But the Word 'Trinity' is not in the Bible

But the Word ‘Trinity’ is not in the Bible

Kevin Probst

7/7/25

I am not in the least troubled when I cannot fully comprehend the nature and the attributes of our eternal God. I rejoice in the fact that our God cannot be understood by the simple, sin-stained minds of common men. We serve a God too big and too glorious and far beyond the analytical capabilities of the human mind. He prepared us for the difficulty of a natural man trying to understand a supernatural God: “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, and your ways are not my ways.” (Isaiah 55:8)

Even an eternity will not give us enough time to learn all there is to know about God. However, when we are delivered from these natural bodies and enter into the world he has gone to prepare for us, then we will no longer be looking at Christ as a reflection through a glass, but we will see him face to face and understand more fully who he really is. (1 Corinthians 13:12)

Though it is not possible to understand fully the Triune nature of God, let us not cease trying to understand.

As a young child growing up in the foothills of northwestern Pennsylvania, there were a few phrases my father often repeated that were a great annoyance to me. I would rather hear fingernails screeching on a chalk board than hear my father awaken my brothers and I every Saturday morning to “Up and at ‘em, boys, we have work to do.” He was a former WWII army sergeant, very old school and hard core. I envied many of my friends who slept until noon on Saturdays.

There was another phrase he used that really got my goat. I would often enquire of my father why I was being asked to perform a certain chore, or more often, why I was refused permission to do something I wanted to do. The typical answer was: “Because I said so.” I understood those words to be a warning to respect his authority but I also felt like he just didn’t want to take time to explain things to me and perhaps my asking was rightly interpreted as resistance and obstinance.

I want to discuss the Christian Doctrine of the Trinity. I have discovered that many Christians believe in the Trinity simply because someone told them to believe. You know, “because I said so.” However, we are instructed by the Apostle John (1 John 4:1) not to “believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see if they are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world.”

The Doctrine of the Trinity should certainly be researched and tested. Atheists love to hammer Christians regarding their belief in the Trinity. If they don’t have eyes to see nor ears to hear (Matthew 13:14), it will be impossible for them to believe because to a secular mind, unawakened by the Spirit, the concept of one God being three persons is nonsensical.

The Trinity is simply the belief that God is three persons, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, having a single substance yet three distinct persons sharing in perfect communion, equality and eternality.

Let me say from the start, try as we might, we cannot understand the Trinity. Therefore, the teaching of the Trinity may seem futile to most. How can you teach something that is impossible to understand? Scientists teach us about gravity even though none have a clear understanding of how it actually works. In like manner, theologians can teach the Doctrine of the Trinity even though they can not comprehend the Trinity fully.

There is a common acrostic used to explain our Triune God:

• Three persons are recognized as God

• Regarded as distinct persons

• Immanent, meaning they are eternally spread throughout the universe and all of creation.

• United in essence, that group of traits or attributes which define the existence of a person.

• No Inequality among them

• Explains all other foundational doctrines while proving itself to be unexplainable.

Although the word ‘trinity’ is nowhere found in the Bible and there are only hints of the doctrine in the Old Testament, it is clearly revealed in the New Testament.

The very first chapter of the Bible alludes to the Trinity. Genesis 1:26 teaches of God’s creation of man: “Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness.” Whom was God speaking to when he used the plural pronoun “us”? Backing up to Genesis 1:2 we are told that “the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters.” It seems easy to conclude that the creation was accomplished by the Father through the Son and the Spirit was also active in the creation process.

Voddie Baucham sees the Trinity working together to create man. He declares that clearly the Triune God, the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, created man in his own image. Baucham goes on to declare that the Triune God is clearly seen in the creation of Adam, from Adam’s side came a woman and finally the union of Adam and Eve produced children. This, he says, demonstrates how we were created in the triune image of God.

In conclusion, even though the word ‘trinity’ is not in the Bible, and even though the doctrine is only hinted at in the Old Testament, the concept of the Trinity is very clearly taught in the New Testament.