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Introduction: Inasmuch as many have sought to write up defenses of the doctrine of The Trinity, maintaining the orthodox and historic Christian position on the nature of God, it seemed good to me also, oh readers of the Cerebral Faith blog, to write up a series defending The Trinity from each of the four gospels, so that you may know the certainty of the things you have been taught. In this essay, I’ll defend The Trinity using only passages from the gospel of Luke. I won’t be drawing from any passages of any other book of The Bible, except occasional Old Testament passages, and that, for the purpose of adding theological context to some of the Lukan pericopes. This is the third article in a series of articles, the previous two being “Defending The Trinity From Matthew Alone” and “Defending The Trinity From Mark Alone”, however, unlike previous blog series on this site, you needn’t have read those to follow what I’m saying here. In fact, if anything, this article may feel really repetitive if you’ve already read those, given the similarity in content between the synoptic gospels. The Doctrine of The Trinity is a systematic conclusion following from 5 biblical teachings (1) There is only One God, (2) The Father is God, (3) The Son Is God, (4) The Holy Spirit is God, and (5) The Father, The Son, and The Holy Spirit are three distinct persons. If support for these 5 statements can be found in The Bible, then the doctrine of the Trinity is the view that has the greatest explanatory scope, for the doctrine of The Trinity asserts that there is 1 God and this 1 God exists as 3 distinct, yet equal and co-eternal persons. The purpose of this exercise (of staying inside of one gospel for textual support rather than the entire biblical canon) is to show people that The Trinity is so well supported that I can basically defend it with my hands tied behind my back. I don’t need the whole Bible, or even the entire New Testament. From a single gospel alone, I can support this essential Christian doctrine.

(1) There Is Only One God

In Luke 10:25-28, we read “And behold, a lawyer stood up to put him to the test, saying, ‘Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?’ He said to him, ‘What is written in the Law? How do you read it?’ And he answered, ‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind, and your neighbor as yourself.’ And he said to him, ‘You have answered correctly; do this, and you will live.'” (ESV)

This may not seem, at first, to contain a statement of monotheism. However, one needs to look at where this lawyer is quoting from.“You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind” is a quotation of Deuteronomy 6:5. Deuteronomy 6:5 comes immediately after Deuteronomy 6:4 which says “Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one.” (ESV) Deuteronomy 6:4-5 formed part of a creed or prayer that Jews of Jesus’ day would recite called the Shema. The Shema is a strong assertion of Monotheism, hence we have the first statement in our case for The Trinity.”The LORD our God, The LORD is one”. Despite verse 4 not being quoted, Jews in Jesus’ audience and Jesus Himself would have undoubtedly known the context of the lawyer’s quotation. And Luke, as the author, very likely would have heard the Apostle Paul, whom he traveled with cite this creed on occasion. ^[1]The author of the gospel of Luke was almost certainly the same author as the book of Acts no matter what view on authorship you take. For Luke 1:1-3 begins with the author addressing “Most … Continue reading

Now, I need to respond to an objection here. Arian groups like the Jehovah’s Witnesses and Modalist groups like the Oneness Pentecostals both sieze upon Deuteronomy 6:4 to make the same point; God can’t be a Trinity. They say that if God were a Trinity, the Shema prayer would not be true. It would not be the case that “The Lord is one”. Rather, the statement “The Lord is three” is true. “The Lord is one” is taken by these heretical sects to mean “The Lord is one person”. And if that were the case, surely the doctrine of The Trinity would be dead upon arrival. However, there are problems with this view. First, groups like the Jehovah’s Witnesses can’t have their cake and eat it too. They tell you that The Trinity was a 4th century invention. ^[2]See “Should You Believe In The Trinity?”, a booklet from The Watchtower Society. pages 7-9 — … Continue reading but they will also say things like “‘Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God is one God.’\” Those words are found at Deuteronomy 6:4. The Catholic New Jerusalem Bible (NJB) here reads: ‘Listen, Israel: Yahweh our God is the one, the only Yahweh.’ * In the grammar of that verse, the word ‘one’ has no plural modifiers to suggest that it means anything but one individual.” ^[3]The WatchTower Society, “Should You Believe In The Trinity?” — Should You Believe It? (jw.org) For a full point by point refutation of this book, see my articles “Why You Should Believe In … Continue reading But if they were correct in saying that The Trinity wasn’t even an existing concept until long after the New Testament was written, then does it really make sense for Moses to be saying “The Lord is one” to mean “The Lord is one person” in an attempt to refute any notion of a Godhead? Moses would have been making a polemic against an idea that didn’t even exist! Therefore, we can imagine that everyone in the ancient world would have just assumed that each of their gods = 1 person. One person per god. The people of Israel would have went “Well, no duh, Moses! Of course Yahweh is one person! Every god is just a single person!”

A second problem is that not only is The Trinity attested to overwhelmingly in The New Testament (even if we stay just inside of the gospel of Luke, as you’ll soon see), but we have at least a two person Godhead in The Old Testament. ^[4]The gold standard resource on this is Allan Segall’s dissertation called “The Two Powers In Heaven: Early Rabbinic Reports About Early Christianity and Gnosticism”, but you can also … Continue reading There are several instances in scripture in which you have two figures in a narrative or a vision who are both identified as Yahweh, and yet there are clear distinctions between these two persons.)) We should allow scripture to interpret scripture. If the rest of scripture overwhelmingly supports the doctrine of The Trinity (and it does), then that should alert us that we probably need to rethink the unitarian interpretation of Deuteronomy 6:4.

