Trinity
The Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit are named together across both Testaments. Scripture nowhere offers a single definition of the relationship; instead, the same divine work is variously ascribed to Yahweh and his Spirit, to the Father who sends and the Son who is sent, and to the Spirit who searches the deep things of God and bears witness to the Son. The verses below trace how UPDV speaks of the three.
The Plural Voice of God
From the opening chapters of Genesis, the divine voice speaks of itself in the plural. At the making of man, "[the Speech of] God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness" (Gen 1:26). After the fall, the same plural recurs: "Look, the man has become as one of us, to know good and evil" (Gen 3:22). The seraphim's threefold cry to Yahweh in Isaiah's vision belongs to the same pattern of divine self-naming: "Holy, holy, holy, is Yahweh of hosts: the whole earth is full of his glory" (Isa 6:3), and immediately the prophet hears "the voice of the [Speech] of Yahweh, saying, Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?" (Isa 6:8). The same triple "Holy, holy, holy" returns at the throne in Revelation, addressed to "Yahweh, the God of hosts, He Who Was and Who Is and Who Is To Come" (Rev 4:8).
Yahweh and His Spirit
The Hebrew Scriptures repeatedly distinguish Yahweh and his Spirit as two named subjects who act together. In Isaiah's servant oracle the speaker says, "the Sovereign Yahweh has sent me, and his Spirit" (Isa 48:16). On Israel's history Isaiah recalls that "the angel of his presence saved them" (Isa 63:9), but that "they rebelled, and grieved his Holy Spirit" (Isa 63:10). The same pairing structures the prophetic anointings: "The Spirit of Yahweh will rest on him, the spirit of wisdom and understanding" (Isa 11:2), and "his delight will be in the fear of Yahweh" (Isa 11:3). On the chosen servant Yahweh declares, "Look, my slave, whom I uphold; my chosen, in whom my soul delights: [my Speech has] put my Spirit on him; he will bring forth justice to the Gentiles" (Isa 42:1). The covenant promise in Isa 59:21 names them together: "this is my covenant with them, says Yahweh: my Spirit who is on you, and my words which I have put in your mouth, will not depart out of your mouth." David's penitential prayer pleads, "Don't cast me away from your presence; And don't take your Holy Spirit from me" (Ps 51:11).
The Servant Anointed by the Spirit
The servant on whom Yahweh's Spirit rests speaks in his own voice in Isa 61:1: "The Spirit of the Sovereign Yahweh is on me; because Yahweh has anointed me to preach good news to the poor." Luke takes that oracle on Jesus' lips at Nazareth, where he reads, "The Spirit of Yahweh is on me, Because he anointed me to preach good news to the poor" (Lu 4:18). Earlier Luke records that at the Jordan "the Holy Spirit descended in a bodily form, as a dove, on him, and a voice came out of heaven, You are my chosen Son; in you I am well pleased" (Lu 3:22). Mark gives the same scene with the heavenly voice naming the Son: "and a voice came out of the heavens, You are my beloved Son, in you I am well pleased" (Mr 1:11). John the Baptist contrasts his own water-baptism with the one to come: "I baptized you⁺ in water; but he will baptize you⁺ in the Holy Spirit" (Mr 1:8); "he will baptize you⁺ in the Holy Spirit and [in] fire" (Lu 3:16). The Baptist's witness in the Fourth Gospel folds the three together: "I have seen the Spirit descending as a dove out of heaven; and it stayed on him" (Joh 1:32), and the one who sent John to baptize said, "On whomever you will see the Spirit descending, and staying on him, the same is he who baptizes in the Holy Spirit" (Joh 1:33).
The Speech with God
John's prologue names the Son as the divine Speech, with God from the beginning. "In the beginning was the Speech, and the Speech was with God, and the Speech was God. The same was in the beginning with God" (Joh 1:1-2). The same Speech "became flesh, and dwelt among us, and we saw his glory, glory as an only begotten from a father, full of grace and truth" (Joh 1:14). John testifies, "I have seen, and have borne witness that this is the Son of God" (Joh 1:34). The Son's own words run the same line back to before time: "Before Abraham was born, I am" (Joh 8:58), and again to the Father, "glorify me with your own self with the glory which I had with you before the world was" (Joh 17:5). Paul's hymn in Colossians describes the Son as "the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation" (Col 1:15), the one who "is before all things, and in him all things consist" (Col 1:17), in whom "dwells all the fullness of Deity bodily" (Col 2:9). Micah's word about Bethlehem's ruler points the same direction: "whose goings forth are from of old, from everlasting" (Mi 5:2).
