(This is an excerpt. To purchase the book, go here: http://bit.ly/U05x1 )
Three Aspects of God
To know Jesus of course we must have at least a relatively good knowledge of God. We know that there are these three divine expressions: God the Father; God the Logos or Word (John 1.1); God the Holy Spirit. The three, we are told, constitute the Holy Trinity. It would serve no good purpose to contend that there is no such word in the Bible as "trinity." That is not pertinent because there still remain undeniably a Father, a Logos or Word and a Holy Spirit, whatever one chooses to name the overall concept.
Of course we who comprise the "Oneness" movement are supposedly completely at odds with the Trinitarians. This writer cannot agree with this stance. When one studies the writings of the Trinitarian theologians (as opposed to the man who voices his unlearned opinion at the local barber shop) one can see that, although the words may be different, they are saying in essence what we are saying. After they go to great lengths to tell us there are three Persons in the Godhead, they then insist that the three are not actually three since the three are of one essence and think and agree as one. The main point here is that they are firm in their assertion that there is only one God.
Is there, then, such a wide gulf between them and us? While we stoutly and correctly maintain, as they do, that there is one God, do we not admit there are three distinct manifestations of the one God? We carefully avoid saying there are three persons as if fearful that will proliferate the one God. But one of the definitions of “person” is this: “Any of the three modes of being (Father, Son, and Holy Ghost) in the Trinity [Godhead].” (Compton's Interactive Encyclopedia © 1999).) That should not ruffle our Pentecostal feathers too much.
There are different spheres of operations for the three respective manifestations of God although there is a blurring of the boundaries at times. This is because whether one refers to the Father, the Son or the Holy Spirit, they are all one God. Each expression or manifestation of God is fully God, therefore each one shares the responsibility and/or credit for all the actions taken by the other two facets of God.
For example, Christ created all things (Eph. 3:9; Col. 1:16, 17) but we would not presume to say that the Father and the Holy Spirit were completely shut out of this activity. There is another example to buttress the premise that one manifestation of God does not operate independently of the other two: The Holy Ghost dwells in the hearts and directs the activities of the saints of God according to John 14:26 and 16:13. But in Acts 16:7 we read that the "Spirit of Jesus" (ASV, RSV, NIV) was He who directed the journeys of Paul and Silas. This Spirit of Jesus of course is the same One we call the Holy Ghost. The scripture's apparently chance reference to Him as the Spirit of Jesus helps to confirm our contention that the three are all one God and what one does is in effect done by all three. At the same time we must remember that God chooses to differentiate between the respective works of the Father, Son and Holy Ghost, and that is the way we should view their operations.
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