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These Three are One
“For there are three that bear record in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost: and these three are one.” – 1 John 5:7
This verse is the clearest description in the Bible of the triune God we serve. Since there are many heresies and confusions about the three in one nature of God, here is a simple Bible believing explanation.
One God
In the statement “these three are one”, we learn that the Biblical necessity of a singular Godhead is preserved when talking about the three. We do not serve three gods.
“Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God is one LORD” –Deuteronomy 6:4
“There is one God…” – 1 Timothy 2:5
“Thou believest that there is one God; thou doest well: the devils also believe, and tremble.” – James 2:19
Whereas there is only one God, there are many men that make up mankind. There are not many gods that make up Godkind. We would never say, “there is only one man.” There are billions of us alive today, but about God, there is only one.
There is only one God, there has always been one God, and there ever will only be only one God. There is nothing else that compares adequately to him.
Three Persons
In the clear statement of 1 John 5:7 we also learn that the one Lord and God, exists in three distinct persons: the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost.
This is where the controversy and confusion can occur. How can one being, one God, exist in three distinct persons? How can the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit all be one God?
God’s Being
It is important to understand that God cannot be compared to how we describe ourselves. God is unique, not created, and without beginning. Everything we know about being man was created by God, and so being a man is not like being God.
Though you can say to another man, I know what it is like being a human, we cannot say the same about God. God is the only one that knows what it is like to be God. Jesus Christ knows what it is like to be God.
“Who, being in the form of God…” – Phil 2:6
God’s Persons
God created every man with a single person. One man, one person. Even when we learn that a man is made up of different parts (spirit, soul, body), these are only parts that make up a single person with singular actions, mind, and will.
This is why only one person of the Godhead became a man. About Christ, Paul says:
“For in him dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily” (Col 2:9).
God’s incarnation is Jesus Christ. (Joseph Smith is wrong when he describes the Father and Son in separate human bodies.)
This can make it hard to grasp how more than one person can exist in a single being, but that is the case with God. God, being different than man, exists in three persons (1 John 5:7). That is, there are three who can act, three distinct wills, three communicators.
God of All Scripture
This understanding of the one true triune God is the product of collecting all scripture in the Bible about God’s nature. It is not sufficient, to take one verse here, and leave another there. Every verse that describes God must be considered.
There is no need to rightly divide verses into different dispensations since we are describing who God is, and not what he is doing (dispensational study). Dispensational right division is useful to know God’s changing will, and what he is doing. God never changes what he is (Mal 3:6; Heb 13:8), and so we can use all scripture.
We can find all three persons described as God in scripture.
In most every epistle Paul writes he addresses “God our Father” (Phil 1:2). He calls Jesus God and Saviour in Titus 2:13. Paul also says that the Lord is the Spirit in 2 Cor 3:17.
All three distinct persons are called God, every attribute that describes God can be used to describe the Father, the Son, and the Spirit. All three distinct persons represent a separate record of testimony from heaven. Yet, the three are the one and only God.
Heresies are born about God when all scripture is not considered. Heresies about what God is doing are born when all scripture is not rightly divided. All scripture is profitable for doctrine, but not all doctrine is for our participation.
We serve one God of three persons. There is no clearer statement describing the triune God than what is found in 1 John 5:7.
“For there are three that bear record in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost: and these three are one.” – 1 John 5:7
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We were having a family bible study last night and discussing this very verse. We were telling the kids that this verse is only found in the KJV (and NKJV?). The discussion was on why we read the KJV and no longer the NIV. This verse was one of the reasons we were convinced that the NIV as a corrupt version so we stopped reading it. To think that the most important trinity verse has been taken out of all the other bibles.
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