Title: Faith in the Trinity
the multiplicity of beliefs
Martin Luther's assertion of "sola fide" (sola fide) is fundamentally correct, but it tends to be misused in church practice. First of all, his claim to be correct not only means that the only way to be justified by God is through our beliefs, not our works, but also presupposes the fact that we cannot fundamentally become righteous by our own efforts. However, this emphasis on faith may lead to a risk of falling into faith monism within the church. These are the things that claim that all problems in Bible study and church life can be solved only by unconditional faith. This unilateral emphasis on faith as a means of quelling all our anxiety and doubts is not a fundamental Christian teaching.
You might then ask, like agnostics, that we should not believe in anything except that everything is empirically certain. Herein lies the tension of the Christian faith. It's not an unconditional belief, but it's not a skepticism either. This means that what we ultimately need is faith, but we must think enough to arrive at that belief. These two things belief and thought, or faith and doubt have pushed and pulled each other through the history of Christianity. Doubts here are not meant to deny, but to gain certainty. Just as there is no development without doubt in any community, and as truth reveals itself through this hermeneutic of doubt, so has Christian history followed this course.
There are traces of that in today's text as well. Now, in the scene of Jesus' final meeting with his disciples as he passes away, we can read the spiritual context of the early Christian community. The eleven disciples went to meet Jesus on a mountain in Galilee, just as Jesus had promised. There they fell down and bowed down to Jesus. “But there were also those who doubted” (verse 17). This description is the situation of early Christianity. Most of the disciples and believers believed and worshiped the resurrected Jesus, but some people doubted.
Such doubts are unavoidable. How can you believe without any doubt that Jesus was resurrected, that Jesus is the Son of God? If you say you had no doubts from the beginning, that would be fanaticism, not faith. It is natural to have doubts about it. Christianity has elucidated its teachings so that we can enter the stage of faith without forcibly suppressing such doubts.
authority of heaven and earth
Today's text testifies that Jesus said this to those who fell on his face and to those who doubted him. “I have been given all authority in heaven and on earth” (18). This declaration is the basic belief of early Christianity, but at the same time, it is an apologetic and explanation for those who do not believe that Jesus was resurrected and that he is the Son of God. Jesus is the One who has been given all authority in heaven and on earth. At that time, people regarded the sky as another world, so Matthew referred to it as ‘heaven and earth’. This means that Jesus has the authority to rule the universe.
What do you think it means for Jesus to rule the universe? Anyone who thinks that rule here comes from the power of the Roman emperor will never understand this. The world cannot explain the completely different reign of Jesus to those who are convinced that it is powered by political and economic forces. It is difficult to explain a life of peace to gangsters who think that they should increase their power even through violence. However, Christianity understands and believes in this cosmological reign of Jesus on a whole new level, and must explain that fact.
Let's ask the question again. In what sense does the entire Bible, including today's text, assert that Jesus is the ruler of the universe? These answers don't end with one or two words. Even today's text does not directly answer. Because Jesus' reign does not operate in a tangible way, as the US invaded Iraq and made a mess, there is no clear answer right now. Of course, in simple terms, we may say that preaching the gospel to people is the reign of Jesus. You could say that this is what makes this world a peaceful world. Or you could say that love is the reign of Jesus. But while those claims are partially or within certain categories correct, they are not the ultimate answer.
Jesus' cosmological reign must be seen as a mystery that only Jesus or God can know. It is correct to say that the reign of Jesus is his exclusive domain, for example, in that no one expected the fact that the cross of Jesus was the salvation of man.
the names of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit
If Jesus' cosmological reign is a secret, the best thing we can do on earth is to prepare for that reign. No, to be more precise, it's just entering that rule. Because the salvation of Jesus occurs in his own unique way, all we can do is wait for such a saving event to happen to us in the end.
In this sense, Matthew explains that Jesus’ last command was ‘baptism’. Baptism means becoming a disciple of Jesus. More essentially, baptism is a religious ceremony for those who believe in the death of Jesus Christ on the cross and life with his resurrection. There is nothing more important to us than to be disciples of Jesus. Because if you are a disciple of Jesus, you must live absolutely dependent on his cosmological rule. This means that through baptism we enter into an entirely different dimension of life.
Matthew interprets this baptism theologically. According to him, baptism is given in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit (19). Although this passage has not yet developed the concept of the Trinity, it serves as a starting point. What does Christianity's most central doctrine of the Trinity refer to? Trinitarianism is basically an overcoming of monotheism. Rather than a God of omnipotence, omnipotence, and oneness, it means that a God who completely depends on history and exists spiritually is the Christian understanding of God. God can become God only through Jesus, who was a historical figure just like us, and on the contrary, Jesus Christ is God only through Yahweh God, and the spirit is forming the same relationship.
You're probably wondering what the heck does this concept have to do with our beliefs. But the Trinity is absolutely important in our Christian faith. There is no better way to understand God than this way. Think about what it means to be baptized in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit according to today's text. We live by believing in Jesus as God, not an abstract, idealistic, anthropomorphic, and furthermore, a self-projected Absolute, a historical figure. It means entrusting our destiny to his concrete life. Not only that, but we believe in God as the Spirit of life operating in us and in this world today. We believe in a human and spirit, who were historical figures, as the absolute God. This means that we think of history and the Spirit as the basis of life from which we must be saved.
However, these things are not yet clear to us. You will still have doubts. We have to work to clear those doubts. In that respect, Matthew’s counsel to ‘teach’ is correct. We must teach them to open their eyes to such a spiritual world. Still, we cannot escape the provisional perception. To help limit our awareness, Jesus promised, “I am with you always, even to the end of the world” (20). *