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Writer's pictureBible Brian

When faith beats math


I don't know about you, but when I was in school, my teachers would always remind me "you won't have a calculator in your pocket in the real world". Well, eventually, we invented the smart phone. Now, you very likely have your phone, email, camera, calendar, notebook, and, yes, calculator, within arm's reach - maybe even in your very hand, right now.


I wonder if you might be willing to do a little experiment. Pull out your calculator and type in 3 ÷ 3. Because 3 is a multiple of 3, you will get a whole number: 1. Now do 3 x 1. Because this is the reverse formula, you will get back to 3.


If you start doing similar calculations with numbers that are not multiples of 3, your answers will be different. Do the same calculation for 100 ÷ 3. The answer you will get is 33.3, with the possibility of there being more 3s at the end. All totally valid answers, because the 3s ultimately never end. However, unless your calculator is programmed to recognise what you're trying to do (a problem solved by simply clearing its memory and re-typing your 33.3), what you will get when reversing the formula is 99.9. You get 33.3 by dividing 100 by 3, but you do not get 100 by multiplying 33.3 by 3.


This may seem illogical, and in many ways it is. But not as illogical as the common misunderstanding of the Trinity: That 1 + 1 + 1 = 1. We all know that no matter how you punch it into your calculator, 3 x 1, 1 x 3, or 1 + 1 + 1, all equal 3. Therefore, if there are 3 gods, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, then Christianity cannot be a monotheistic faith.


But this fails to understand what the doctrine of the Trinity actually is. See, the misunderstanding is that the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, are all separate gods. In reality, they are all actually different personages within the same Godhead. This is why Colossians 2:9 tells us that in Christ "...dwells all the fullness of the Godhead bodily;".


One unique aspect of God is His eternality. As He said to Moses, "...you shall say to the children of Israel, ‘I AM has sent me to you.’" (Exodus 3:14). And as Jesus said to the Pharisees, "Most assuredly, I say to you, before Abraham was, I AM." (John 8:58). That is, Jesus is claiming to be the same subsistent God as was revealed to Moses, not a distinct being. But that name, "I AM", tells us a lot more. There was a time when God had not created the heavens and the Earth. There was a time when God had not entered the world as a man. There was even a time when Jesus was not risen. But there was never a time when God did not exist as the self-sufficient, self-contained, self-relational being He has always been, and will always be.


So, rather than the formula for the Trinity being 1 + 1 + 1 = 1, which would be illogical, the actual formula is ထ + ထ + ထ. But the infinite, by its nature, is unalterable. When you add to infinity, it doesn't change. When you subtract from infinity, it doesn't change. When you multiply infinity, it doesn't change. When you divide infinity, it does not change. Therefore, 1ထ + 1ထ + 1ထ = 1ထ!


You can demonstrate this with the finite, too. Consider the Bible. How many Bibles are there? If you want to be silly, you can say "well there are hundreds, there's the NIV, the KJV, the ESV...". For sake of argument, pick one. Don't even pick study versions, just focus on a single version. One which, if you ordered online, you would expect to receive. I open the book on one side of the Earth, you open the book on the other side of the Earth, we're reading the same book. But there's two of them! There is one Bible in my hand, and one Bible in yours. But they're one Bible. 1 + 1 = 1, because the one Bible is present in two cases.


Now let's bring them together. Your Bible and my Bible are close enough that we can lay them side by side, we can put one on top of the other, we can even clink them together like glasses of wine during a toast. They are now relational. The one Bible, in two, wholly divided yet wholly identical, are relating to one another.


This is what we see with the Trinity. Yes, if you think of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, in the same way as you think of Zeus, Hades, and Poseidon, you end up with three gods, because these three gods of Olympus are of a different essence. But when you understand that the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, are of the same essence, their distinction melts together, and you see that they 3 beings, yet one God, for similar reasons to how our two Bibles are one Bible.


Ultimately, this means the doctrine of the Trinity is more logically sound than something you can punch in to your calculator! It doesn't seem logical than 100 ÷ 3 is 33.3, but 33.3 x 3 is not 100. But it makes all the sense in the world that ထ + ထ + ထ = ထ. We can therefore conclude that God's thoughts really are higher than ours! While we're busy breaking math, He's busy breaking the chains of sin!


This, He did by sending the Son to receive the punishment our sins justly deserve. The infinite God received a finite punishment in order that the finite sinner may be spared an infinite punishment. But only through faith. Jesus says "...You are from beneath; I am from above. You are of this world; I am not of this world. Therefore I said to you that you will die in your sins; for if you do not believe that I am He, you will die in your sins." (John 8:23-24). It is neither wise, nor safe, to mock the Trinity, as many do. Rather, to believe in the Deity of Christ is essential for salvation. Let anti-Trinitarians therefore humble themselves, repent and be saved.

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