For many Christians, I think the Trinity is doctrinal baggage. I hate to say that, because the doctrine of the Trinity is a beautiful doctrine, a beautiful teaching about how God is and how the Bible talks about him. I will say, it is difficult to understand, and I don’t even think we can fully understand it, but for many people, it even seems contradictory.

I want to talk about that today, is the doctrine of the Trinity contradictory? Some people, especially non-Christians, would say yes. Some Christians even say yes, and they’re fine with that, and I think that’s extremely problematic. Often the confusion results from people saying that God is three in one. He’s three persons in one person, or he’s three beings in one being. You know what? If that were what the doctrine of the Trinity taught, that would be a contradiction.

The doctrine of the Trinity is that God exists as three coequal persons in one divine being. There are three persons in one being, not three persons in one person, not three beings in one being: three persons in one being. This is not a contradiction. A contradiction is a formal type of thing. People can’t just say, “Well, that’s a contradiction,” and not be able to substantiate that claim.

When someone says a certain belief is a contradiction, ask them to explain what they mean. Because unless their contradiction is in the form of “something is said to be this thing and not this thing at the same time,” it’s not a contradiction. Because to be a contradiction means to break the law of non-contradiction—one of the three laws of logic. That law simply says that “something cannot be what it is and what it is not at the same time and in the same way.”

God cannot be three in the same way that he is one. He’s not. He’s not three in being and one in being. He’s three in person and one in being. That is not actually a logical contradiction. Is it hard to understand? Yeah. I’ll give you that. It’s not a contradiction. That makes a world of difference.

We’ll talk about why I don’t think it should surprise us that it’s hard for us to understand that later. Now, why do Christians actually believe this thing? I’ve defined it extremely briefly: The doctrine that God is three persons in one divine being all have always existed. None were created, all are co-eternal, all are equal in power, and might, and glory. All of those things. That’s a doctrine of the Trinity. Why do Christians believe that?

Well, the Bible is full of teaching that there is one God. For instance, Deuteronomy 6, “Listen, O Israel, the Lord is our God. The Lord is one.” Jesus actually says in John 10 that “the Father and I are one.” There is this oneness here. That claim is extremely controversial, at least it was back then. Because Jesus isn’t claiming that he and the Father are the same, he are saying they are of the same “type of thing.” “The Father and I are one thing.” The actual underlying Greek grammar supports that type of idea. Not that they are identical, but they are of the same thing, that they are both God.

We even see other places in the Gospels where Jesus claims to be the Son of God, and the Jews rightly understand that he is claiming to be equal with God, to be the same type of thing as God. That he’s claiming to be God. We see this oneness, but we also see distinct persons as is evidenced by Jesus being God, and yet, the Father being God. Yet, Jesus is not the Father.

Then the Holy Spirit comes along sent by Jesus and the Father, and he is fully God. He is divine also. We see that there is one God, and there are many passages that speak to this. We see that Jesus is God; he claims equality with the Father who is also God, and yet, we see that Jesus is not the Father in the same way that the Father is not the Spi…