Swain The Trinity

An Introduction
1. Auflage 2020
ISBN: 978-1-4335-6124-5
Verlag: Crossway
Format: EPUB
Kopierschutz: 0 - No protection

E-Book, Englisch, 160 Seiten

Reihe: Short Studies in Systematic Theology

Practical Theology for the Church Today The Trinity is one of the most essential doctrines of the Christian faith, as it reveals a magnificent truth about God-that he is one God eternally existing as three distinct persons. While Christians often struggle to find the right words to describe the union of Father, Son, and Spirit, the Bible gives clarity concerning the triune God's activity in nature (creation), grace (redemption), and glory (reward). In the second installment of the Short Studies in Systematic Theology series, theologian Scott Swain examines the Trinity, presenting its biblical foundations, systematic-theological structure, and practical relevance for the church today.

Scott R. Swain (PhD, Trinity Evangelical Divinity School) serves as president and James Woodrow Hassell Professor of Systematic Theology at Reformed Theological Seminary in Orlando, Florida. He is the author or editor of several books, including The God of the Gospel and Retrieving Eternal Generation. Scott and his wife, Leigh, reside in Orlando, Florida, with their four children. Swain is an ordained minister in the Presbyterian Church in America.

Autoren/Hrsg.

Swain, Scott

Leseproben

Introduction

Praising the Triune God

Christians praise one God in three persons, the blessed Trinity. We do so by proclaiming God’s triune name in baptism (Matt. 28:19), by invoking his name in benedictions (2 Cor. 13:14), by binding ourselves to his name when confessing our faith (1 Cor. 8:6; 12:3), and by hymning his name in our songs, joining the chorus of heavenly beings with all the saints in heaven and earth (Rev. 4–5).

Christians praise God the Trinity because he is supremely worthy of our praise. The blessed Trinity is supreme in being, beauty, and beatitude.

The Lord is a great God,

and a great King above all gods. (Ps. 95:3)

His “glory” is “above the heavens” (Ps. 8:1). He is “the blessed and only Sovereign, the King of kings and Lord of lords” (1 Tim. 6:15). Though the triune God is worthy of all the praise he receives (Rev. 4:11; 5:9–10, 12), our praise falls far short of his majestic greatness. He is God beyond all praising (Neh. 9:5), beyond all human comprehending. “His greatness is unsearchable” (Ps. 145:3).

Christians praise the triune God not only in response to the greatness of his being, beauty, and beatitude. We also praise him in response to the wonder of his works of creation, redemption, and consummation. The thrice-holy God is worthy “to receive glory and honor and power” because he “created all things” (Rev. 4:11). The Lamb who sits on the throne is worthy

to receive power and wealth and wisdom and might

and honor and glory and blessing! (Rev. 5:12)

For he redeemed us by his blood and made us a kingdom of priests to our God (Rev. 5:9–10). The Spirit is worthy of our praise because he opens our eyes to behold the majesty of God’s being and works (Rev. 4:2–3), because he enables us to receive every spiritual blessing by his indwelling presence (Eph. 1:3), because he opens our lips to declare God’s praise (1 Cor. 12:3; Gal. 4:6), and because he assures us that God will one day consummate his kingdom, in which—in and with our Lord Jesus Christ—we will reign on the earth as a kingdom of priests (Eph. 1:13–14; Rev. 5:10).

In praising God’s triune name, we do not praise him as mere spectators, stunned before the magnificence of his being and works. Christian praise of God the Trinity is self-involving. The God who is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, the author and end of all things, wills to be our Father, through the Son, in the Spirit. The blessed Trinity who dwells in a high and holy place, who inhabits eternity, whose name is holy, wills also to dwell among us and to make us eternally blessed through union and communion with him, to the praise of his glorious grace (Lev. 26:12; Isa. 57:15; John 14:23; 2 Cor. 6:16, 18; Eph. 1:3–14).