So what did Moses actually mean? I take this to be a vow of loyalty to Yahweh alone. “The LORD our God”. “Yahweh our elohim, Yahweh is one.” Remember that the gods of the nation are real (see Psalm 82, Exodus 12:12, Deuteronomy 32:8-9, 1 Corinthians 10:20, et. al.) And we know that idolatry was a very real problem in ancient Israel from the books of Kings and the prophetic books. Moses is very likely saying “Yahweh is our elohim”. We don’t have any elohim other than Yahweh. “Hear, O Israel: Yahweh our elohim, Yahweh is one.” This could possibly be construed as “Yahweh is the one”. Moses is saying “Yahweh is the one God that we will worship. We won’t worship any other elohim; not Baal, Dagon, Ashera, Ra, or whoever.” That this is a loyalty oath rather than an (anacronistic) statement of unitarianism is strengthened by the very next verse which says “You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might.” (ESV) The phrase “is one” can also be construed as a statement of supremacy. Despite the existence of other elohim being repeatedly acknowledged in scripture, we have statements like “I am the first and the last, besides me there is no god.” (Isaiah 44:6). This isn’t a contradiction, because this is likely to be construed as a statement of supremacy. I say this for two reasons; first in Isaiah 44:7 God says “Who is like me? Let him proclaim it. Let him declare and set it before me, since I appointed an ancient people.” Secondly, this same language is used in the mouths of Ninevah and Babylon. As Michael Heiser says“Isaiah 47:8 and Zephaniah 2:15 have, respectively, Babylon and Nineveh saying “there is none besides me.” Are we to believe that the point of the phrase is to declare that no other cities exist except Babylon or Nineveh? That would be absurd. The point of the statement is that Babylon and Nineveh considered themselves incomparable, as though no other city could measure up to them. This is precisely the point when these same phrases are used of other gods—they cannot measure up to Yahweh.” ^[5]Heiser, Michael S.. The Unseen Realm: Recovering the Supernatural Worldview of the Bible (p. 35). Lexham Press. Kindle Edition.

Ultimately, Deuteronomy 6:4 is definitely a statement of exclusive worship of Yahweh, and that Yahweh is the only God Israel should worship, and possibly the God above all Gods. He is the ultimate God! Or as philosophers like William Lane Craig would say, “God is a Maximally Great Being.” ^[6]William Lane Craig, “Reasonable Faith: Christian Truth and Apologetics”, ed. John S. Feinberg and Leonard Goss (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Books, 2008), 184–185. So it is true that there is “Only one God” if by “One God” we mean, one Maximally Great Elohim. ^[7]For an excellent biblical discussion on God’s “Omni” attributes which make Him a Maximally Great Being, I recommend “The Attributes of God Volume 1: A Journey Into the Father’s … Continue reading All other elohim are created beings who either serve Yahweh or are in rebellion against Him. On the doctrine of The Trinity, Jesus and The Holy Spirit are not separate gods on equal footing with Yahweh, they ARE Yahweh! They are the same God as The Father, they just aren’t the same person. The doctrine of The Trinity asserts that God is one spiritual essence containing three co-eternal persons. God is one what and three whos. So, Jesus would not be a “God besides YHWH”. He is YHWH.

Another objection I want to respond to doesn’t necessarily come from the JWs or Modalists, but from the atheist and agnostic crowd. Matthew and Mark record a very similar dialogue taking plae in their gospels (Matthew 19:16–30; Mark 10:17-31). But here, in Luke 10:25-28, it isn’t a rich young ruler, it’s a lawyer. Moreover, in Matthew and Mark, Jesus is the one who cites the first and greatest commandment, but in Luke, it’s the lawyer who says this. Do we have a contradiction between the gospels here? From a historical perspective, this could just be a similar account, resolving any apparent contradictions. It isn’t unfathomable to think that more than one person would want to have eternal life. There is nothing in this account that would necessarily make us believe that this is the same person and the same conversation that we read about in Matthew and Mark. The similarities in the narratives are what we would expect if Jesus had multiple conversations with people wanting to know how to have eternal life; first the question, and then the answer in the form of citing the first and second greatest commandments. Moreover, we are told in Luke’s version that this is a Lawyer. Whereas in Matthew and Mark, it is a rich young ruler. It does seem one man’s modus ponens is another man’s modus tollens. While this feature might make the skeptic go “Contradiction”, it makes me go “Different person, different conversation.” Moreover, Matthew and Mark’s versions don’t have Jesus following up with the Parable Of The Good Samaritan. Moreover, Jesus actually does engage with the rich young ruler in Luke’s gospel, but not until much later, in Luke 18:22-25! Thus, these are definitely different events, as it can hardly be believed that Luke would record the same incident twice, just one being more accurate than the other.

But the point here is simply that we have an allusion to the Shema which is a strong statement of Monotheism.

(2) The Father Is God

That The Father is God is such a taken-for-granted premise that it almost feels needless to defend it here. Pretty much no one who reads The Bible walks away thinking that Jesus’ Father isn’t Yahweh. But for the sake of completeness, let me just go ahead and provide a reference or two.

Luke 10:21-22 says “In that hour Jesus rejoiced in spirit, and said, I thank thee, O Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them unto babes: even so, Father; for so it seemed good in thy sight. All things are delivered to me of my Father: and no man knoweth who the Son is, but the Father; and who the Father is, but the Son, and he to whom the Son will reveal him.” (KJV)

Jesus prays to God, who is identified as The Father. He thanks his Father for hiding spiritual truths from the wise and prudent and revealing them to little children (or “babes” as the King James puts it, which does not refer to attractive women. That’s a false friend!) It is overwhelmingly obvious that The Father is God.

In Gabriel’s annunciation of Jesus’ birth to the young Mary of Nazareth, he says “He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. And the Lord God will give to him the throne of his father David,” (Luke 1:32, ESV) When Mary, who paid attention during sex ed asked the angel how this would be possible (Luke 1:34), Gabriel responds “The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; therefore the child to be born will be called holy—the Son of God.” (ESV) Thus, we can see from the annunciation that The Father of Jesus is God. Because Jesus’ Father is identified as “The Most High” a term frequently used of Yahweh in both testaments (e.g Genesis 14:18-20, Psalm 9:2, Psalm 91:1, Psalm 21:7, Psalm 46:4, Psalm 82:6, Daniel 4:17, Daniel 4:24-25, Daniel 4:34, Luke 1:76, Luke 6:35, Hebrews 7:1).