Father, Son, and the Mutual Indwelling
In the upper-room discourse the Son names the Father and the Spirit as distinct from himself, yet inseparable from his work. "If you⁺ have known me, you⁺ will also know my Father… Don't you believe that I am in the Father, and the Father in me?" (Joh 14:7, 10). Of the coming Helper he says, "I will pray the Father, and he will give you⁺ another Supporter, that he may be with you⁺ forever, [even] the Spirit of truth" (Joh 14:16-17), and "the Spirit, the Supporter, whom the Father will send in my name, he will teach you⁺ all things" (Joh 14:26). The Son's sending of the Spirit and the Father's sending of the Spirit are spoken in the same breath: "When the Supporter has come, whom I will send to you⁺ from the Father, [even] the Spirit of truth, who proceeds from the Father, he will bear witness of me" (Joh 15:26). The Son adds, "I go to him who sent me" (Joh 16:5); after his going, the Spirit "will glorify me: for he will take of mine, and will declare [it] to you⁺. All things that the Father has are mine: therefore I said, that he takes of mine, and will declare [it] to you⁺" (Joh 16:14-15). The Father and the Son bear mutual witness ("I am he who bears witness of myself, and the Father who sent me bears witness of me," Joh 8:18; cf. Joh 5:32, 37), and the Son and the Father are claimed as one: "I and the Father are one" (Joh 10:30). Paul puts the two confessions side by side: "yet to us there is one God the Father, of whom are all things, and we to him; and one Lord Jesus Christ, through whom are all things, and we through him" (1Co 8:6).
The Spirit of God and the Things of God
The Spirit is named as the one who knows God from the inside. "But to us God revealed [them] through the Spirit: for the Spirit searches all things, yes, the deep things of God. For who among men knows the things of a man, except the spirit of the man, which is in him? Even so the things of God none knows, except the Spirit of God" (1Co 2:10-11). The same Spirit speaks through the prophets: "no prophecy ever came by the will of man: but men spoke from God, being moved by the Holy Spirit" (2Pe 1:21). Jesus' own words to the disciples are "spirit, and… life" (Joh 6:63). The Spirit teaches the things of Christ: "Which things also we speak, not in words which man's wisdom teaches, but which the Spirit teaches" (1Co 2:13). And in worship "God is spirit: and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth" (Joh 4:24). Paul fuses the two namings in 2Co 3:17: "Now the Lord is the Spirit: and where the Spirit of the Lord is, [there] is liberty."
The Triadic Patterns of the Apostolic Letters
The three are named together in the letters in many turns of phrase, none of them stylized into a creed and all of them woven into the pastoral argument.
The opening of 1 Peter ascribes salvation to all three: chosen "according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, in sanctification of the Spirit, to obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ" (1Pe 1:2). Paul's farewell at the close of 2 Corinthians says the same in benediction: "The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Spirit, be with all of you⁺" (2Co 13:13).
The gifts of the church are sorted under the three: "Now there are diversities of gifts, but the same Spirit. And there are diversities of servings, and the same Lord. And there are diversities of workings, but the same God, who works all things in all" (1Co 12:4-6). The confession itself is Spirit-given: "no man can say, Lord Jesus, but in the Holy Spirit" (1Co 12:3); and the church's one body is gathered in the one Spirit (1Co 12:13). Paul sets the same triad inside the unity of the church in Eph 4:4-6: "one Lord, one faith, one baptism" (Eph 4:5), "one God and Father of all, who is over all, and through all, and in all" (Eph 4:6).
The believer's adoption runs through the three. In Galatians: "when the fullness of the time came, God sent forth his Son, born of a woman, born under the law… And because you⁺ are sons, God sent forth the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying, Abba, Father" (Gal 4:4, 6). In Romans 8 the Spirit who bears witness is named in Father-and-Son terms: "But you⁺ are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God dwells in you⁺. But if any man does not have the Spirit of Christ, he is not his. And if Christ is in you⁺, the body is dead because of sin… But if the Spirit of him who raised up Jesus from the dead dwells in you⁺, he who raised up Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your⁺ mortal bodies through his Spirit who dwells in you⁺" (Rom 8:9-11). The same chapter names the Spirit's intercession: "the Spirit also helps our infirmity… the Spirit himself makes intercession for [us] with groanings which can't be uttered. And he who searches the hearts knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because he makes intercession for the saints according to [the will of] God" (Rom 8:26-27). And again: "The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit, that we are children of God" (Rom 8:16).
