theism. This view teaches that there are three Gods
who are sometimes related, but only in a loose association. This approach artificially separates Biblical
oneness of God and the threeness of God.
5.
Arianism. This view teaches “that God the Son was at
one point created by God the Father, and that before that time the Son did not
exist, nor did the Holy Spirit, but the Father only” (Wayne Grudem, Systematic Theology, 243). Therefore, this view teaches that Jesus is
not deity. “The result was ultimately
Arianism which denied the deity of Christ.
Arius taught that only God was the uncreated One; because Christ was
begotten of the Father it meant Christ was created by the Father. Arius believed there was a time when Christ
did not exist. Arius and his teaching
was condemned at the Council of Nicea in A.D. 325” (Paul Enns, The Moody
Handbook of Theology, Moody Press, p. 199).
6.
Subordinationism. This view affirms that the Son was of the
same nature as the Father, but was inferior or subordinate in being to the
Father” (Wayne Grudem, Systematic
Theology, 245).
7.
Adoptionism. This view teaches “that Jesus lived as an
ordinary man until His baptism, but then God ‘adopted’ Jesus as His ‘Son’ and
conferred on Him supernatural powers” (Wayne Grudem, Systematic Theology, 245).
Of
these seven views, only Modalism and Tri-Theism come close to true
Trinitarianism. The point of commenting
on all of these views is to say that if one denies the Trinity, he denies the
full deity of Christ. If one denies the
full deity of Christ, he denies the Trinity.
Since
Modalism denies that God is three distinct person, it denies the full deity of
Christ, opting instead that Christ is not fully God, but rather God wearing the
“hat” of Christ, or otherwise operating in the “mode” of Christ. Trinitarianism says that God is one, but yet
still three persons – all fully God, not God the Father merely acting as
Christ.
Tri-Theism
sees one set of Gods. Father, Son and Holy Spirit, but does not
recognize the deity of Christ as separate and distinct from the deity of God
the Father or the deity of God the Holy Spirit.
In general, it denies that there is only one God.
We’ll
look at God in Three Persons as the Trinity tomorrow.
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