{"id":2893,"date":"2013-01-09T20:31:00","date_gmt":"2013-01-10T04:31:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/godslovewins.com\/blog\/?p=2893"},"modified":"2015-02-04T12:45:48","modified_gmt":"2015-02-04T20:45:48","slug":"the-life-of-the-trinity-the-backstory-to-the-gospel","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/godslovewins.com\/blog\/the-life-of-the-trinity-the-backstory-to-the-gospel\/","title":{"rendered":"The Life of the Trinity: the “Back-Story” to the Gospel"},"content":{"rendered":"

I was recently listening to a lecture on the Trinitarian relationship between Father, Son and Spirit which was illustrated as the “Back-Story” necessary for an accurate comprehension of the events of the Gospel. It was stated that without the understanding of this eternal relationship of family love we cannot properly interpret what we have called the Gospel–the death, resurrection and ascension of Jesus Christ for the sin of the world.<\/p>\n

The speaker relayed the story about his brother who one summer was feverishly working to update and restore a dilapidated farmhouse, remodeling and repairing both the house and the animal dwellings. Working every day and late into the nights it took him several weeks to complete the job.<\/p>\n

As onlookers of this man, who appeared to be undoubtedly dedicated to this project, what might we conclude about his mission? Perhaps that he was “into” remodeling and restoring old broken down farmhouses? Maybe he was getting paid a lot of money for the work and overtime. Or perhaps he was excited to raise livestock and was remodeling it because of his passion for animals.<\/p>\n

The truth was, he was in love with a woman<\/em>. She was on an extended trip and he was working to get his “extreme makeover” finished before she returned. He was preparing a place in hopes of wooing and romancing her to himself in marriage. That’s the backstor<\/em>y. And that puts a different spin on how you interpret all the blood, sweat and tears. It gives you a very different vision on account of all his efforts and activity.<\/p>\n

Similarly if you look before the cross…before creation…before the angels…indeed before sin even entered into the cosmos …you find a “Back-Story” as well. It is the relationship of a Father, Son and Spirit that has existed from all eternity. This is the romantic prologue to the story we call “The Gospel.” It is The Love Story that began before time, before sin<\/em>. This is the essential element of the Story of God we need to have in our vision in order to place the historical events of the Gospel in their proper context.\u00a0The Gospel is not just a Story about how God came down and fixed humanity’s problems. The love that Jesus displayed on the cross was in motion long before the human race fell in Adam. In fact, Adam “fell” into the greatest romance Story ever told!<\/p>\n

It is not unlike Samwise Gamgee’s question of “I wonder what sort of tale have we fallen into?” It was the best question he could ask, for it assumed there was<\/em> a Story. A story of joy and love and purpose going on long before any of us were even born! And the context of the Story is everything. Scriptures tell us it is nothing less than the eternal fellowship of love between the Father, the Son and the Spirit and their unified desire and planned mission to share that love (John 1; 17; Eph 1). It was the nature of that love to give itself away that brought about mankind in the first place. God is an eternal community of love and the incarnation of the Son of God means that we have been included in that fellowship of love from before<\/em> the foundation (lit. the ‘fall’) of the world!<\/p>\n

Evangelicals are invariably quick to defend the “Doctrine of the Trinity” but most are hard pressed to explain why. Some say it is necessary for the atonement to “work” as it is only the incarnate Son who can save us. But we have come to believe, and hope you can see a bit clearer, how it is immensely more<\/em> than that.<\/p>\n

The ministry of Perichoresis<\/a> is dedicated to the renewal of the centrality of the Trinity in the Gospel Story. Please visit their websites and check out their extensive articles on the Trinitarian life as it relates to the Gospel and the Story we find ourselves in. They highlight and expound the thinking of Trinitarian theologians such as Athanasius<\/a> (296-373AD) and J. B. \u00a0Torrance<\/a>\u00a0(1923-2003). The following is an excerpt by Perichoresis founder Dr. C. Baxter Kruger from his new book, The Shack Revisited:<\/em><\/p>\n

