The Triune Nature of God: God’s Divine Nature in Creation
by Ethan Longhenry
via Biblical Insights, Vol. 14, No. 9, September 2014
In Romans 1:18-20 Paul makes an important argument: everyone has been given a sufficient understanding of who God is based within His creation. We recognize how God’s eternal power is evident in the creation: from the fixed properties of the universe that facilitate life down to the functioning of DNA, we can see the hand of God in how things exist. But how does the creation testify to God’s divinity or His “divine nature”?
According to Deuteronomy 6:4, God is One. Yet we see in other Scriptures that the Father is God, the Son is God, and the Holy Spirit is God (John 1:1; 10:30; Colossians 2:9; 1 Peter 1:2; 2 Peter 1:21). The best understanding of this mystery is to declare that God is One Being in Three Persons, for all other alternatives run into biblical challenges. If the Three are just different manifestations of one person, how can all three testify at the baptism of the Son, or how can both the Father and the Son witness to the Son (Matthew 3:16-17; John 8:17-18)? If God the Father is really God, and the Son and the Spirit are divine but not fully God, how could Paul say that in Jesus, the Godhead dwelt fully in bodily form (Colossians 2:9)?
God’s divine nature, then, features the Three in One: God as one, not in person, but in nature, being, character, and will (John 1:1; Colossians 2:9; Hebrews 1:3). In short, God is one in relational unity. The relationship among the Three is so deep and intimate that we can speak of God as one Being, using the singular “He” or “Him.”
God’s divine nature, then, is as the Three in One. Yet how is this evident in creation?
According to Genesis 1:26-27, humans are made in God’s likeness. However, this does not mean we are gods, or God is a man (John 4:24). Instead, we manifest the metaphysical characteristics of God’s creatures: consciousness and the soul.
What do we humans seek in life? Different answers might be given: money, stuff, fame, power, and so on and so forth. While people might be motivated by different desires, what is at the heart of many of them? People want a comfortable lifestyle and many of the things listed above, but who wants to have them alone? People might want to be as wealthy as Ebenezer Scrooge, but who wants to be Ebenezer Scrooge?
When it comes down to it, people want to be loved, known, and appreciated. In short, they are seeking relationships. Psychologists are discovering that we are wired for relationships; they are one of our most fundamental needs!
When people think of a relationship, the relationship between a husband and wife often comes to mind. What happens in that situation? A man and a woman, unrelated, somehow meet each other. They get to know each other, and they fall in love with each other. They commit to one another. The two become one; they are still two different humans, but it’s more about " us " than “me.” Such is a wonderful time, full of creativity; after all, how many songs, books, and plays have been written, or paintings, sculptures, or other pieces of art made, on account of the desires of love?
There is a natural desire to share in love, and offspring often come based on that love.
Is this not God’s divine nature manifest in His creation?
As we have seen, He is the Triune God, the Three in One. A man and his wife becoming one is analogous to the unity within God (Genesis 2:24). And just as the love between the man and the woman leads to creativity and various creative acts, not the least of which being offspring, what else motivated God to create all things but love? He wanted to share the love within Himself with the beautiful creation which He made, particularly with His “offspring,” man made in His image (Genesis l:l-2:3; Acts 17:26-28).
It is not good for man to be alone; how can it be when he is made in the image of the Three in One, the God who is one in relationship? We are made to seek a relationship with our Creator who loved us and, in so doing, to maintain relationships with one another as well. The Bible testifies to it. The creation testifies to it. Let us praise and thank God that His divine nature is evident in the creation. Let us seek to maintain a relationship with the Triune God, seeking to be conformed to the image of the Son (Romans 8:28). Let us seek to be one with one another as the Father and Son are one (John 17:20-23), and let us thus honor and glorify God!
