Triangular thinking

Ohio preacher David Reid at Shorewood’s summer family Bible conference this past July: “Is there any time in the gospels where Jesus Christ says, ‘Well, the majority text says this and the best reading is this’?

“What He does is He just quotes the Word of God with the firm conviction that it’s true. He doesn’t appeal to logic, or reason, or anything else. He takes it as a given that it’s available and it’s truthful.

“Well, what God said in Exodus 3, when Moses asked for a description of His name, was, ‘I am that I am.’ There’s no appeal to logic or reason. There’s also no appeal to any creative being. He doesn’t say, ‘You can believe it because so-and-so says that He says, I am that I am, and that’s sufficient.’

“If you think about that, what’s the Old Testament standard of proof? Is one witness enough? Deuteronomy 19:15. What Deuteronomy does is it establishes under the law a principle that two witnesses are required. Notice II Corinthians 13:1.

“Is the two or three witness’s requirement something that only happened in the Old Testament or is it a standard of proof that God operates according to throughout time? It’s throughout time. It applies during the dispensation of grace.

“Numbers 35:30. That simply says that if all you have is one witness you can’t testify. It’s inadequate. It’s incompetent as a matter of proof.

“John 5:31. That’s interesting, isn’t it? Can Jesus Christ lie? No because we saw it’s impossible for God to lie. What he’s saying is even the testimony of a single member of the godhead is insufficient, according to the standard of the scripture.

“Verse 32. Obviously three witnesses is preferable and it’s better than two. What’s interesting to think about is what is the strongest geometric shape? A triangle. When you mount a camera or microphone, what do you mount it on?

“John 1:1. That tells you clear as can be that God has existed in more than one person. Luke 22:42. Some people will say God is one God and He doesn’t really exist in three persons; He just has three different ‘modes,’ or three different manners of operation, but in that verse isn’t it absolutely clear that there’s a conversation between two different people going on? They’re apparently different persons with different wills and they can have an actual conversation between them.

“Matt. 3:16. God has to exist in three persons or what do you do with that passage? Plainly there’s something going on there that involves three different people all doing something different at the very same time.

“The very fact that God has a Son is a refutation and a disproof of the notion that monotheism in one person is the correct view.

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“God can’t be incomplete and He can’t be dependent on His creation. Does God need something from man or a created being? You know why that matters? If God existed in only one person there would be no one for Him to love in the absence of His creation.

“If there’s only one person in the godhead, there is no one else for God to love. Is there anyone else for God to glorify or to have fellowship with? If God existed in only one person than He would be dependent on some created being in order to have a relationship.

“John 3:35. John 14:31. John 17:24. What happened in eternity past is the three persons of the godhead got together and decided what they were going to accomplish throughout time. They decided they were going to use time to glorify the Lord Jesus Christ.

“John 17:1. The reason the three persons of the godhead exist is to glorify one another. There’s something very shallow about glorifying yourself but there’s nothing shallow at all about glorifying another person.

“Exodus 3:13. There’s a fundamental order to the universe making three the strongest shape. I John 5:7. Look at verse 8. The idea there is there are three that testify. So there are three that bear record in heaven—the Father, the Word and the Holy Ghost and these three are one.

“Let me read to you all of verse 7 in the NIV: ‘For there are three that testify:’

“Listen, people tell you that what the modern versions do is change the ‘thees’ and the ‘thous,’ but that’s not all. When you leave them out in verse 7, then it goes to verse 8 and you think all that’s being talked about in the passage is the water, the blood and the Spirit.

“What verse 7 is really about is it’s saying the three members of the godhead in heaven bear record, testifying to the exact same thing. That ensures that God the Father has satisfied the two or three witness’s standard of proof.”