Essentials of Christianity
What is the deal with Christianity?
This question is hardly new. People have been asking it as long as Christianity has existed. Sometimes, they ask the question in wonder: “These people seem so ordinary . . . so why does it seem like they have something I don’t have?” Other times, they ask in exasperation: “Who do these Christians think that they are?” And sometimes they’re puzzled: “You really believe a guy rose from the dead and is coming back in the sky?”
People are good at misunderstanding Christianity. Even believers can misunderstand some of the basics of the faith. That’s why it’s important that we focus on the essential truths. In these seven sessions, we’ll be exploring things like:
- God’s nature
- Humanity’s purpose
- What sin is
- Jesus’ death, resurrection, and return
- The work of the Holy Spirit
By the end, sure, I pray that you come out with a richer understanding of Christianity than you had before. But more than that, I pray that you come away with a different view of this figure at its center—a man who was dead, who isn’t dead anymore, and whom people haven’t been able to stop talking about for two thousand years.
Question 1:
When have you thrown up your hands and
determined something was too complicated?
THE POINT
God has revealed Himself
to us as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
Daylight saving time. Some of us welcome it. Others think it’s unnecessary. And the rest of us dread it because we struggle every six months to change the clocks in our cars!
We all face things that seem complicated to us, but with enough work and determination we usually can figure them out. Yet some things are beyond our ability to grasp. A 4-year-old may be learning to count, but we don’t expect him to be able to understand advanced calculus. It’s not that the child is dumb, but his brain is still developing and it will be a while before abstract ideas like calculus are within his ability to understand. While calculus is beyond his comprehension now, he will grow in his understanding.
One subject that remains beyond our ability to grasp is the Trinity. A key truth in Scripture is that God has revealed Himself as the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Three Persons, but one God. Our finite minds cannot fully comprehend how three can be one, but we can still appreciate the beauty of the nature of God.
WHAT DOES THE BIBLE SAY?
John 14:8-11
8 “Lord,” said Philip, “show us the Father, and that’s enough for us.” 9 Jesus said to him, “Have I been among you all this time and you do not know me, Philip? The one who has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, ‘Show us the Father’? 10 Don’t you believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me? The words I speak to you I do not speak on my own. The Father who lives in me does his works. 11 Believe me that I am in the Father and the Father is in me. Otherwise, believe because of the works themselves.”
When we think about the Trinity, it’s easy to get our brains in a twist. How can one be three? Are there three Gods? Are they all the same, but we just have three names for them?
The Trinity is a word we use to try to put God’s nature into human words. More importantly, it describes the three ways God has revealed Himself to us. He has revealed Himself as God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit. Interestingly, we do not find the word “Trinity” anywhere in Scripture, but many passages help us understand exactly how this works. John 14 is one of those places.
On His last night with His disciples before His arrest and crucifixion, Jesus told them, “If you know me, you will also know my Father. From now on you do know him and have seen him” (v. 7). This wasn’t clear to Philip, so he made a request: “Show us the Father, and that’s enough for us.” Jesus essentially told him, “You’re looking at Him.” Jesus equated Himself with the Father, but He was not saying He is the Father. As He said on an earlier occasion: “I and the Father are one” (10:30).
Question 2:
In what ways does Jesus show us
what God is like?
Legend has it that when Patrick went to Ireland to share the gospel, the people were having trouble understanding the Trinity. So he reached down, plucked a clover from the ground, and explained how the clover had three distinct leaves, but it was just one plant. This might be a helpful way to get the idea of the Trinity in our minds, but it falls short in an important way: God is not divided into parts. Each part of a clover is just a part of the whole. But each Person of the Trinity is fully God, not just a part of Him. (Every analogy used to help us understand the Trinity works to a point, but they all fall short.)
Our inability to fully understand how the Father and the Son are one but separate doesn’t mean we can’t appreciate the way He works. We might not understand how a car engine works, but we can still rely on it to take us from place to place. In the same way, we may not understand exactly how God works, but we can know and trust that He does work. When the Word of God became flesh and made His home among us (1:14), He came to us as Jesus, the Son of God. Jesus is fully God, and He revealed God to us in a way we can relate to. He became human like us. He looked like us. He could walk with us and talk with us. And most importantly, even though He is God, Jesus died as a human. The key difference is that Jesus died with our sins upon Himself. He died in our place so we could be cleansed from our sins and have eternal life with Him.
Every culture in every place and every time can know God through general revelation. But Jesus reveals God in a different way. He does so in a personal, relatable way. Jesus, who is fully human, is also fully God. God the Father, the sovereign, holy Creator of the universe, can be seen in Jesus Christ, God the Son.