<\/em>–<\/span>
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Summary of the Trinitarian Vision<\/h3>\n
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by C. Baxter Kruger<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
From all eternity, God is not alone and solitary, but lives as Father, Son and Spirit in a rich and glorious and abounding fellowship of utter oneness. There is no emptiness in this circle, no depression or fear or insecurity.\u00a0\u00a0The trinitarian life is a great dance of unchained communion and intimacy, fired by passionate, self-giving and other-centered love, and mutual delight.\u00a0\u00a0This life is good.\u00a0\u00a0It is right, unique, full of music and joy, blessedness and peace. Such love, giving rise to such togetherness and fellowship and oneness, is the womb of the universe and of humanity within it.<\/div>\n
–<\/span><\/div>\n
The stunning truth is that this Triune God, in amazing and lavish love, determined to open the circle and share the trinitarian life with others. This is the one, eternal and abiding reason for the creation of the world and of human life.\u00a0\u00a0There is no other God, no other will of God, no second plan, no hidden agenda for human beings.\u00a0\u00a0Before the creation of the world, the Father, Son and Spirit set their love upon us and planned to bring us to share and know and experience the trinitarian life itself.\u00a0\u00a0Unto this end the cosmos was called into being, and the human race was fashioned, and Adam and Eve were given a place in the coming of Jesus Christ, the Father\u2019s Son himself, in and through whom the dream of our adoption would be accomplished.<\/div>\n
–<\/span><\/div>\n
Before creation, it was decided that the Son would cross every chasm between the Triune God and humanity and establish a real and abiding relationship with us\u2014union.\u00a0Jesus was predestined to be the mediator, the one in and through whom the very life of the Triune God would enter human existence, and human existence would be lifted up to share in the trinitarian life.<\/div>\n
–<\/span><\/div>\n
When Adam and Eve rebelled, ushering in chaos and misery into God\u2019s creation, the Father, Son and Spirit never abandoned their dream, but wonderfully incorporated darkness and sin into the tapestry of the coming incarnation.\u00a0As the Father\u2019s Son became human, and as he submitted himself to bear our anger, and bizarre blindness, and as he gave himself to suffer a murderous death at our hands, he established a real and abiding relationship with fallen humanity at our very worst\u2014and he brought his Father and the Holy Spirit with him.\u00a0\u00a0It was in Jesus himself, and in his death at our bitter hands, that the trinitarian life of God pitched its tent in our hell on earth, thereby uniting all that the Father, Son and Spirit share with all that we are in our brokenness, shame and sin\u2014adoption.<\/div>\n
–<\/span><\/div>\n
In the life and death of Jesus the Holy Spirit made his way into human pain and blindness.\u00a0\u00a0Inside our broken inner worlds the Spirit works to reveal Jesus\u00a0in<\/em>\u00a0us so that we can meet Jesus himself in our own sin and shame, and begin to see what Jesus sees, and know his Father with him. The Holy Spirit takes of Jesus and discloses it to us, so that we can know and experience Jesus\u2019 own relationship with his Father, and we can be free to live in the Father\u2019s embrace with Jesus.\u00a0As the Spirit works we are summoned to take sides with Jesus against our own darkness and prejudice, and take simple steps of trust and change.\u00a0\u00a0As we do Jesus\u2019 own anointing with the Spirit\u2014his own fellowship with his Father, his own unearthly assurance, his own freedom and joy and power in the Spirit\u2014begin to form in us, while not diminishing but augmenting and freeing our own uniqueness as persons.\u00a0\u00a0The Spirit\u2019s passion is to bring his anointing of Jesus to full and personal and abiding expression in us as unique persons, and not only in us personally, but in our relationship with the Father in Jesus, and in our relationships with one another, and indeed with all creation, until the whole cosmos is a living sacrament of the great dance of the Triune God.<\/div>\n
–<\/div>\n
An excerpt from\u00a0The Shack Revisited,<\/em>\u00a0C. Baxter Kruger, 2012<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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C. BAXTER KRUGER, PH.D.\u00a0<\/a><\/p>\n

–<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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I was recently listening to a lecture on the Trinitarian relationship between Father, Son and Spirit which was illustrated as the “Back-Story” necessary for an accurate comprehension of the events…<\/p>\n

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