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In the history of theological study concerning the Divine Trinity, three words have been used — essence, hypostasis, and substance. We need to clarify the meaning of these three words, which we have already mentioned in relation to the Divine Trinity.
We can see what the word essence means in the study of the Divine Trinity by defining two related words — element and nature. An element is a substance. In the New Jerusalem there are three elements — gold, pearls, and precious stones. Therefore, in the building of the New Jerusalem there are three substances or elements. Every element has its nature, and in the nature of the element is the essence. Consequently, the essence denotes the very thing itself. Now we can see that there is a difference in using the two words essence and substance. We cannot refer to the substance of the essence but to the essence of the substance. Each substance, or substantial element, has its essence.
It is clearly revealed in the Bible that God is an eternal God. The eternal God has His existence, and with His existence there must be the essence. Without essence there is not existence. Anything that exists has an essence, so essence actually refers mostly to God’s existence. Our God is the eternal God existing from eternity to eternity. His existence tells us that He has an essence, which we call the divine essence.
Another word used in relation to the Trinity is hypostasis. This anglicized Greek word is actually composed of two Greek words — hupo, meaning “under or below,” and stasis, meaning “substantial support.” The word, therefore, means “the substantial support underneath.” This is like the four legs of a table being the substantial support underneath. Hypostasis in English simply means “substantial support.” The Father, the Son, and the Spirit are the three hypostases, or substances, of the Divine Trinity, or of the Godhead.
Gradually, however, this word has been used in the sense of person. This understanding is far off and causes trouble. To say that the Father, the Son, and the Spirit are three hypostases is correct, but to say definitely that the Father, the Son, and the Spirit are three persons is going a little too far. Griffith Thomas indicated that we may borrow a word like person to define the Trinity because our human language is inadequate, but if we press the term person too far, it will lead to tritheism. Even to use the word hypostasis is not completely safe, because when we use any terms, vocabulary, or illustrations to define the Divine Trinity, we always run a risk. The Divine Trinity is too much of a mystery. Our finite mentality is incapable of understanding the Divine Trinity in full. We do not have the adequate vocabulary to describe Him, because in our human culture there is not such a mysterious thing as the Divine Trinity. Because there is not such a thing, we do not have the vocabulary, and even in our mentality we do not have the logic to understand the Divine Trinity.
In the historical study of the Divine Trinity, the word hypostasis was first used and then the word substance. Hypostasis and substance are synonyms in theological study. Then the word essence was picked up. In the substance there is the essence. In the study of the Divine Trinity the following crucial statement was made — the Triune God has three substances but only one essence. This statement is more safe. The Triune God is essentially one but substantially three. The Triune God is one in His essence, but He is three in His substance. To say that God has three essences is wrong, but to say that God has three substances is correct. Three substances equals three hypostases, and as some say, three hypostases equals three persons. Therefore, substantially speaking, God is three, and essentially speaking, God is one. This is the essential Trinity. In essence the Father, the Son, and the Spirit are one, but in substance (person) They are three. Actually, we do not appreciate the word persons that much. Rather, we appreciate the word hypostases. I hope this fellowship has provided “a simple map” of the understanding of the words element, nature, essence, substance, hypostasis, and person.
Also, God is very purposeful. Ephesians 1 reveals that God has His good pleasure, His heart’s desire (vv. 5, 9). God made a purpose according to His good pleasure, which is His heart’s desire. He is a living God and very purposeful. Such a purposeful God surely has a desire. He wants something, and He wants to do something, so He made a plan. This plan needs to be accomplished, and to carry out the accomplishment of this plan many works are needed. God made a plan with an arrangement to fulfill His purpose according to His desire. This plan, this arrangement, is His economy, His oikonomia, His household arrangement, His household administration.
In God’s economy there are three steps or stages. The first step was taken by the Father, the second step was taken by the Son, and the third step was taken by the Spirit. In each step of this successive economy there are some works to be accomplished.