16 “And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Counselor to be with you forever. 17 He is the Spirit of truth. The world is unable to receive him because it doesn’t see him or know him. But you do know him, because he remains with you and will be in you. 18 “I will not leave you as orphans; I am coming to you. 19 In a little while the world will no longer see me, but you will see me. Because I live, you will live too. 20 On that day you will know that I am in my Father, you are in me, and I am in you.”
Jesus had just given His disciples seemingly sad news: He was going away, and they couldn’t come with Him. It had already been a traumatic night because they learned one of them would betray Jesus. But Jesus didn’t leave them hanging in despair. He was about to leave them, but He would be giving them a gift that was, if they could believe it, better than the gift they had sitting in front of them. Jesus told them later that evening that it was good that He was going, because if He didn’t, the gift wouldn’t come (John 16:7).
This gift, Jesus said, would be a “Counselor,” translated from a Greek word that literally means “a calling to one’s side.” It refers to someone who comes alongside us to comfort, encourage, and exhort us. Specifically, Jesus was referring to the third Person of the Trinity: the Holy Spirit. A key to understanding the Holy Spirit is Jesus’ use of the word “another.” The Greek language had two words for “other/another,” and Jesus used the word that means “another of the same kind.” In other words, this Counselor, the Holy Spirit, would be just like Jesus! They are both God.
The eleven disciples sitting with Jesus—Judas had already departed (13:30)—had already fulfilled the only requirement for receiving the Holy Spirit: they recognized and acknowledged Jesus as the Messiah, the One who came to save them. The promise of the Holy Spirit meant they would not be disconnected from a relationship with God. This is also good news for us. When Jesus, the Son of God, is in your life, God the Holy Spirit is in your life. The Holy Spirit will work through you in ways you can’t comprehend in order to carry out the Father’s will.
Question 3:
How does the Holy Spirit work in the life of
a believer?
John 14:23-26
23 Jesus answered, “If anyone loves me, he will keep my word. My Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him. 24 The one who doesn’t love me will not keep my words. The word that you hear is not mine but is from the Father who sent me. 25 “I have spoken these things to you while I remain with you. 26 But the Counselor, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you all things and remind you of everything I have told you.”
When Jesus said it was good that He was going away and the Holy Spirit was taking His place (16:7), He meant it. In God’s Word, we have the testimonies of people who encountered Jesus; they recorded what Jesus said and did while He was on earth. But now we have the Holy Spirit to guide us in the same way Jesus guided His disciples.
Question 4:
How does understanding God as Father, Son,
and Holy Spirit help you engage with Him in your daily life?
Jesus said the Spirit would “teach you all things and remind you of everything I have told you” (v. 26). Later, as the Spirit moved God’s people to action, He empowered them to share the gospel in languages they didn’t speak (Acts 2:4), heal the sick and the lame (3:1-9), and discern truth from lies (5:3-4). Whatever the situation, each time someone did an amazing thing through the power of the Holy Spirit, it was to further the kingdom of God. It allowed them to reach people who had been unreachable, speak to those who had not heard, and teach the gospel and make disciples in impossible places.
The Holy Spirit we read about in Scripture is the exact same Spirit at work in our hearts today. He still convicts us, moves us, and empowers us. And He dwells inside of everyone who calls Jesus, Lord. The Father sent the Son to give us an example to follow and to die for our sins. He sent the Holy Spirit to continue the work of the Son by empowering believers to be His church.
The Holy Spirit comes alongside us and instructs us in the ways of God. Through the Holy Spirit we can find God’s truth in Scripture, live the way Jesus taught, and carry out the work that Jesus left for us to do: to make disciples of all nations.
Question 5:
How does our understanding
of the Trinity affect our understanding of community?
RELATING TO GOD
The Bible teaches that God is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. In each of the columns below, list words or phrases that describe how you relate to each person of the Trinity.
Father Son Holy Spirit
Example: He makes a plan for my life He saved me He teaches me
“It was the whole Trinity, which at the beginning
of creation said, ‘Let us make man.’ It was the
whole Trinity again, which at the beginning of
the Gospel seemed to say, ‘Let us save man.’”
J. C. RYLE
LIVE IT OUT
What will you do with the truth about how God has revealed Himself as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit? Choose one of the following applications:
- Pray. Thank God for being a God who reveals Himself to us. Thank Him for coming to us in Jesus Christ and for giving us His Holy Spirit to work in us and through us.
