Complex Theology?

There are many of our opponents who challenge our faith on the basis of the complexity of our theology, specifically The Holy Trinity and how One God is Three and Three are One God. There is no question that the doctrine of the Trinity is perhaps one of the most polarizing beliefs we Christians hold, but it is the very truth. The complexity of being able to explain and fathom unto completeness the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit who are One is evidence the Trinity is the True and Only God. There are plenty of religions that have an almost mathematical equation for explaining their gods, and to this I offer the argument, how can the Creation fully explain or fathom The Creator? Does anything we create, art, technology, or even children totally understand or could  explain who we are? How many hidden shades of ourselves do our children not know? Yes it is possible to explain the main points of our personality; he or she is loving, kind, enjoys history, believes in Christ, and etc; but there are elements of who we are that remain the sole knowledge of God and ourselves; this is why communicating can be frustrating; we know our intent, meaning, and goal, but our spouse, friend, or stranger does not perceive rightly our intent, meaning, and goal. 

The Trinity who is the True God is meant to confound our understanding at a level. Yes we can know Him, and know much about Him through the Bible and relating to Him; but How he works and how He’s One and Three will be one of those aspects we cannot fully understand. It is meant to humble us, to cause us to offer adoration and worship to a Triune God who reveals so much of Himself and lives in us, and yet still some mystery remains, namely, How The Trinity thing works. Our part is to believe in Him who is Three but One, and be content that we will never fully grasp the mechanics, dimensions, details, and supernatural qualities that allow God to Be One and Three: Father, Jesus, and Holy Spirit. Our purpose is not to explain the unexplainable, but to love Him who is The Holy Trinity. 

Part of the fallout of Greco-Romanism is we want everything to be explained, and as Wordsworth said so elloquently, “we murder to dissect,” we kill a frog to learn how it works, when we could have kept it alive and learned through relationship and obervation more about the frog. We do this to children, who look in wonder at the cosmos or dinosaurs, and we try to reason these mysteries to the point that we drain every lost drop of wonder. I am not saying explanations and learning is evil, or that we cannot know things about God the Trinity, on the contrary we have 66 Books in the Holy Bible that give us much info on our God, and yet there still is wonder, mystery, and excitement as we learn more about our Great Triune God through Ginosko (knowing in personal relationship). 

I worry that we are becoming a people who cannot tolerate some mystery or unanswered questions. When we were children the answer “God only knows why,” sufficed, but as we get older we want Deo Gnosis, God like knowledge of everything! This insatiable desire to have no anomalies, mysteries, paradoxes, and unanswerable questions like miracles makes me feel great alarm. Society is fastly approaching a apex of knowledge and I worry we have not headed the lessons from Eden, that The Fruit of the Knoweldge of Good and Evil enlightened our ancestors Adam and Eve yes, but it also tainted them with sin because they acted as antichrists, not content to let God alone judge Good from evil, and as a result damned humanity, made our planet become fallen, and God had to come in a body as the person Jesus Christ and die for sin and redeem us. Curiosity is not a sin, but the velocity at which people want to be all knowing (omniscient) is as I said alarming. The irony is secular society seeks knowledge and invention, and yet all knowledge is in Christ, “Christ,  in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.” (Colossians 2:2-3), who is The Son, and One with the Father, and Holy Spirit. 

We are a complex creation, and there are parts of ourselves that remain a mystery to others, so then why should we expect our Creator, The Holy Trinity to be any different? Are we not made in His Image? (Genesis 1:26-27). Then why do some theologians have the audacity to try and be omniscient? Its pride. Man wants to be in control, specifically in knowledge; what we cannot understand unnerves and frightens us. And yet are we not to serve the Lord with reverent fear?  I want to be clear that God the Trinity is not distant and totally unfathomable; on the contrary He lives in us and we in Him (), and He has revealed much of Himself in the Scriptures. My focus was how we struggle to grasp How He as the Holy Trinity works, a Truth that crushes our ego, which needs to be crushed by the glory of God. Amen.