In the first step there was the need to exercise foreknowledge. Second, God selected persons according to His foreknowledge, and third, He predestinated, or marked out, His chosen people. This is according to the New Testament revelation. In the first step of God’s economy, the works that were done in eternity past were all done by the Father. This does not mean, however, that when the Father did these three things, the Son was not there, or the Spirit was not there. If we say this, we jeopardize the essential Trinity and the unique essence of the Trinity. In other words, we jeopardize the existence of the Triune God. This kind of interpretation leads to modalism because modalism tells us that the Father, the Son, and the Spirit have a successive existence. Their existences are in succession. When the Father was there, there was no Son or no Spirit. When the Son came, the Father was over, and the Spirit was not yet. Then when the Spirit came, the Father and the Son both were over. This is the heresy of modalism. When the Father was working to exercise His foreknowledge to choose His people and to mark out His chosen ones to predestinate them unto sonship, the Son was with Him, and the Spirit was with Him. He did it in the Son and with the Spirit.
After this first step of His economy, God came in first to create, second to become flesh, third to live a human life on this earth, fourth to die an all-inclusive death on the cross, fifth to enter into resurrection, and finally to enter into ascension, the exaltation. These are the six main works in the second step of God’s economy, and these works all have been done by the Son with the Father and by the Spirit. In the Bible we are told that “all things came into being through Him, and apart from Him not one thing came into being which has come into being” (John 1:3). The creating work was done by the Son for God to become flesh in Him.
For God to live a human life among the human race on this earth in a lowly family was a particular work. This may not seem so great, but no human adjective can describe this work. Too often we Christians do not think about this. We do not consider God’s living on this earth in the man Jesus for thirty-three and a half years as a great work. When people teach concerning Christ, they mostly do not stress this aspect. They stress His creation, His incarnation, His crucifixion, His resurrection, and His ascension. They skip over His human living. We must realize, however, that among His six works, the item of His human living took Him the longest time. The Lord did not spend thirty-three and a half years to create. Also, He took only nine months to become flesh, He only took six hours to die an all-inclusive death, and He might have taken less than thirty-six hours to accomplish His resurrection. Of course, His exaltation work probably involved only a matter of minutes to accomplish. However, He took thirty-three and a half years to accomplish His human living. This is marvelous!
The major part of the revelation in the four Gospels is the human living of Jesus. His conception, His birth, His death, His resurrection, and His ascension are at the two ends of this revelation, while the main part is His human living. For example, in the book of Matthew, chapter 1 covers the Lord’s conception and birth, and chapters 27 and 28 cover His death and resurrection. Therefore, twenty-five chapters of Matthew are on the Lord’s human living. The bulk of the revelation in the four Gospels covers the human living of our Savior.
I hope that none of us, especially the young saints among us, would think that we have exhausted the New Testament. I would like to have another ten years to have a life-study of the New Testament. Many of today’s Christians merely pick up “gleanings” from the field of the divine revelation, and they become proud. This is a poor situation. Even what we have picked up from the divine revelation of the holy Word might also be considered in the Lord’s eyes as “gleanings.” It may be that we have not touched the harvest in the Lord’s revelation. Our life-study of the Bible, only comparatively speaking, may be the best.
Now we can see what a great, fine, and patient work was done by this One who spent thirty-three and a half years to carry out the silent work of His human living. This work has all been done by the Son. This again, however, does not mean that when the Son was doing this work, the Father was absent, and the Spirit came to replace Him. This kind of understanding is modalism. The New Testament, though, tells us that whatever the Son did, He did it with the Father and by the Spirit. The Son was sent by the Father, and He was even given to us by the Father, but when He came, He came with the Father. He did not only come with the Father, but He also came in the Father’s name. This means that He came as the Father. If I come to the meeting in another person’s name, that means I come as that person. If I go to the bank to withdraw some money in another person’s name, I go there as that person. The bank would not call me by my name, but it would call me by that other person’s name. In the same way, the Son came with the Father in the Father’s name.
The Son came in a way of divine conception, which was carried out by the Spirit, of the Spirit, and with the Spirit. The divine conception of Jesus was carried out by the Holy Spirit, of the Holy Spirit, and with the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit was the very essence of His conception. The Lord’s human essence came from the virgin Mary, and His divine essence came from the Holy Spirit. His conception was a mingling of the divine essence with the human essence, and this mingling produced a God-man. This was a man produced of two essences and two natures — the divine and the human. He came with the Father, and He came by the Spirit. He did His work with the Father, and He did His work by the Spirit. When He was baptized in the water, He was baptized with the Father and by the Spirit. When He was arrested, He was arrested with the Father and by the Spirit. When He was judged and crucified, He was judged and crucified with the Father and by the Spirit. If we do not see this, we jeopardize the existence of the Trinity. The works done by the Son were done with the Father and by the Spirit.