The Pauline pattern is the same in 2 Thessalonians: "God chose you⁺ from the beginning to salvation in sanctification of the Spirit and belief of the truth: to which he also called you⁺ through our good news, to the obtaining of the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ" (2Th 2:13-14); and in the doxology, "our Lord Jesus Christ himself, and God our Father who loved us…" (2Th 2:16). The same pattern in Titus: "when the kindness of God our Savior, and his love toward man, appeared… according to his mercy he saved us, through the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Spirit, which he poured out on us richly, through Jesus Christ our Savior" (Tit 3:4-6). And in Philippians, the prisoner expects "the supply of the Spirit of Jesus Christ" (Php 1:19).
The mystery of the gospel is summed up in 1Ti 3:16: "He who was manifested in the flesh, Justified in the spirit, Seen of angels, Preached among the nations, Believed on in the world, Received up in glory." And Heb 9:14 ties the cross to all three: "the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without blemish to God."
The Anointing, the Sealing, the Indwelling
The anointing that establishes the believer is described by all three names. "Now he who establishes us with you⁺ in Christ, and anointed us, is God; who also sealed us, and gave [us] the security deposit of the Spirit in our hearts" (2Co 1:21-22), and again "he who worked us for this very thing is God, who gave to us the security deposit of the Spirit" (2Co 5:5). The believer is a temple: "Don't you⁺ know that you⁺ are a temple of God, and [that] the Spirit of God dwells in you⁺?" (1Co 3:16); "your⁺ body is a temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you⁺, whom you⁺ have from God" (1Co 6:19). The Spirit who indwells is also identified as the Spirit of Christ (Rom 8:9-10) and the Spirit of his Son (Gal 4:6). The Spirit can be grieved, with covenantal weight: "do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, in whom you⁺ were sealed to the day of redemption" (Eph 4:30; cf. Isa 63:10).
Father, Son, and Spirit in the Witness of 1 John and Revelation
John's letters distil the same pattern. "Hereby you⁺ know the Spirit of God: every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is of God" (1Jn 4:2). "We have seen and bear witness that the Father has sent the Son [to be] the Savior of the world" (1Jn 4:14). "Hereby we know that we stay in him and he in us, because he has given us of his Spirit" (1Jn 4:13). The witness around the Son is named in 1Jn 5:6-9: "And the Spirit is who bears witness, because the Spirit is the truth. For there are three who bear witness… If we receive the witness of men, the witness of God is greater: for the witness of God is this, that he has borne witness concerning his Son." And in Revelation's throne-room the One praised as "Holy, holy, holy" is Yahweh "Who Was and Who Is and Who Is To Come" (Rev 4:8), while it is "the Lamb that has been slain" who is hailed alongside (Rev 5:12); the closing words of the book have "the Spirit and the bride" both saying "Come" (Rev 22:17).
The Fatherhood of God
Naming God as Father runs the length of the canon. "Don't we all have one father? Has not one God created us?" (Mal 2:10); "But now, O Yahweh, you are our Father; we are the clay, and you our potter" (Isa 64:8); "Do you⁺ thus repay [the Speech of] Yahweh, O foolish people and unwise? Isn't he your father who has bought you?" (Deu 32:6); "A father of the fatherless, and a judge of the widows, Is God in his holy habitation" (Ps 68:5); "Therefore David blessed Yahweh before all the assembly; and David said, Blessed be you, O Yahweh, the God of Israel our father, forever and ever" (1Ch 29:10). Peter ties the name to reverent conduct: "if you⁺ call on him as Father, who without favoritism judges according to each man's work, pass the time of your⁺ sojourning in fear" (1Pe 1:17). And to the Romans, the universal Fatherhood holds across Jew and Gentile: "Or is God [the God] of Jews only? Is he not [the God] of Gentiles also?" (Rom 3:29). Paul puts the same in capital terms: "to us there is one God the Father, of whom are all things… and one Lord Jesus Christ, through whom are all things" (1Co 8:6); "one God and Father of all, who is over all, and through all, and in all" (Eph 4:6). The Son's own name for the Father is given to those who receive the Spirit of his Son: "you⁺ received the spirit of adoption, by whom we cry, Abba, Father" (Rom 8:15; cf. Gal 4:6).