Triune God final STUDY THIS

List the three basic biblical commitments that underlie the Christian doctrine of the trinity

There is only one true God, there are three who are distinct and these three are co-equal and co-eternal

What significance do the OT references to the “Angel of the Lord” have for the doctrine of the trinity?

Some OT references to the Angel of the Lord are references to a created angel while others indicate that the angel is someone divine

How does psalm 45:6-7 indicate self differentiation within the Godhead?

There are two who are called God

How does Isaiah 48:12-16 suggest that God is triune?

The speaker says the Lord has sent me and his spirit which means Jesus is speaking about himself and the HS

What is the connection between the progress of redemption and the progressive revelation of God’s inner triune life?

We can see into God’s triune life by seeing what God has done in the sending of his son and spirit

How do the historical/redemptive “missions” of the son and spirit in the NT provide a sketch of the eternal relations among the persons of the Godhead?

The going forth of the Son and spirit in redemptive history seem to indicate something of their relation to the father as those that are eternally from the father.

How does baptism disclose the trinity to us?

Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit

(T/F)All biblical references to God as “Father” specifically designate the person of the Father in distinction from the son and spirit

False

To what is the father being contrasted when the NT speaks of him as the one/only true God?

Idols/false gods

How does John 1:1-4 prove the Word’s(Son’s) divine identity?

With God, was God, made all things

According to Aquinas, what was wrong with the Arian and Sabellian understanding of the procession of the Son and Spirit?

Aquinas says we must distinguish between an outward procession and inward procession

How does Thomas Aquinas use the analogy of intellectual activity to illumine the meaning of procession within God?

Procession is always action but there is an action happening outside and a process of understanding inside

According to Aquinas what is the proper meaning of generation?

Procession of the word of God is generation

What doe the word receive from, the father in the act of generation? Does this place him in a position of subordination to the Father?

The Word receives from the Father everything that God has and is. In this way there is no subordination between the Word and God

How does Aquinas maintain divine pure actuality and simplicity, on the one hand and real relationship in God on the other?

Relationship in God is talking about respect to something else and not to essence so His essence is still one

In the trinity what are the three distinguishing characteristics that differentiate each of the three persons from the other two?

paternity, filiation and procession

According to Gilles Emery, What problem ensues if one defines the persons just by reason or freedom or capacity of autonomous action?

There would then be a difference of essence

T/F According to Gilles emery, the spiration of the spirit is an act of procession in God that occurs separately from the generation of the Son

False its distinct in mode of origin

T/F Divine simplicity proscribes not only division and composition in the Godhead but also any distinction

True

What is meant by the distinction between the ontological trinity and the economic trinity

Economic trinity is the grounds of cognition for the ontological and the ontological is the grounds of being for economic

How do various models of social trinitarianism attempt to use the trinity?

They attempt to use the trinity as a blueprint for human society

Divine decree

His eternal plan for all that exists or will happen in time

According to Ephesians 1:11 what is encompassed by God’s will/counsel?

God’s decree encompasses all that exists and transpires. All things happen according to God’s counsel

T/F There is no distinction among the divine persons at the level of being or essence

True there is not distinction

T/F According to the lecture note, the plurality within the world requires for its foundation a plurality of really distinct decrees in God?

False the plurality of the world does not require plurality of distinct decrees in God

If God decrees responses, does it follow that he must decree reposnsively?

No one can affirm that he decrees responses and deny that he decrees responsively

Does an eternal decree necessitate and eternal creature?

No an eternal decree does not beget an eternal creature

T/F God decrees conditionals but does not decree conditionally

True

Give a basic summary of Wilhelmus a Brakel’s description of predestination

God’s decrees of election and reprobation

In what sense does election differ from predestination?

Election has a stricter sense than predestination

Summarize Brakel’s definition of election

Predestined of God motivated by his singular and sovereign good pleasure to the glory of His grace

Summarize Brakel’s definition of reprobation

Out of soverign good pleasure to the manifestation of God’s justice; punishing them for their sin

How does Bavinck explain the meaning of creation?

Act of God by his soverign will he brought the entire world out of nonbeing into being

According to the lecture notes, what is the chief significance of the doctrine of creation

The doctrine of creation is foremost religious and ethical

Identify one of the biblical texts listed in the lecture notes that testifies to the narrow sense of creation ex nihilo and indicate how that text estabishes such a conception of creation

“All things were made through Him” conception of creation because it indicated nothing came to be without God

How does Romans 11:36 support the doctrine of creation ex nihilo?

All things come from God and through Him

T/F in creation there is something new in the world and something new in God that he begins to do what he previously did not

false in creation the newness is the effect and not the creator

In what sense might we say that God eternally creator and that he did not become a creator

The world exists because he wills from all eternity to create it

Should we think the absolute creator- creature distinction as a creator creature separation?

No we should not

Be familiar with Louis Berkhof’s definition of divine providence

The work of God by which he preserves all creatures till their appointed end

What is wrong with conceiving divine providence as God’s interference in the world

This conceives world more as a machine God put into operation

What is meant by God’s providential preservation?

nothing exists in the world or anywhere that isn’t totally through and to God

Be familiar with the meaning of providential concurrence

The work of God by which he co-operates with all his creatures and causes them to act as they do

Is divine concurrence a cooperation of collateral involvement in which God does his part and humans do theirs?

No divine concurrence is not doing our own part because God does everything but lets us do what he already does