- Study. Compare two passages: Genesis 1:1-2 and John 1:1-18. Underline where you see the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit in these passages. Make note of the similarities and differences in how the three Persons of the Trinity are described.
- Display. Just as the world around us reveals God, we are called to reveal Him to those around us. Trust the Holy Spirit to give you the opportunity and the words to point others to Jesus.
Some of us may not be math whizzes or even be able to change the clock in our cars when the time changes. We certainly can’t understand the complexity of the One who made us. But we can thank God for revealing Himself to us and appreciate who He is and how He works nonetheless.
Teacher's Notes:
What is the deal with
Christianity?
·
Sometimes, people ask the question: “These
people seem so ordinary . . . why does it seem like they have something I don’t
have?”
·
Other times, people say: “Who do these
Christians think that they are?”
·
And then there are those that say: “You really
believe some guy rose from the dead and is coming back in the sky?”
People misunderstand
Christianity. Believers misunderstand some of the very basics of the faith. It’s
why we are focusing on the essential truths over the next 7 weeks.
We’ll be exploring
things like:
- God’s very nature – Father, Son, and Holy
Spirit
- Humanity’s purpose – why were we even created?
- The nature of Sin – we will see that on our
own, we can’t do anything about it. But we also are going to consider the
opinion that none of us in our generation feels as guilty about Sin as we
should or as our forefathers did.
- Jesus’ death, resurrection, and return – why
did Jesus have to die? Why His resurrection is so important and why is He
coming back?
- The work of the Holy Spirit
At the end, we come
away with a richer understanding of Christianity and a different view of the
center of Christianity—a person who was dead, but isn’t anymore, and whom people
haven’t been able to stop talking about for 2000 years.
Video: RC
Sproul – Trinity Monotheism
The
Nature of God
Essence
– soul, spirit, ethos, life, core, nature (God is one in essence)
Person
– individual being with a mind, emotions, and a will (and 3 in person)
Trinity
/ Triunity - state of being triune they mean the same (Tri + Unity = Trinity)
Progressive Revelation
– “The New is in the Old – Concealed, The Old is in the New – Revealed.
Monotheism
– one God
Animism
– soul/spirit in inanimate objects
Polytheism
– many gods
Henotheism
– a god for each nation
Monotheism
Some
have tried to give human illustrations for the Trinity, such as H2O being
water, ice and steam (all different forms, but all are H2O). Another
illustration would be the sun. From it we receive light, heat and radiation.
Three distinct aspects, but only one sun.
Math –
God would not be 1+1+1 = 3 / God would be 1+1+1 = 1
When
have you thrown up your hands and determined something was too complicated?
·
The way many feel about of the Trinity
·
The Point: God has revealed Himself to us as Father,
Son, and Holy Spirit.
The
Passage: John 14:8-11,16-20,23-26
John 14:8-11
8
“Lord,” said Philip, “show us the Father, and that’s enough for us.” 9 Jesus
said to him, “Have I been among you all this time and you do not know me,
Philip? The one who has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, ‘Show us
the Father’? 10 Don’t you believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in
me? The words I speak to you I do not speak on my own. The Father who lives in
me does his works. 11 Believe me that I am in the Father and the Father is in
me. Otherwise, believe because of the works themselves.”
There
are 3 points that our lesson wants to make today as it tries to explain the
Tri-Unity of the nature of God as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
1. To
know Jesus, the Son of God, is to know the Father.
·
The Lord reveals Himself to us in our daily
walk with Him; we need to have eyes of faith to accept and trust what He makes
known.
·
The authority behind Jesus’ words and works is
God the Father.
·
Jesus declared He and the Father are one in
essence; Jesus is not a separate or secondary deity.
In
what ways does Jesus show us what God is like?
The
disciples knew Jesus, but they wanted to know God the Father. Jesus encouraged
them to understand that by knowing Him they also knew the Father since the Son
came from the Father. The root of the disciple’s request seems to have come
from a desire to please God the Father. That is a noble desire for all of God’s
people.
The
things we learn about Jesus, and the things we see Him do in the gospels, reflect
the very nature of God. By believing in Jesus and by obeying His teaching, we
please the Father. Jesus is the exact reflection and representation of the
Father (Col. 1:15).
When
we think about the Trinity, it’s easy to get our brains in a twist. How can one
be three? Are there three Gods? Are they all the same, but we just have three
names for them? The Trinity describes the three ways God has revealed
Himself to us.