(3) The Son Is God

Arian groups and Modalist groups typically don’t have a problem with the first two statements in our case. They will agree that there is only one God and that The Father is Him(othy). However, the former group will strongly contend that Jesus Christ (The Son) is not God. The latter group will gladly affirm that Jesus Christ is God, but contend that He and the Father are not distinct persons. And so, this is why in all articles in this series, I have spent more time on this and the 5th premise than on the others, for they are the most controversial premises in a case for The Trinity. Does the gospel of Luke teach that Jesus is God? Let’s take a look, shall we?

Exhibit A: John The Baptist Prepares The Way For The Lord

In Luke 1:76, we read “And you, child, will be called the prophet of the Most High;  for you will go before the Lord to prepare his ways,” (ESV, emphasis mine in bold). This is Zechariah speaking to John the Baptist when John The Baptist was just an infant. This alludes to Malachi 3:1 and Isaiah 40:3 which show that John The Baptist is preparing the way for Yahweh, not just a mere human prophet. Let’s take a look at both of these Old Testament prophesies.

Malachi 3:1-6 says “Behold, I send my messenger, and he will prepare the way before me. And the Lord whom you seek will suddenly come to his temple; and the messenger of the covenant in whom you delight, behold, he is coming, says the LORD of hosts. But who can endure the day of his coming, and who can stand when he appears? For he is like a refiner’s fire and like fullers’ soap. He will sit as a refiner and purifier of silver, and he will purify the sons of Levi and refine them like gold and silver, and they will bring offerings in righteousness to the LORD. Then the offering of Judah and Jerusalem will be pleasing to the LORD as in the days of old and as in former years. ‘Then I will draw near to you for judgment. I will be a swift witness against the sorcerers, against the adulterers, against those who swear falsely, against those who oppress the hired worker in his wages, the widow and the fatherless, against those who thrust aside the sojourner, and do not fear me, says the LORD of hosts. ‘For I the LORD do not change; therefore you, O children of Jacob, are not consumed.’” (ESV, emphasis added in bold)

This passage is interesting because Yahweh is clearly the speaker here. Yahweh says that “I will send MY messenger, and he will prepare the way for ME.” The messenger is preparing the way for whom? For Yahweh Elohim! It is overwhelmingly clear that Yahweh is the speaker and that he says that the messenger that He will send will prepare the way for Him.

Isaiah 40:3 says, “A voice cries: ‘In the wilderness prepare the way of the LORD; make straight in the desert a highway for our God.” (ESV, emphasis added in bold.)

Again, whose way is being prepared? Yahweh. The way is being prepared for Yahweh. The messenger to come would “make straight in the desert a highway for our God“.

However, it is not just the OT references that say that Yahweh’s way is being prepared. Zechariah’s own mouth, speaking to the baby John in his arms says “You… will be called the prophet of the Most High; for you will go before The Lord to prepare his ways.” Zechariah says that John will go before who? Before the Lord. To prepare whose way? The Lords ways. But whose way is being prepared, really? Jesus. This shows that Jesus is God.

Luke alludes to two Old Testament prophesies in which a messenger would prepare the way for Yahweh. Zechariah tells his son essentially that he is the messenger. Luke 3:15-17 heavily implies that John is preparing the way for Jesus in how the passage is worded, “As the people were in expectation, and all were questioning in their hearts concerning John, whether he might be the Christ, John answered them all, saying, ‘I baptize you with water, but he who is mightier than I is coming, the strap of whose sandals I am not worthy to untie. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire. His winnowing fork is in his hand, to clear his threshing floor and to gather the wheat into his barn, but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire.'” (ESV) And when John’s preaching scene starts in Luke, Isaiah 40 is quoted explicitly (see Luke 3:4-6). This shows that Jesus is God. Because God’s way was prepared in the prophesies, but Luke depicts John The Baptist as preparing the way for Jesus.

Exhibit B: Jesus Forgives The Sins Of A Paralytic

In Luke 5:18-26, we read, “And behold, some men were bringing on a bed a man who was paralyzed, and they were seeking to bring him in and lay him before Jesus, but finding no way to bring him in, because of the crowd, they went up on the roof and let him down with his bed through the tiles into the midst before Jesus. And when he saw their faith, he said, ‘Man, your sins are forgiven you.’ And the scribes and the Pharisees began to question, saying, Who is this who speaks blasphemies? Who can forgive sins but God alone?’ When Jesus perceived their thoughts, he answered them, ‘Why do you question in your hearts? Which is easier, to say, ‘Your sins are forgiven you,’ or to say, ‘Rise and walk’?But that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins’—he said to the man who was paralyzed—’I say to you, rise, pick up your bed and go home.’ And immediately he rose up before them and picked up what he had been lying on and went home, glorifying God. And amazement seized them all, and they glorified God and were filled with awe, saying, ‘We have seen extraordinary things today.'” (ESV)

As we read in this account, before Jesus heals the man of his paralysis, he tells the man that his sins are forgiven. This provokes outrage among the religious leaders in the room, and they object that only God has the right to forgive sins. Jesus doesn’t dispute that only God has the right to forgive sins. He simply tells them that The Son of Man has the authority to forgive sins and that he will prove it by the miracle that he’s about to perform. The significance of Jesus’ claim to forgive sins is heard in the angry reaction of the religious leaders “Who can forgive sins but God alone?” Who indeed? If Jesus is God, then what Jesus claims to do here wouldn’t be the slightest bit blasphemous. After all, God has a right to do things only God can do. However, on the view that Jesus were a creature (even a lesser, created elohim like St. Michael), then Jesus would need to be told to know his place in the cosmic order of things. But if Jesus were a blasphemer, then would God really be on his side? Would he really be able to perform the miracle of healing the paralytic? The best explanation is that Jesus not only claimed to be God, but that he is who he claimed to be.

Albert Barnes, a 19th century theologian, said it well; “Christ was charged with saying a thing in his own name, or attempting to do a thing, which, properly belonged to God; thus assuming the place of God, and doing him injury, as the scribes supposed, by an invasion of his prerogatives. ‘None,’ said they (see Mark and Luke), ‘can forgive sins but God only.’ In this they reasoned correctly.See Is. 43:25; 44:22. None of the prophets had this power; and by saying that he forgave sins, Jesus was understood to affirm that he was divine; and as he proved this by working a miracle expressly to confirm the claim, it follows that he is divine, or equal with the Father.” ^[8]Albert Barnes, Notes on the New Testament: Matthew & Mark, ed. Robert Frew (London: Blackie & Son, 1884–1885), 98.

