The Treasure of the Trinity - Part 1 of 5

Welcome marathoners in and for Christ. (1 Corinthians 9:24; Hebrews 12:1; 2 Timothy 4:7) Exhausted, depleted from running the Godly, good, and being-a-blessing-to-others race? Welcome. Sit. Relax. Let’s feast.

Feast of the Heart exists to help bring about Christ-centered “reformation, revival, and constructive revolution” (Francis Schaeffer, Death in the City) so that God will be glorified and people blessed.

Reformation… we seek to abide by and serve up the true truth, pure doctrine of the Bible

Revival… we seek to model biblical Christians living in word and deed

Constructive Revolution… we seek to spread the true gospel right where God has planted us with urgency, compassion, and radical self-abandonment

“Father, Son, and Holy Spirit…”

I can’t remember at what point in time or for what reason I began to preface every prayer, every formal and informal interaction with God by acknowledging, addressing the Holy Trinity. If my blurry and fast-decaying remembrance serves, the catalyst was hearing a sermon on the subject and the monumental importance of The Trinity many years ago.

This Training Table feast of the born-again heart, especially prepped for marathoners for Christ running the good race, is devoted to The Trinity; and since I could hardly say anything on the subject that hasn’t been said far better than I could, please enjoy and employ some offerings from some other Saints.

Please relax, journal, meditate on, enjoy, and employ these inspiring quotes and content for the next four Training Table gatherings. Each of the Training Table menu weekly items on The Trinity will be offered as a meaty, small-size portion, quote ALONG WITH its context and a much longer, in-depth portion to chow down on. Don’t miss out on the big portions: there is no breadth and depth we can go to to exhaust how much we need to get to know each, every Person of The Trinity, Beloved of God.

Father, Son, and Holy Spirit Are All Divine Persons

“Since the members of the Trinity are persons, they are all capable of having a personal relationship with each other and with the humans they created. God is a social being; from eternity past, the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit have continually interrelated as persons (in complete harmony), and we humans were given the honor to enter into communion with this tri-personal God, and to love each other as His image-bearers. If all three Persons of the Godhead shared in that purpose of creating us for relationship, then it seems that all three of them would be interested in having personal interaction with us. It is not just a “nice thing” for us to communicate with each person in the Trinity; this fits into God’s purpose for our existence. Jesus prayed to His Father that His followers would know both the Father and the Son. “This is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom You have sent.”

The Apostle John said, “Truly our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son Jesus Christ” (John 1:3). Our fellowship is not simply with a single divine person, but with at least two—both the Father and the Son. We commune with the Father, knowing that He was the One who sent his Son. We commune with the Son, knowing that he was the One who gave His life for us. We make a distinction between our worship of the Father and the worship of the Son because the Bible makes a personal distinction between the Father and the Son.

This can be applied to the Holy Spirit as well. The Spirit is a divine Person that has distinctive roles to play in our lives. This being the case, it is appropriate to pray to Him about those particular roles, like guidance for preaching and other acts of service. It’s appropriate to thank Him for His blessing in our lives. How could we not verbalize our adoration of Him? How could we not tell Him how much we love Him? He’s helped us in so many ways.” (Dr. Mark Bird, Prayer and the Trinity)

Please use this as well as the rich fare connected to Dr. Bird’s content via the Answers In Genesis website. Consider whether it might be a good idea to address God as Trinity from this point on… if you don’t already. I promise you, as you inculcate the habit of the heart to do so, the totality and the individuality of the Trinity will be magnified more and more in your life and the lives you influence every day!

In J.I. Packer’s classic and most laudable book, Knowing God, Packer’s title opens the door to what’s most important in “the eternal now of life” (Tillich): Knowing God. And, if I may, ALL OF GOD… The Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. For each person of the Trinity is part and parcel of just one seminal principle and practice from Packer’s worthy book:

“Guidance, like all God’s acts of blessing under the covenant of grace, is a sovereign act. Not merely does God will to guide us in the sense of showing us his way, that we may tread it; he wills also to guide us in the more fundamental sense of ensuring that, whatever happens, whatever mistakes we may make, we shall come safely home. Slippings and strayings there will be, no doubt, but the everlasting arms of God are beneath us; we shall be caught, rescued, restored. This is God’s promise; this is how good he is.” (J.I. Packer, Knowing God)

Until we meet to feast next week on Part 2 of 5, may God guide, guard, and bless you in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.
JohnDoz