John 14:16-20
16
“And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Counselor to be with
you forever. 17 He is the Spirit of truth. The world is unable to receive him
because it doesn’t see him or know him. But you do know him, because he remains
with you and will be in you. 18 “I will not leave you as orphans; I am coming
to you. 19 In a little while the world will no longer see me, but you will see
me. Because I live, you will live too. 20 On that day you will know that I am
in my Father, you are in me, and I am in you.”
2. When
Jesus, the Son of God, is in your life, the Holy Spirit is in your life.
·
Jesus promised His disciples—and us—that He
would not abandon them and leave them as orphans. This conversation took place
during the Last Supper and after Jesus had washed the feet of the disciples.
There was apprehension about what was going to take place since Jesus had been
very clear about His coming death. Certainly, the disciples feared being
completely alone in a world that they must have known would be hostile to them.
How
does the Holy Spirit work in the life of a believer?
·
The Holy Spirit is our Counselor and He will
never leave us. While the disciples enjoyed the physical presence of Jesus
Christ, God’s Holy Spirit with us allows us to share in the same understanding
of God’s nature and connection with Him. While the world can’t understand what
it means to have the presence of the Holy Spirit, believers in Christ can.
John 14:23-26
23
Jesus answered, “If anyone loves me, he will keep my word. My Father will love
him, and we will come to him and make our home with him. 24 The one who doesn’t
love me will not keep my words. The word that you hear is not mine but is from
the Father who sent me. 25 “I have spoken these things to you while I remain with
you. 26 But the Counselor, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my
name, will teach you all things and remind you of everything I have told you.”
3. God
the Father sends the Holy Spirit to continue the work of the Son.
·
Verse 26 does identify all three Persons of the
Trinity and explains that the Father will send the Holy Spirit to all who
express faith in Jesus. The role of the Holy Spirit is to be our counselor, our
teacher, our guide, and to continue the work of Jesus. Verse 26 states that the
Holy Spirit will remind us of everything that Jesus taught. The role of the
Holy Spirit in the lives of believers today is the same as it was for the
disciples. The Holy Spirit helps us to understand the things of God, the things
we read in Scripture, and the biblical truths we hear in messages.
·
Because believers have a love relationship with
Jesus, they are able to “see” the things of the Lord that unbelievers cannot.
·
True love for the Lord should drive the
believer to read, study, meditate, and obey His word of truth.
·
Believers are to obey the instructions of Jesus
because they are the Word from the Father.
·
The Holy Spirit guides the believer in knowing,
understanding, and doing the things Jesus taught and expects from His
disciples.
How
does understanding God as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit help you engage with Him
in your daily life?
·
We need to Seek the Father, Follow
the Son, and Do What the Holy Spirit says.
Wrap
It Up
While
some people try to make an explanation of the triune nature of God into a complicated
academic exercise, the truth of this passage is that God desires a personal
relationship with us, His creation. Just as the disciples enjoyed a personal
relationship with Jesus, God has provided a way for all of us to know Him, the
Father, personally through a saving relationship through faith in Jesus and
experienced in the promised indwelling Holy Spirit.
What
Does it Mean That God is a Trinity?
The
doctrine of the Trinity means that there is one God who eternally exists as
three distinct Persons--the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Stated differently,
God is one in essence and three in person. These definitions express three
crucial truths:
(1)
The Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are distinct Persons,
(2)
each Person is fully God,
(3) there
is only one God.
The
Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are distinct Persons.
The
Bible speaks of the Father as God (Phil. 1:2), Jesus as God (Titus 2:13), and
the Holy Spirit as God (Acts 5:3-4). Are these just three different ways of
looking at God, or simply ways of referring to three different roles that God
plays?
The
answer must be no, because the Bible also indicates that the Father, Son, and
Holy Spirit are distinct Persons. For example, since the Father sent the Son
into the world (John 3:16), He cannot be the same person as the Son. Likewise,
after the Son returned to the Father (John 16:10), the Father and the Son sent
the Holy Spirit into the world (John 14:26; Acts 2:33). Therefore, the Holy
Spirit must be distinct from the Father and the Son.
In the
baptism of Jesus, we see the Father speaking from heaven and the Spirit
descending from heaven in the form of a dove as Jesus comes out of the water
(Mark 1:10-11). In John 1:1 it is affirmed that Jesus is God and, at the same
time, that He was “with God”- thereby indicating that Jesus is a distinct
Person from God the Father (cf. also 1:18). And in John 16:13-15 we see that
although there is a close unity between them all, the Holy Spirit is also
distinct from the Father and the Son.
The
fact that the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are distinct Persons means, in other
words, that the Father is not the Son, the Son is not the Holy Spirit, and the
Holy Spirit is not the Father. Jesus is God, but He is not the Father or the
Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is God, but He is not the Son or the Father. They
are different Persons, not three different ways of looking at God.