19th century Pastor-Scholar David Brown wrote “How does the supreme Divinity of the Lord Jesus shine forth here, in the authority and power to forgive sins, even as the Son of Man upon earth, which He first put forth and then demonstrated that He possessed! and the half-suppressed horror which filled those ecclesiastics who were spectators of the scene, as they heard from Human Lips what it was the sole prerogative of God to utter, when we connect with, it the evidence which Jesus gave them of the justice of His claim, only crowns the proof which this scene furnishes of the Divine glory of Christ.” ^[9]David Brown, A. R. Fausset, and Robert Jamieson, A Commentary, Critical, Experimental, and Practical, on the Old and New Testaments: Matthew–John, vol. V (London; Glasgow: William Collins, Sons, … Continue reading

At this point, I want to respond to an objection to this argument that comes from New Testament scholar Bart Ehrman. Ehrman wrote “With respect to the forgiveness of sins: when Jesus forgives sins, he never says ‘I forgive you,’ as God might say, but ‘your sins are forgiven,’ which means that God has forgiven your sins. This prerogative for pronouncing sins forgiven was otherwise reserved for Jewish priests in honor of sacrifices worshipers made at the temple. Jesus may be claiming a priestly, not a divine prerogative.” ^[10]Bart D. Ehrman, “How Jesus Became God: The Exhaltation Of A Jewish Preacher From Galliee”, pages 126-127

There are three problems with Ehrman’s explanation here:

New Testament scholar Michael F. Bird responds to Bart Ehrman in the book “How God Became Jesus” and he says that Jesus’s actions were fundamentally different and claimed a unique, unmediated divine authority. First, Bird points out that Jesus was neither a priest nor in the Temple when he forgave the paralytic’s sins. Priestly forgiveness was tied to the sacrificial system; Jesus’s declaration was unattached to such an act. Secondly, the key, according to Bird, is the scribes’ reaction. They did not say, “Who can forgive sins except a priest?” Instead, they said, “Who can forgive sins but God alone?” ^[11]How God Became Jesus: The Real Origins of Belief in Jesus’ Divine Nature—A Response to Bart Ehrman (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2014). Pages 92-94 The scribes understood Jesus’s declaration as a violation of monotheistic devotion which is a claim of God’s unique prerogative. Thirdly, divine approval and identity. Because Jesus pronounced the forgiveness and then authenticated it by performing the physical healing, it suggests that “the God of Israel not only approves of what he does, but even approves of who he says he is.” ^[12]See Michael F. Bird et al., How God Became Jesus: The Real Origins of Belief in Jesus’ Divine Nature—A Response to Bart Ehrman (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2014), 92–94. Bird concludes that Jesus was not claiming a “priestly prerogative,” but was rather assuming a divine prerogative by pronouncing the forgiveness of sins, an act only God is capable of doing. ^[13]See ibid.

Exhibit C: Jesus Is Lord Of The Sabbath

In Luke 6:1-5, we read “On a Sabbath, while he was going through the grainfields, his disciples plucked and ate some heads of grain, rubbing them in their hands. But some of the Pharisees said, ‘Why are you doing what is not lawful to do on the Sabbath?’ And Jesus answered them, ‘Have you not read what David did when he was hungry, he and those who were with him, how he entered the house of God and took and ate the bread of the Presence, which is not lawful for any but the priests to eat, and also gave it to those with him?’And he said to them, ‘The Son of Man is lord of the Sabbath.’“ (ESV)

In this passage, Jesus claims to be the Lord of the Sabbath. This is an astonishing claim when you stop to think about it.

Allison A. Trites and William J. Larkin say in their commentary on Luke-Acts say “Moreover, he asserted his own divinely given authority as Son of Man, boldly declaring to his opponents, “The Son of Man is Lord, even over the Sabbath” (6:5). In saying this, Jesus was really asserting a claim of equality with God, who had established the Sabbath day in the first place (Exod 20:8–11; Deut 5:12–15). He was suggesting that the work of God is unending and that it was appropriate for him to participate and continue that work.” ^[14]Allison A. Trites, William J. Larkin, Cornerstone Biblical Commentary, Vol 12: The Gospel of Luke and Acts (Carol Stream, IL: Tyndale House Publishers, 2006), 101.

However, a potential objection here is that if Jesus is God as he claims to be in this passage, shouldn’t He be sinless? For God Himself is sinless. After all, passages like Deuteronomy 32:4 say “The Rock, his work is perfect, for all his ways are justice. A God of faithfulness and without iniquity, just and upright is he.” (ESV) If Jesus violated the Sabbath, he broke one of The Ten Commandments. If Jesus broke one of The Ten Commandments, He is a sinner. If He is a sinner, He cannot be God.

The answer to this objection is that Jesus didn’t actually break the Sabbath. He only broke the man-made rules the Jewish leaders had built up around the Sabbath. Scholars refer to this set of rules as Halakha. They were essentially rules created by men to help you keep the laws of God. ^[15]See Phil Weingart, “The Rabbi On The Mount: How Jesus’ Judaism Clarifies The Sermon On The Mount”, pages 105-112. Jesus kept the Torah perfectly, and thus was sinless, but Jesus had no tolerance for man made traditions. This is a theme throughout all the synoptic gospels, especially containing the Sabbath. The Jewish leaders had regulated the Sabbath so heavily that keeping the Sabbath ironically became a lot of work. The slightest bit of exertion would make you a Sabbath breaker! Look at what Jesus and his disciples did in this account in particular to be accused of Sabbath breaking! All they did was pluck a handful of grain to snack on. They weren’t harvesting or reaping, or doing any real work. They just grabbed a handful of snacks as they were going on their way, and yet in the eyes of the religious leaders, this was considered work! Jesus’ response in this instance was that even genuine violations of the Sabbath are permissible if overriding concerns are at play (such as the hunger of David and his men in the scripture Jesus was alluding to.) And finally, says that given that The Son of Man is Lord of the Sabbath, he has a right to regulate it as He sees fit, meaning his interpretation as what counts as unlawful work supersedes that if the Pharisees. As GotQuestions.org says“As Creator, Christ was the original Lord of the Sabbath (John 1:3; Hebrews 1:10). He had the authority to overrule the Pharisees’ traditions and regulations because He had created the Sabbath—and the Creator is always greater than the creation. Furthermore, Jesus claimed the authority to correctly interpret the meaning of the Sabbath and all the laws pertaining to it. Because Jesus is Lord of the Sabbath, He is free to do on it and with it whatever He pleases. As Lord of the Sabbath, Jesus had the right, power and authority to dispense it in any way He pleased, even to the abolishing of it and reinstituting it as the Lord’s Day, a day of worship.” ^[16]Got Questions Ministries, “Got Questions? Bible Questions Answered” (Bellingham, WA: Logos Bible Software, 2002–2013). In other words, Jesus’ final counter argument was “I’m God. I decide what counts as Sabbath-breaking work and what doesn’t.” Not that you need to be God to see the ridiculousness of grabbing snacks as “work”, but I digress.

