Gregory of Nazianzus, one of the most significant figures behind the resolution of the fourth century Trinitarian crisis at the Council of Constantinople in 381, remarked “when I say God, I mean Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.”[1] For him, as for those who stood with him at the time, the trinity was not an abstract puzzle but the heart of the Christian faith and the center of true worship. Indeed, the answers the church provided to the challenge of Arianism in its various forms, particularly the most articulate expression in Eunomius, emerged from issues surrounding worship.
1. Gregory of Nazianzus, Oration 38.8, in Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Second Series, vol. 7, ed. Philip Schaff and Henry Wace, trans. Charles Gordon Browne and James Edward Swallow (Buffalo, NY: Christian Literature Publishing, 1894).
For Gregory, the presenting issue was the identity and status of the Holy Spirit. If the Spirit was not God, and if he was not one with the Father and the Son, then we would be baptized into the one name of two divine persons (Father and Son) and a creature (the Spirit). This would be blasphemous. Moreover, central to the Greek church’s understanding of salvation was deification. Although humans never become divine, deification describes the process by which we are transformed into the image of the glorified Christ, to reach its zenith at his return. Clearly, only one who is himself God can effect such a remarkable and renovative work; it would be impossible for a creature to do so. “How can one who is not God deify me in baptism?” so it was asked. In short, these were very practical matters; the proponents of the Trinitarian orthodoxy were bishops, engaged in preaching to their congregations and leading in the liturgy. They were not innovators. They were conscious of expressing the faith handed down from the apostles. Their case was grounded on biblical exegesis from both Testaments.
Matthew 28:18–20
This can be demonstrated by focusing on baptism. Baptism is common to all members of the visible church of Jesus Christ. It is the common denominator that identifies old and young, rich and poor, Jew and Gentile. We have all been baptized by the Holy Spirit into the one body of Christ (1 Cor. 12:13). As Jesus presented it in Matthew 28:18–20, we are all baptized into the one name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.
Moreover, the apostle Paul reflects on this when addressing the Corinthian church. Despite all of its many problems, he states that “you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ and in the Spirit of our God [theos]” (1 Cor. 6:11). Since the Greek term theos frequently refers to the Father, we have here a reference to a washing that all had received in the name of the Son, the Spirit and the Father. Paul was no proto-gnostic or docetist; it is clear that baptism is in view. Baptism marked the point of transition from wrath into the church in an open, vivid, and visible way.
That statement in Matthew 28:18–20 needs to be seen in the context of the Gospel as a whole and, behind that, in the history of God’s covenantal dealings with his people. At each stage in the historical development of redemption, in the enactment of the various covenants, God reveals his name. In each case, that revelation is connected with the redemptive deeds that he has performed. In the Abrahamic covenant he made himself known as El Shaddai, or God Almighty (Gen. 17:1). In the Mosaic covenant he named himself I am, or Yahweh (Exod. 3:14, cf y’vah in Exod. 6:3). In each case, sacraments were instituted (circumcision and the sacrificial system, respectively).
At the apex of redemptive history, Jesus came to fulfill the promises of the Old Testament. At the start of his Gospel, Matthew records that Jesus is “the son of David, the son of Abraham” (Matt. 1:1), the inheritor of the promises of those covenants. Underlining this is the royal nature of the genealogy in Matthew 1:1–17, centered on David. The covenant is no longer restricted to Israel but extends to the whole world as God has promised (Gen. 12:1–3, Matt. 8:11–12). As the Mosaic covenant was inaugurated with the sprinkling of covenantal blood, so the new covenant is founded in the blood of Christ (Matt. 26:27–29). At the end of the Gospel Matthew recounts how the nations are to be made disciples (Matt. 28:19–20), the Abrahamic promise having reached fulfillment in the new covenant. Hence, baptism—together with the Lord’s Supper—is the sacrament of the new covenant. Thus, Jesus the Son names God as the one God who is the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, God’s crowning revelation of himself, the new covenant name of God.
A Worshipful Response
From this, it comes as no surprise that the church’s worship is grounded on who God is and what he has done, in particular in the fulfillment of his covenant in Christ. The Father has sent the Son “for us and our salvation.” In turn, the Father together with the Son has sent the Holy Spirit to indwell the church, while the focus of the Spirit’s ministry is to speak of Christ the Son (Gal. 4:4–6). Here lies the basic premise of all God’s actions—from the Father, through the Son, by the Holy Spirit—all three persons working in inseparable harmony.
Thus, our response to God in worship and prayer reflects this Trinitarian order, in reverse (Eph. 2:18). “Through him [Christ] we both [Jew and Gentile] have access by the Holy Spirit to the Father.” Access to God is ultimately access to the Father, through Christ, the Son, in and by the Spirit. Here is the reverse movement to that seen as the ground of the church’s worship—by the Holy Spirit through Christ to the Father. This encompasses our entire response to, and relationship with, God—from worship through the whole field of Christian experience. From this it follows that prayer is distinctively Trinitarian. Prayer and worship is thus an exploration of the character of the holy trinity. It is urgent to ensure our theology is in line with this most basic datum of Christian experience.
The Proper Place of Worship
The incident recorded in John 4 illustrates this conclusion. The Samaritan woman’s question concerns the proper place of worship, whether at Jerusalem (which the Jews insisted Yahweh required) or Mount Gerizim (where the Samaritans worshipped). Jesus supports Jerusalem, indicating that the Jews worshipped according to knowledge while the Samaritans did not. However, now the time has arrived when the distinction between Jerusalem and Mount Gerizim is superseded. True worshipers now worship the Father in spirit and in truth.
What does Jesus mean? This hardly means merely that a particular location is completely irrelevant, or that true worship can now occur anywhere, although that may be entailed in what he says. Nor is “spirit” a reference to the human spirit, as if true worship was purely inward and externals of no consequence. Rather, the extensive teaching in John on the Spirit indicates that every reference to pneuma, bar probably two, points to the Holy Spirit.[2] In this connection, Jesus means that true worship are directed to the Father in the Holy Spirit. Again, with reference to “truth,” do we have to look any further than John’s record of Jesus as the embodiment of truth (John 14:6), as the true light coming into the world (John 1:9), “full of grace and truth” (John 1:14), who as a result brought grace and truth into the world (John 1:17)? We worship the Father in and by the Holy Spirit and in the fullness of truth, his incarnate Son.
2. See John 1:32-33; 3:5-6, 8, 34; 4:23-24; 6:63; 7:39; 11:33; 13:21; 14:17, 26; 15:26; 16:13; 19:30; 20:22. The two instances that likely do not refer to the Holy Spirit are John 11:33 and 13:21.
Conclusion
We began with Gregory, we will end with him. He rightly commented “This, then, is my position . . . to worship God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Ghost, three persons, one Godhead, undivided in honor and glory and substance and kingdom.”[3]
