The early Christians invented the word Trinity, as they struggled to accurately describe God as he revealed himself to them. God is three persons: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Yet there is only one God.   

It is amazing how often the word trinity is used today. It can be a person's name. Educational institutions that have nothing to do with the Christian faith may use the name. Businesses may be called something like Trinity Savings and Loan Association. It also is used as a synonym for the word trio, especially when three things have something in common. People talk about three individuals who stick together through thick and thin as an inseparable trinity. I have even heard the word used in the unlikely phrase "an unholy trinity" to describe a group of three unsavory characters or three especially damaging vices.

But the word really describes something that is unique and far different from these things. Trinity means three things that are one thing. That is a nonsensical concept to human reason. Common sense tells us the word shouldn't be used to describe anything. But there is one unique entity that it describes most accurately. In his Word the one true God reveals himself to us as a trinity. He says there are three separate, individual persons who make up one God. Are we sure that is what the Bible says?

ONE GOD, THREE PERSONS

Nothing is more clearly stated in the Bible than the fact that there is only one God. Moses taught the Israelites just before they entered Canaan to confess it: " Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one" (Deuteronomy 6:4). Through Isaiah the Lord told his people that he would brook no competition: "Understand that I am he. Before me no god was formed, nor will there be one after me" (43:10). Jesus taught the same when he quoted Moses in Mark 12:29.

These same Scriptures teach that three separate persons are God. The Father is God. St. Paul regularly greets his readers with the words, "Grace and peace to you from God our Father" (Romans 1:7). In the introduction to his gospel, the evangelist John speaks of Jesus Christ, the One who became flesh. He calls him the Word and says of him, "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God" (John 1:1). Finally, in the early days of the Christian church, two members of the church, Ananias and Sapphira, tried to make themselves out to be something they were not. Peter told Ananias, "Ananias, how is it that Satan has so filled your heart that you have lied to the Holy Spirit." Peter made it clear that lying to the Holy Spirit is not trying to deceive some inanimate force. He said, "You have not lied to men but to God" (Acts 5:3,4).