Exhibit D: Jesus Heals Through The Spoken Word

In Luke 7:1-10, we read “After he had finished all his sayings in the hearing of the people, he entered Capernaum. Now a centurion had a servant who was sick and at the point of death, who was highly valued by him. When the centurion heard about Jesus, he sent to him elders of the Jews, asking him to come and heal his servant. And when they came to Jesus, they pleaded with him earnestly, saying, ‘He is worthy to have you do this for him, for he loves our nation, and he is the one who built us our synagogue.’ And Jesus went with them. When he was not far from the house, the centurion sent friends, saying to him, ‘Lord, do not trouble yourself, for I am not worthy to have you come under my roof. Therefore, I did not presume to come to you. But say the word, and let my servant be healed. For I too am a man set under authority, with soldiers under me: and I say to one, ‘Go,’ and he goes; and to another, ‘Come,’ and he comes; and to my servant, ‘Do this,’ and he does it.’ When Jesus heard these things, he marveled at him, and turning to the crowd that followed him, said, ‘I tell you, not even in Israel have I found such faith.’ And when those who had been sent returned to the house, they found the servant well.” (ESV)

Eugene Carpenter and Phillip W. Comfort say “God’s ‘word’ has power to execute His will. It will not return to Him empty but accomplish that which He purposes (Isa. 44:23; 55:11). By His speech alone, God created the world, and His word upholds it (Gen. 1; Ps. 33:6; Heb. 1:3; 11:3; 2 Pet. 3:5).” ^[17]Eugene E. Carpenter and Philip W. Comfort, Holman Treasury of Key Bible Words: 200 Greek and 200 Hebrew Words Defined and Explained (Nashville, TN: Broadman & Holman Publishers, 2000), 422.

In Genesis 1, God creates everything by just speaking it into being. Repeatedly saying “Let there be” followed by the author of Genesis saying “And it was so”, i.e what God spoke into existence came into existence. By portraying Jesus as capable of healing through a mere spoken word, Luke might be suggesting a high Christology that connects Jesus to the divine creative power seen in Genesis 1, where God created the world by His speech alone. Notice that Jesus doesn’t pray to The Father for the son to be healed. Jesus simply says the word himself and it is done. It is under the authority of Jesus (and from a distance!) that the centurion’s son is healed! In fact, this is a recurring theme in Luke and the other synoptics; that Jesus just speaks or acts on his own to make miraculous things happen rather than praying to God first or commanding it to happen in the name of God (e.g like the apostles would do in Acts 3:6). But the most astonishing example of this is below…

Exhibit E: Jesus Calms The Storm

In Luke 8:22-25, we read, “One day he got into a boat with his disciples, and he said to them, ‘Let us go across to the other side of the lake.’ So they set out, and as they sailed he fell asleep. And a windstorm came down on the lake, and they were filling with water and were in danger. And they went and woke him, saying, ‘Master, Master, we are perishing!’ And he awoke and rebuked the wind and the raging waves, and they ceased, and there was a calm. He said to them, ‘Where is your faith?’ And they were afraid, and they marveled, saying to one another, ‘Who then is this, that he commands even winds and water, and they obey him?'” (ESV)

The late biblical scholar Dr. Michael Heiser addresses the significance of Jesus calming the storm within the context of Ancient Near Eastern (ANE) and Old Testament theology, particularly regarding the theme of God conquering the forces of chaos and the sea-dragon. ^[18]Dr. Michael S. Heiser: “Jesus as the One Who Defeats the Sea Dragon.” YouTube.com, March 4th 2024, –> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qw8M5M6OrIk

Michael Heiser’s Argument connects Jesus’s control over the sea to two major theological concepts; (1) Yahweh as the Conqueror of the Chaos Dragon (a motif called Chaoskampf by Old Testament scholars). In the Ancient Near East, the sea and its chaotic nature were often symbolized by a sea monster or dragon (like Leviathan in the Old Testament or Yam in the Ugaritic Baal cycle). The ability to subdue this creature and bring order to the water was the ultimate demonstration of a deity’s power and sovereignty. ^[19]See Dr. Michael S. Heiser: “Jesus as the One Who Defeats the Sea Dragon.” YouTube.com, March 4th 2024, –> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qw8M5M6OrIk Old Testament passages (like Psalm 74:14 and Psalm 89:9–11) employ this imagery to assert that Yahweh (God) alone is the one who subdued the sea and the chaos monster (Rahab or Leviathan) to establish and maintain creation’s order. This was a direct polemic against competing pagan deities like Baal, who was also mythologically known for defeating the sea god Yam. By rebuking the wind and commanding the sea to be still, Jesus performs an act that, in the worldview of the disciples and the ANE context, belonged exclusively to the God of Israel. ^[20]ibid.