The
personhood of each member of the Trinity means that each Person has a distinct
center of consciousness. Thus, they relate to each other personally -- the
Father regards Himself as “I,” while He regards the Son and Holy Spirit as
“You.” Likewise, the Son regards Himself as “I,” but the Father and the Holy
Spirit as “You.”
Often
it is objected that “If Jesus is God, then he must have prayed to himself while
he was on earth.” But the answer to this objection lies in simply applying what
we have already seen. While Jesus and the Father are both God, they are
different Persons. Thus, Jesus prayed to God the Father without praying to
Himself. In fact, it is precisely the continuing dialog between the Father and
the Son (Matthew 3:17; 17:5; John 5:19; 11:41-42; 17:1ff ) which furnishes the
best evidence that they are distinct Persons with distinct centers of
consciousness.
Sometimes
the Personhood of the Father and Son is appreciated, but the Personhood of the
Holy Spirit is neglected. Sometimes the Spirit is treated more like a “force”
than a Person. But the Holy Spirit is not an it, but a He (see John 14:26;
16:7-15; Acts 8:16). The fact that the Holy Spirit is a Person, not an
impersonal force (like gravity), is also shown by the fact that He speaks
(Hebrews 3:7), reasons (Acts 15:28), thinks and understands (1 Corinthians
2:10-11), wills (1 Corinthians 12:11), feels (Ephesians 4:30), and gives
personal fellowship (2 Corinthians 13:14). These are all qualities of
personhood. In addition to these texts, the others we mentioned above make
clear that the Personhood of the Holy Spirit is distinct from the Personhood of
the Son and the Father. They are three real persons, not three roles God plays.
Another
serious error people have made is to think that the Father became the Son, who
then became the Holy Spirit. Contrary to this, the passages we have seen imply
that God always was and always will be three Persons. There was never a time
when one of the Persons of the Godhead did not exist. They are all eternal.
While
the three members of the Trinity are distinct, this does not mean that any is
inferior to the other. Instead, they are all identical in attributes. They are
equal in power, love, mercy, justice, holiness, knowledge, and all other
qualities.
Each
Person is fully God.
If God
is three Persons, does this mean that each Person is “one-third” of God? Does
the Trinity mean that God is divided into three parts?
The
Trinity does not divide God into three parts. The Bible is clear that all three
Persons are each one hundred percent God. The Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are
all fully God. For example, it says of Christ that “in Him all the fullness of
Deity dwells in bodily form” (Colossians 2:9). We should not think of God as
like a “pie” cut into three pieces, each piece representing a Person. This
would make each Person less than fully God and thus not God at all. Rather,
“the being of each Person is equal to the whole being of God.”[1] The divine
essence is not something that is divided between the three persons, but is
fully in all three persons without being divided into “parts.”
Thus,
the Son is not one-third of the being of God, He is all of the being of God.
The Father is not one-third of the being of God, He is all of the being of God.
And likewise, with the Holy Spirit. Thus, as Wayne Grudem writes, “When we
speak of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit together we are not speaking of any
greater being than when we speak of the Father alone, the Son alone, or the
Holy Spirit alone.” [2]
There
is only one God.
If
each Person of the Trinity is distinct and yet fully God, then should we
conclude that there is more than one God? Obviously, we cannot, for Scripture
is clear that there is only one God: “There is no other God besides me, a
righteous God and a Savior; there is none besides me. Turn to me and be saved,
all the ends of the earth! For I am God, and there is no other” (Isaiah
45:21-22; see also 44:6-8; Exodus 15:11; Deuteronomy 4:35; 6:4-5; 32:39; 1
Samuel 2:2; 1 Kings 8:60).
Having
seen that the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit are distinct Persons, that
they are each fully God, and that there is nonetheless only one God, we must
conclude that all three Persons are the same God. In other words, there is one
God who exists as three distinct Persons.
If there is one
passage which most clearly brings all of this together, it is Matthew 28:19:
“Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name
of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit.” First, notice that the Father,
Son, and Holy Spirit are distinguished as distinct Persons. We baptize into the
name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Second, notice that each
Person must be deity because they are all placed on the same level. In fact,
would Jesus have us baptize in the name of a mere creature? Surely not.
Therefore, each of the Persons into whose name we are to be baptized must be
deity. Third, notice that although the three divine Persons are distinct, we
are baptized into their name (singular), not names (plural). The three Persons
are distinct, yet only constitute one name. This can only be if they
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