We have seen that Jesus was conceived of the Spirit and that the Spirit was one of His two essences. After His baptism He was standing in the water with the essence of the Holy Spirit and, no doubt, also with the Father, yet the Spirit still came down as a dove to descend upon Him, and the Father spoke from the heavens concerning Him. This is the economical Trinity to carry out God’s economy. In the same principle, when He was crucified and hanging on the cross, God forsook Him (Matt. 27:46). This does not mean that God left Him essentially but that God left Him economically.
There are three steps in God’s economy, and each step has a certain amount of work. We have covered two steps, and now we must see the third step — the step of the Spirit’s application. In this step there are a great many works. After finishing the works of the second step, the Son became a life-giving Spirit. Actually, the life-giving Spirit is the issue of the work that He did in the second step. He finished incarnation, human living, His all-inclusive death, resurrection, and ascension. In resurrection He became the life-giving Spirit, and this life-giving Spirit is the issue of His incarnation, human living, death, and resurrection. This does not mean that the life-giving Spirit is a separate Spirit from the Holy Spirit. This means, however, that His death and resurrection brought all the works that He did in the second step into the very constitution of the Spirit. Therefore, before His death “the Spirit was not yet” (John 7:39), but after His resurrection the Spirit came out with all the constituents of divinity, humanity, human living, His all-inclusive death, and His excellent resurrection. The third step, the step of the Spirit’s application, is not the Spirit working with the Son but rather the Son working as the Spirit with the Father.
According to the entire revelation of the sixty-six books of the Bible, the Trinity of the Godhead is for God’s dispensing. God’s desire with His strong intention is to dispense Himself into His chosen people as their life, as their life supply, and as their everything. To do this, or to carry out this dispensing, He needs to be triune. Without His Trinity He has no way to carry out His divine dispensing. Therefore, His Trinity is absolutely for the divine dispensing. The first verse that clearly bears the denotation of the Divine Trinity is Genesis 1:26. When God was going to create man, there must have been a council in the Godhead (as the one revealed in Acts 2:23 — see footnote 1, Recovery Version). In that conference They conversed in this way: “Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness.” This sounds very much like a talk in a council. In the creation of the heavens and the earth there was not such a council, such a talk, that referred to “Us.” The “Us” is the Divine Trinity — the Father, the Son, and the Spirit. The first mentioning of the Divine Trinity refers to the divine dispensing. God made man in His own image and according to His own likeness for the coming work of dispensing Himself into man.
When the work in the first and the second steps of His economy was accomplished, He came back to His disciples and charged them to go and disciple the nations, baptizing them into the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit (Matt. 28:19). This was absolutely for dispensing because by this time the very Divine Trinity had been fully completed. In John 7:39 the last item of the Divine Trinity was not yet, not complete. After the Lord’s death and resurrection, however, the Divine Trinity was fully complete and ready for God’s chosen people to be baptized into for the divine dispensing. Vincent’s Word Studies in the New Testament tells us that the baptism referred to in Matthew 28:19 brings people into a spiritual and mystical union with the Triune God. Later, I referred to this as an organic union. Baptism brings people into the Triune God, into a spiritual union with the Triune God, as indicated by the word into. This is an organic union for the divine dispensing.
Whenever we come to any verses or any expressions concerning the Divine Trinity, we have to be impressed with the dispensing of the Divine Trinity. Ephesians 2:18 says, “Through Him we both have access in one Spirit unto the Father.” The Divine Trinity is mentioned in this verse for the divine dispensing. Also, in Ephesians 3:14-17 Paul tells us that he bowed his knees unto the Father that we would be strengthened with power through His Spirit into our inner man, that Christ may make His home in our hearts. This again refers to the Divine Trinity for the divine dispensing. Second Corinthians 13:14 says, “The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all.” Again in this verse we see the Divine Trinity for the divine dispensing.