(2) Fulfillment of Royal/Divine Prerogative. Heiser also references Psalm 89, a royal psalm which speaks of the King (often understood as the Davidic King, or ultimately, the Messiah) being someone who will rule the sea, an action reserved only for God. The act of calming the sea thus demonstrates that Jesus is the Messianic/Divine figure who possesses the power of Yahweh over the chaotic elements of creation. The disciples’ reaction, “Who then is this, that even the wind and the sea obey him?” (Luke 8:25) reflects their realization that Jesus is demonstrating control over forces that only God, the sovereign Lord, commands.

In essence, Heiser’s position is that the miracle of Jesus calming the storm is a profound theological statement, intentionally framed by the Gospel writers to portray Jesus as the one who fulfills the role of Yahweh, the Creator and Chaos-Defeater, thereby establishing his full divinity.

Exhibit F: What God/Jesus Has Done For You

In Luke 8:26-39, we have the account of Jesus casting out Legion; a demon so named because there were a whole bunch of them inside of the guy (imagine a Roman Legion of soldiers). When all is said and done, the previously demon-possessed man begs to follow Jesus on his journey. But Jesus sent him away, saying “Return to your home, and declare how much God has done for you.” The text then says “And he went away, proclaiming throughout the whole city how much Jesus had done for him.” We have clearly gone from a blatant, powerful, flashy example to a really subtle one really fast. The phrase “What God has done for you” is paralleled with “How much Jesus had done for him”, subtly implying that Jesus is God. It isn’t as potent as Jesus claiming to be able to forgive sins or controlling the weather, but it is nevertheless a subtle “wink wink” from the author to the reader. The astute reader should go “Oh, I see what you did there.”

Exhibit G: Jesus Sitting At God’s Right Hand.

In Luke 22:66-71, we read, “When day came, the assembly of the elders of the people gathered together, both chief priests and scribes. And they led him away to their council, and they said, ‘If you are the Christ, tell us.’ But he said to them, ‘If I tell you, you will not believe, and if I ask you, you will not answer. But from now on the Son of Man shall be seated at the right hand of the power of God.’ So they all said, ‘Are you the Son of God, then?’ And he said to them, ‘You say that I am.’ Then they said, ‘What further testimony do we need? We have heard it ourselves from his own lips.'” (ESV)

Jesus does not give the full answer as he does in Matthew 26:57–68 and Mark 14:61–64. He does not mention that he will come riding on the clouds of heaven. I have tended to think this makes the force of the passage a little less forceful than in the Matthean and Markan parallels, but at the same time, he does say that he will sit at the right hand of God, thus claiming to sit on God’s throne, thus making himself equal to God. To claim to sit at God’s right hand is a claim to sit on God’s throne. To sit on God’s throne is to claim equality with God. Jesus basically told the Sanhedrin “I am going to sit on the highest and most exalted throne in the universe, and from there I will reign as King.” But Jesus isn’t just saying this to claim to be The King over all kings, he is making an allusion to Psalm 110:1, which says “The LORD says to my lord, ‘Sit at my right hand until I make your enemies your footstool.'” (NRSV) Notice how Psalm 110:1 reads; the first instance of LORD is in all caps. If you have access to Bible software like I do, or if you just know why English translators do this, you can discover that in the Hebrew, this is the tetragrammaton (YHWH). It is the personal name for the God of Israel. The second use of “lord” is in lowercase, and the Hebrew here is “Adonai”. Although Jews do often refer to God as “Adonai”, it isn’t necessarily a specific name for God. It’s like how we call Jesus “Savior”, yet if someone rescues you from, say, drowning in a river, you could say that they are your “savior”. The word “Adonai” is just a generic term for “lord”, as in “Would you like some tea, my lord?” That said, things do get interesting with the word, for Jews both ancient and modern refuse to use the divine name for fear that they might accedentally break the commandment not to take The Lord’s name in vain (Exodus 20:7, Deuteronomy 5:11). And so when referring to God, even when reading scripture passages that say “YHWH” in the text, they will substitute YHWH for terms like “Hashem” (The Name) or “Adonai” (a more generic term for “lord”). Thus, there is a good chance that when Psalm 110:1 was sung in the synagoges of Jesus’ day, it would have verbally been read/recited as “Adonai said to Adonai ‘Sit at my right hand until I make your enemies your footstool.'” Thus making it sound like there are two YHWH’s in the text. Like a two-person Godhead. Given indications elsewhere that some of the Jews held to a Binitarianism in Jesus’ day ^[21]See the book “The Angel Of The Lord: A Biblical, Historical, and Theological Study” by Douglas Van Doorn and Matthew Foreman. Other resources you can can check out are my YouTube video … Continue reading might Psalm 110:1 be interpreted as a “Two Powers text”? Might Jesus have been claiming to be that second Adonai?

Now, again, Jesus’ full answer is not recorded in the gospel of Luke. Matthew and Mark’s parallel accounts have Jesus saying that He, as The Son Of Man, will come riding on the clouds of Heaven. Nevertheless, Jesus still refers to himself as The Son Of Man, and when you look at what that term means in Daniel 7:13-14, it has significant Christological implications. Normally, we could just make the point by cross checking the parallel references between the gospels; but given my methodological restraints (i.e staying inside of the gospel of Luke), I won’t go into that point. Interested readers are urged to check out the other entries in this series such as “Defending The Trinity From Mark Alone” if you’re interested in getting into that. Nevertheless, even in Luke’s truncated version of the account, there is still an implication that Jesus would sit on the throne of God, thus making a claim to be God.

(4) The Holy Spirit Is God

In this section, I want to make a case not only for the divinity of The Holy Spirit, but for the person hood of The Holy Spirit. For some groups are prone to seeing The Holy Spirit as “God” in the sense that He is an emanating force from God, but they don’t see Him as a person in His own right.

Luke 1:35 – Gabriel says to Mary “The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you.” (ESV) The phrase “The Holy Spirit will come upon you” is linked to the phrase “The power of The Most High will overshadow you” in Synonymous Parallelism. This indicates that The Holy Spirit and The Most High are to be identified as the same being. We know who “The Most High” is because many biblical passages use this as a term for Yahweh, most notably Psalm 82:6 and Deuteronomy 32:8-9. Thus, The Holy Spirit is God. Other references of notice in The Old Testament would be Genesis 14:18-20, Psalm 9:2, Psalm 91:1, and Psalm 21:1.

