A Three-Legged Religion
"In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things came into being through Him, and without Him not one thing came into being. What has come into being in Him was life, and the life was the light of all people." John 1:1-4.
These days, I find it most difficult to write of God, the Word and the Light, because with each passing day, I find that I know less and less regarding all three. This three persons-in-one explanation of God's Being is difficult to grasp; yet most Christians accept the Trinity as a bedrock doctrine of God's Being. However, according to Cruden's Unabridged Concordance, the word, Trinity, strangely enough does not appear anywhere in the Bible. I feel sure that you noticed that John's vision of God seems to differ from the traditional, "God, the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Ghost (Spirit)", (God, Word and Light).
A two-legged stool has to be propped up, and a four-legged stool will rock if all four legs are not exactly the same length. The length of the legs of a three-legged stool, do not have to be exactly the same to stand sturdily without rocking about. I find this to be a powerful symbol of our steadfast God.
I have been told by many a believer that you can't be a Christian unless you believe in the Trinity. We all want a god that is steady, unshakable and possessing unquestionable, supernatural power over everything that is. If we can have that vision in our hearts, then maybe we don't have to cut God into three parts to have a meaningful relationship with this God who is indefinable.
If I know so little about God, why do I continue to write about God? Writing is one of my ways of hopefully learning something about what is beyond my comprehension. To just let it go because I don't understand it, is to rob myself of finding a better relationship with God through any infinitesimal "ahah" gained by struggling with the writing itself.
All religions that I have had the opportunity to study, start with some charismatic person's significant impact on a number of people who choose to emulate and worship him or her. This Initiator changes the whole way each sees life and becomes their Hero, Idol, or God. When this initiator dies, those who truly believe in him begin to tell stories of their experiences with their hero, write them down, and over time this Initiator becomes Legend and often the God of a religion that is fleshed out over hundreds of years by its followers. I see these same elements in the history of Christianity.
The above scripture seems to conflict with some perspectives of the Bible. Many call the Bible the Word of God. John sees Jesus as the Word.
I know this is not the time of the year that we celebrate the birth of the Trinity, but rather the birth of Jesus of Nazareth. But, is that what most of us really do at Christmas? I think not! We pay homage to Santa Claus, go overboard in buying gifts for family and friends while we do little to pay proper homage to Jesus, the Word. There is much we do not know about the circumstances surrounding the birth of this innocent child of God, but we owe so much to the life He lived and the words He spoke. We must pause to worship Him with the highest form of thanksgiving we can produce within our human limitations.
I can only apologize for the rambling nature of this exegetical Provocation and for its literal use of the scripture to provide us all with food for thought.
I now close with this paraphrase of the eleventh and twelfth commandments proclaimed by Jesus himself. "Thou shalt love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind" (11th). "And you shall love thy neighbor as thyself"(12th). It well could be that the living out of these last two commandments is the ultimate way to celebrate the birth of Jesus.