As we have seen, the Divine Trinity is the top divine attribute of our God. In the theological study of the past concerning God’s person, the word triune was invented. Triune is an adjective just as holy is an adjective. The Triune God bears an attribute, which is trinity. Just as holy produces holiness, so triune produces trinity. Holiness is an attribute of God, and trinity is also an attribute of God. In 2 Corinthians 13:14 grace, love, and fellowship are attributes of the Triune God, but the top attribute of our God is the trinity. To say that He is dispensing Himself into us is a general speaking. Specifically speaking, we must realize that He is dispensing His trinity because His trinity is the top and all-inclusive attribute including His love, His grace, His fellowship, His holiness, and His everything.
If God were not triune — the Father, the Son, and the Spirit — He could not have a way to dispense Himself into us. Many works have been accomplished in God’s economy, which consists of three steps, and this economy is the economy of the very one God who is essentially one. He performed many works. The Father exercised His foreknowledge. He chose us and predestinated us in the Son and with the Spirit. As the Son, the Triune God did many works in creation, incarnation, human living, crucifixion, resurrection, and ascension. Now He is doing a finer work as the Spirit in regeneration, sanctification, transformation, conformation, and glorification. He is also living in us and guiding us in many, many things as the Spirit.
It is always safe to use the general term of God. God chose us, God predestinated us, God created us, God became flesh, God accomplished redemption and redeemed us, God regenerated us, God sanctified us, and God is doing everything in us, through us, and for us. God is the all-inclusive divine title. To use this all-inclusive divine title is always right. To use the subsidiary divine titles, such as the Father, the Son, and the Spirit, we must be careful.
There is nothing wrong with saying that God exercised His foreknowledge, chose us, predestinated us, and created the world. God also became flesh and accomplished redemption. He regenerated us, and He is sanctifying us and guiding us. We cannot say, however, that the Son selected us and that the Spirit predestinated us. Neither can we say that the Father became flesh, died on the cross for our sins, resurrected, and ascended. Acts 20:28 tells us that God purchased the church with His own blood. We can say in a general way that God purchased or redeemed the church. We cannot say, however, that the Father purchased us. In the Bible we cannot see the church of the Father or the church of the Spirit but the church of Christ and the church of God. The Father, however, has regenerated us because His function as a Father is begetting. We may say that the Son regenerates us as the Spirit, but we cannot say that the Spirit redeems us. We also cannot say that the Spirit created the world. Neither can we say that the Spirit selected us. Now we must ask who redeems our body? Philippians 3:21 indicates that the Lord Jesus Christ, the Son, will transfigure us.
This fellowship may help you to realize how to use, understand, and apply many verses in the Bible, especially in the New Testament, concerning the Divine Trinity because as a whole the Bible is constructed with the Divine Trinity. This is a great subject. I believe that if we are faithful to Him in the coming years, more light will come concerning this matter. I expect that our fellowship in this chapter will help us to understand and experience the Divine Trinity more easily.
We have only touched a small amount of the truth in the Bible. To some extent we have wasted people’s time and held them back because we did not know the truth adequately. Year after year we nearly presented the same thing to people. We must realize that the basic problem is the problem of not having the adequate knowledge of the basic truth. Because we are short of the adequate knowledge of the truth, we are influenced by “good things.” An adequate knowledge of the truth can preserve us. Throughout church history Christendom has picked up many things that are not in accordance with the truth of the divine revelation. Once the adequate knowledge of the truth came in, many of these things were dropped and “mopped away.” Up until Luther’s time, the Catholic Church had picked up much “dirt” of pagan practices and unscriptural doctrines. Then Luther stood up to put out one basic truth — justification by faith. This truth swept away a lot of dirt. The Catholic Church became “dirty” because of the lack of knowledge of the truth. If I discover any dirt, it is my responsibility to sweep it away with the truth. Many of you have an inadequate knowledge of the Lord’s recovery. This means that you are short of protection and that you miss the safeguard. We must clean up the dirt, not by human doing but by presenting the truth. Once the saints see the truth, they know where they are, and they know what the Lord’s recovery is.