Jesus was “led by the Spirit in the wilderness,” (Luke 4:1) language suggesting active, intentional guidance rather than passive empowerment. Jesus rejoiced “in the Holy Spirit,” (Luke 10:21) indicating a relational dynamic between Jesus and the Spirit as separate persons.

The Spirit’s personal agency emerges clearly in Luke’s narrative. The Holy Spirit will “teach you in that very hour what you ought to say,” (Luke 12:12) attributing conscious instruction to the Spirit. Blaspheming against the Holy Spirit constitutes an unforgivable sin, distinct from speaking against the Son of Man, (Luke 12:10) implying the Spirit possesses the status and dignity worthy of such distinction. Regarding divinity, omnipotence is ascribed to the Spirit (Luke 1:35) ^[22]John M’Clintock and James Strong, “Holy Ghost,” in Cyclopædia of Biblical, Theological, and Ecclesiastical Literature (New York: Harper & Brothers, Publishers, 1891), 4:308., a divine attribute. Names proper only to God—Jehovah and Lord—are ascribed to the Holy Spirit ^[23]See ibid., establishing his divine identity.

(5) The Father, The Son, and The Holy Spirit Are Distinct Persons

This is one of the more controversial premises in the case for The Trinity other than the deity of Jesus. There are groups who are more than glad to concede that Jesus is God, but they don’t think he is a distinct person from The Father or The Holy Spirit. Thus, it is necessary to show that while all three persons are identified as Yahweh in the gospel of Luke, they are also distinguished from each other as well.

Exhibit A: The Baptism Of Jesus

In Luke 3:21-22, we read “Now when all the people were baptized, and when Jesus also had been baptized and was praying, the heavens were opened, and the Holy Spirit descended on him in bodily form, like a dove; and a voice came from heaven, ‘You are my beloved Son; with you I am well pleased.'” (ESV)

This is the baptism of Jesus. Here, you have all three persons present. The Son is the one being baptized, going into the water and coming out of the water. The Holy Spirit descends upon Jesus in the form of a dove, and a voice from Heaven says “You are my beloved Son, with you I am well pleased.” The Father, The Son, and The Holy Spirit are all present in the narrative simultaneously. This makes no sense if The Father, The Son, and The Holy Spirit were just three different “modes” that one person underwent. If God were just one person, then why do we see three persons in this narrative? The Father speaks from Heaven, the Son is in the water being baptized, the Holy Spirit is descending upon Jesus in the form of a dove. It sure looks as if there are three persons here to me! Think of it like this; Batman and Bruce Wayne are not distinct persons. They are the same person. But what if the people of Gotham City saw Batman and Bruce Wayne together in the same room at the same time? They would probably conclude that Batman and Bruce Wayne are NOT the same person, they are different persons. Now, another possibility is that Batman and Bruce Wayne are indeed the same person, and Bruce merely paid someone to don the Batman outfit in a ruse (maybe to throw people off the suspicion that they’re the same). Well, since we have The Father, The Son, and The Holy Spirit in the same “room”, then we likewise must conclude that they either aren’t the same person, or that God is pulling off an elaborate deception to make us think that He consists of three persons! But the latter option is unconscionable since Numbers 23:19 says that God does not lie. Thus, we must conclude that what appears to be the case really is the case.

Exhibit B: The Holy Spirit Leads Jesus Into The Wilderness

Luke 4:1 – The Holy Spirit leads Jesus into the wilderness. Jesus is not leading himself, and that would be an odd way to phrase that. Luke would probably just say “So Jesus went into the desert”. The most logical reading is that Jesus and The Holy Spirit are distinct persons.

Exhibit C: Jesus Prays To The Father

In Luke 10:21-22, we read “In that same hour he rejoiced in the Holy Spirit and said, ‘I thank you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that you have hidden these things from the wise and understanding and revealed them to little children; yes, Father, for such was your gracious will. All things have been handed over to me by my Father, and no one knows who the Son is except the Father, or who the Father is except the Son and anyone to whom the Son chooses to reveal him.'” (ESV)

In this passage, Jesus prays to The Father after “rejoicing in The Holy Spirit.” He says “I thank you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that you have hidden these things from the wise and understanding and revealed them to little children.” Think about this implications of this if some form of Saballianism/Modalism were true. This passage would essentially be saying “He rejoiced in Himself, and said, ‘I thank myself, Me, my Father (I’m my own Father, you know) Lord of heaven and earth, that I have hidden these things from the wise and understanding and revealed them to little children. Yes, me. For such was my gracious will. All things have been handed over to me by myself, and know one knows who I am except myself, and no one has seen me except myself…” This is just incoherent babble! Modalism makes God into a schizophrenic mess!

The primary way Oneness Pentecostals (like those in the United Pentecostal Church International, or UPCI) address passages like Luke 10:21-22, where Jesus prays to the Father, is through the distinction between the human nature and the divine nature of Jesus Christ. The Modalist position is that God is one single Person who manifests Himself in three distinct roles or modes (Father, Son, and Holy Spirit). Therefore, the “Son” designation is specifically tied to the incarnation; God becoming man. Jesus would not have been the “Son” of God prior to the incarnation. In giving birth to a human God-Man, God essentially had a “Son” in their thinking. The “Son” is the human Jesus of Nazareth.

Prominent Oneness theologian Dr. David K. Bernard frequently articulates this position. He says that the distinction between Father and Son is the same distinction as between the humanity of Jesus Christ and the deity of Jesus Christ. And that the terms ‘Father,’ ‘Son,’ and ‘Holy Ghost’ are not eternally distinct persons in the Godhead, but are the way the one God has revealed himself. When Jesus prays, it is the perfectly human nature of Christ -the Son – submitting his will and dependence to the omnipresent, sovereign divine nature—the Father/Spirit. ^[24]Bernard, David K. The Oneness View of Jesus Christ. Hazelwood, MO: Pentecostal Publishing House, 1994.

