The Trinity

We commonly speak of the first, second, and third Persons of the Trinity. We call God the Father the first Person, God the Son the second Person, and God the Spirit the third Person.

Some ignorantly imagine that to mean that God the Father is the primary Person in the Godhead and that the Son and the Spirit are secondary Gods. That is not the case at all. The three Persons of the Holy Trinity are in all things equal to and co-existent with one another.

In the execution of the covenant of grace there is a subordination of one Divine Person to another. This is not a subordination of personal inferiority; but a voluntary subordination of the Son to the Father to redeem his elect, and of the Spirit to the Father and the Son and the Sanctifier and Preserver of all who were chosen by the Father and redeemed by the Son.

This division (First, Second, and Third Persons) is made simply because our puny brains must have some order in which to think of the infinite God. The three Persons of the eternal Godhead “are,” as the apostle John puts it, “one.” They are one in nature, essence, being, and glory. When seeking to understand what the Scriptures teach about the Trinity, this is one of the many places where faith must submit to and receive as a fact of Divine Revelation that which reason can never comprehend.