The self-involving nature of Christian faith in the Trinity is exhibited, perhaps most clearly, in Christian baptism. There the name of the triune God is proclaimed in the word of the minister and put on us with the washing of water (Matt. 28:19; Eph. 5:26). In baptism the God who is Father, Son, and Spirit signifies and seals to us that he is our Father, through union with the Son, by the indwelling of the Spirit and that we are God’s sons and daughters, fellow heirs with Christ of an eternal kingdom (Rom. 8:17; Gal. 3:26; 4:6–7). Thereafter, the entire Christian life is about learning to “put on” the reality signified and sealed to us through baptism in God’s triune name (Gal. 3:27), about receiving all that goes with having the triune God as our God, and about growing up into his praise within the communion of saints.1

A Short Study in Systematic Theology

In keeping with the aims of the larger series of which the present study is a part, this book is intended to be a “short study in systematic theology.” Systematic theology, as a field of discourse, takes God and all things in relation to God as its object and Holy Scripture as its supreme source and norm. In doing so, systematic theology seeks to promote fluency, formation, and fellowship with the triune God among its major ends. A word about how each of these elements of systematic theology relates to the present topic is in order.

Systematic theology takes God and all things in relation to God as its object. Systematic theology focuses on God: his being, attributes, persons, and decrees; as well as the works of God: creation, providence, redemption, sanctification, and consummation. In each instance, God is the organizing principle of systematic theology. When considering any doctrine, systematic theology asks, how does this doctrine relate to God as its author and end (Rom. 11:36)? Thus, for example, systematic theology does not consider human beings in general terms. It considers human beings as creatures made in the image of God, as rebels who have sinned against God, thereby bringing misery upon themselves, and as objects of God’s redeeming, sanctifying, and consummating work. The specific focus of the present study is the principal subject matter of systematic theology: the blessed Trinity in his being and works.

Systematic theology takes Holy Scripture as its supreme source and norm. God reveals himself in a multitude of ways: through creation and conscience, through miracles and theophanies, and supremely through his Son, our Lord Jesus Christ (Rom. 1:18–32; Heb. 1:1–4). Holy Scripture is God’s Spirit-inspired testimony to Jesus Christ. As such, Holy Scripture is the supreme source and norm for our knowledge of the triune God in his being and works (2 Tim. 3:15–17). In this book, our main focus is on the scriptural patterns of naming the triune God and the way those patterns have been received and confessed by the church in response to the triune God’s self-revelation in Holy Scripture.

Among its major ends, systematic theology seeks to promote fluency, formation, and fellowship. Because it focuses on God and all things in relation to God as these realities are revealed in Holy Scripture, systematic theology aims at making us more fluent readers of Holy Scripture. Because the God who reveals himself in Holy Scripture also writes its message on our hearts by the Holy Spirit, systematic theology seeks to serve the Spirit’s work of forming in us the image of Jesus Christ. In this regard, systematic theology seeks to shape our judgment, our affections, and our actions. Finally, systematic theology seeks to promote fellowship with the object of theology, God himself. God is the sovereign good that systematic theology pursues, and fellowship with God (and with one another in God) is the supreme means of engaging with God the sovereign good.

How does this volume relate to these various ends? It seeks to cultivate greater fluency in following the basic “grammar” of Scripture’s Trinitarian discourse.2 In so doing, the present study seeks to form Christian judgment—specifically, the capacity for distinguishing the true and living God from idols. This study also aims to shape our capacities for receiving and responding to the blessed Trinity as he presents himself to us in his word: directing our faith to receive the triune God as our God, to hold fast to the triune God in love, and to call upon the triune God in prayer, proclamation, and praise. Finally, the present study seeks to promote fellowship with the triune God, the sovereign good of systematic theology. Ultimately our fluency as readers of Holy Scripture and our formation in Christian virtue are ordered to this supreme end, the triune God himself, who gives himself to us as our supreme good in the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God the Father, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit (2 Cor. 13:14).

As a species of catechetical theology, this “short study” in systematic theology intends to offer a brief introduction to Christian teaching on the holy Trinity, with a focus on scriptural patterns of divine naming. The book’s limitations in space and focus mean that it will not give extensive attention to the doctrine’s historical development, polemical uses, or more sophisticated dogmatic elaborations. Nevertheless, I hope that by introducing the basic grammar of scriptural Trinitarianism, this book may encourage more advanced study of these other topics as well.3

This work is designed to serve beginning students of theology, whether enrolled in a formal program of theological study or not, pastors seeking to review the main contours of Trinitarian teaching, and interested laypersons. In each case, it is written to help Christians enter more fully into the praise of the triune name into which we are baptized. How shall we proceed?

An Overview of Chapters

Christians praise the triune God because that is how God presents himself to us in Holy Scripture: as one God in three persons, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. By his word, God reveals his triune name in Holy Scripture. By his Spirit, God takes his triune name, as revealed in Holy Scripture, and writes it on our hearts, training us to call upon his name in prayer, proclamation, and praise. For this...