This perspective leads to the following conclusion regarding Luke 10:21-22: (1) Jesus (the Son/Man) prays to the Father (the Spirit/Deity). The human Jesus, in his role as a perfect, dependent human being, is submitting his human will to the divine will (God). This is seen as a necessary part of the Incarnation, where God truly entered human limitation. (2) “Rejoiced in the Holy Spirit”: The Holy Spirit is understood as the same indivisible Spirit of God (the Father) indwelling Jesus’s humanity. Jesus, as a man, is empowered and filled with the very Spirit of God, and His joy comes from that divine indwelling.

So what are to we make of this counter-argument? As Trinitarians, we do affirm the doctrine of the incarnation. Jesus was truly human and truly God. So we can’t dispute the point by saying that Jesus is only one person with one nature, for to say that would either undermine the deity of Christ (which we’ve well established in this article) or the humanity of Christ. At least for me, I would reject this option on the basis of my commitment to monoethelitism. Anyone who has seen my article“Is The Doctrine Of The Incarnation Incoherent?” or watched the YouTube lecture I gave called “Is The Incarnation Logically Coherent?” will know that I subscribe to Dr. William Lane Craig’s model of the incarnation, which is often referred to as “Neo-Apollonarianism”. I recommend readers check out the YouTube video as it’s much more of an expansive treatment than that short blog post, but the blog post is good if you want a quick run down version of it (a Cliff Notes version, if you will). An aspect of Dr. Craig’s model is Monotheletism. Dr. Craig writes “What is Monotheletism? It is the doctrine that the incarnate Christ has a single faculty of will. By contrast Dyotheletism teaches that the incarnate Christ has two faculties of will, one associated with his human nature (his human will) and one associated with his divine nature (his divine will). The Third Council of Constantinople condemned Monotheletism, promulgating as obligatory for Christians belief in two wills in Christ. I suspect that most evangelical Christians give allegiance with their lips to the Third Council and Dyotheletism but haven’t really reflected seriously on it.” ^[25]Dr. William Lane Craig, ReasonableFaith.org, “Question Of The Week #75: Monotheletism”, September 22nd 2008, –> https://www.reasonablefaith.org/writings/question-answer/monotheletism The reason why William Lane Craig and I reject Dyotheletism is that it would seem to logically entail the heresy known as Nestorianism! It seems obvious to me that natures don’t have wills. Persons have wills! So, if there are two natures in Christ (and there certainly are), and those two natures each have a will of their own, that would seem to imply that Christ is two persons! A human person and a divine person! But if Christ has only one faculty of will (being only one person, yet in this one person are combined two natures in what theologians call “The Hypostatic Union”). To affirm The Hypostatic Union while simultaneously avoiding Nestorianism, I have opted to agree with Dr. Craig on Monotheletism. This then, offers me a good response to the Oneness Pentecostal who seems to sieze upon the possibility of the natures having wills of their own. Jesus is a person. God The Father is a person. The Father is not the divine nature of Christ. Natures, being non-personal types of things, are not the type of things that can communicate with each other. But if the human nature of Christ is not communicating with the divine nature of Christ (since natures aren’t persons in their own right), then it would seem that we are thrust back in the dilemma; God is either a schizophrenic mess or He’s more than one person. ^[26]Space does not permit me to get into philosophical and theological objections to Neo-Apollonarianism in general, and Monotheletism in particular. I would simply urge you to check out my video … Continue reading

But let us suppose you are a Christian who affirms Dyotheletism? Is there a response available for you to use against the Modalists? Well, yes, I think there is. We can call it “The Problem of Disingenuousness”. If the Father and the Son are the same single Person (as Oneness teaches), the prayer is essentially a dialogue within one Person. This makes Jesus’s prayer disingenuous or “mere theater” because the speaker and the addressee are ontologically identical. Secondly, there is a distinction of will. In Gethsemane, Jesus prays,“Father, if you are willing, remove this cup from me. Nevertheless, not my will, but yours, be done.” (Luke 22:42, ESV). The modalist might say that Jesus is praying that his human will be overridden by his divine will. However, the prayer is an expression of two distinct centers of self-consciousness or persons (the Son and the Father) with two distinct wills (human and divine) being brought into submission. If the Father and the Son were merely the divine nature and the human nature of one Person, the phrase “not my will, but yours” would represent an internal struggle within that single Person. While such a depiction of an internal struggle is logically possible, it seems like a very strained reading of the text. Wouldn’t it be more natural to interpret the text exactly as it reads? That Jesus is communicating with a different person, someone whom he calls Father and God? Also, it is noteworthy that the Sonship of Jesus is spoken of elsewhere as preceding his incarnation (see John 17), so that would be a good response overall, but not in this article in which I’m tying my hands to just one book of the canon (in this case, Luke). But under normal circumstances, that Jesus is referred to as The Son of God even before his human birth is a good response.

Conclusion

We have seen that The Gospel Of Luke teaches that (1) There is only one God, (2) The Father is God, (3) The Son Is God, (4) The Holy Spirit is God, and (5) The Father, The Son, and The Holy Spirit are 3 distinct persons. These 5 statements, when taken together, make the most sense in light of the doctrine of The Trinity. Non-Trinitarians make much out of things like Jesus never saying “I am God” in those exact words, the word “Trinity” not being in The Bible, or there not being one verse saying “There is one God who exists as 3 distinct, co-eternal persons”. Yet we can see that the underlying concepts of Trinitarian doctrine are present in the gospel of Luke. The Trinity can account for all 5 facts. Arianism can make sense of facts 1, 2, and 5, but not 3 and 4. Modalism can account for facts 1-4, but not 5. Only The Trinity can account for all 5. Thus, the doctrine of The Trinity has exhaustive explanatory scope.

If you’ve read my previous two articles in this essay, “Defending The Trinity From Matthew Alone” and “Defending The Trinity From Mark Alone”, you’ll see that I adequately defended The Trinity using the same methodology I’ve employed here; stay only in the chosen gospel, and the only outside biblical texts I permitted myself to use are Old Testament passages for the sake of adding missing background knowledge that would have been present to the original readers. Could it be that perhaps The Trinity is essential to “The Gospel” which is why it is equally present in “The gospels”? And if so, could it be that in rejecting The Trinity, one is undermining the very gospel itself? Food for thought.