 | Pastor Dave grew up in northern New Jersey in a very diverse cultural area. He attended Central College in Pella, Iowa received a BA in sociology and psychology. He was an offensive guard for their NCAA Div III National Championship team in 1974. In speaking for the Fellowship of Christian Athletes, he sensed a call to full time ministry. Meeting is future wife Sandy at Central, went to Michigan to finish her college while Dave started Western Seminary in Holland, Michigan. Dave married Sandy in 77 and completed his Masters of Divinity degree in 78. Pastor Dave’s first church was in Fort Lee, New Jersey, home of the George Washington Bridge. Their three children were born there and he also served as a Police and Fire Chaplain for the city. In February 1991, they came to Wichita to start Harvest Community Church. In 2006, he received his Doctor of Ministry degree from Covenant Theological (Presbyterian) Seminary in St Louis. During that year he gained a daughter-in-law with now 2 grandsons of 3 years and 6 months old. Besides Pastoring at HCC for the past 20 years, he has been Director of the SCSD & WPD Police Chaplains for 11.
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Religion
2013-03-01 10:42:19
Questions on baptism
Q-Although difficult, I am trying to understand the concept of the Trinity, where there are three persons in one God. I have come to understand that God the Father always was and always will be. That’s kind of tough to imagine, but it does lead me to my question.
If there are three persons in one god, was there only one of these persons who “always was”? Did then both Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit have a beginning insofar as being a God? If so, I know when Jesus was born, but what about the Holy Spirit?
A-What the questioner says about the Trinity being a mystery is very true. But then what can we expect when we are dealing with an infinite Creator-God who always was and will be, with no beginning or end. {Genesis 1:1}How does one of finite understanding, truly understand something so far beyond our reach mentally? Explaining it we come up short but we can still affirm its truth. We can bear witness to the fact that He reveals Himself throughout the scriptures as Father, Son and Holy Spirit.
For instance we see hints of the Trinity already in Genesis “the Spirit of God was moving over the surface of the waters.”{1:2} and “Then God said, "Let Us (plural) make man in Our image…{1:26a}.
In the New Testament we see a strong reference to the Trinity in Jesus’ own words when He commissions the disciples to baptize “in the name (which is singular) of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit.” {Matthew 28:19b} We see Jesus even claim deity when He almost gets stoned by the Jews for claiming His pre-existence before Abraham and calls Himself “I Am.” Through this title every Jew knew He was claiming to be the Eternally Existing God. {John 8:58} Later on in John’s gospel Philip asks, “Lord, show us the Father” {14:8} and Jesus responds, “…Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father!”{9b} and then goes further about being the same substance or essence as the Father when He says, “Don’t you believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me? The words I speak are not my own, but my Father who lives in me does his work through me.”{10} In the same passage Jesus speaks to the Holy Spirit being sent so that the disciples are not left alone but like Jesus, He is “another Counselor” {16} sent by the Father and the Son to be with them forever.
We see also the Holy Spirit being seen as the same essence and substance of the Father in Acts 5 when Annias and Sapphira are being hypocritical liars. Peter is alone with Annias and proclaims, “You lied to the Holy Spirit.” {3b} In the same exchange Peter says to him, “You weren’t lying to us but to God!” Notice that Peter proclaims God and the Holy Spirit as the same being. {4b} After Annias drops dead and is carried off, his wife comes in and Peter interviews her. She lies to Peter and then he says, "Why is it that you have agreed together to put the Spirit of the Lord to the test?” {9} Peter again addresses the Holy Spirit as “the Spirit of the Lord.” Notice to, the Holy Spirit is not an impersonal “it,” but a person who is reasoned with because He is lied to as God.
Now some will protest the word “Trinity” is not in the Bible which is true but the doctrine is all through the scriptures. The doctrine was more explicitly developed by the early church fathers than it was by the biblical writers. The technical terms are not found in the Bible which the early church fathers used to describe the doctrine. People like Athanasius were not seeking to float a new doctrine but were affirming what the scriptures already proclaimed and what Christians already believed. The raw materials for the doctrine of the Trinity were already in the scriptures. The early church fathers just drew the doctrine out for us to understand God more clearly.
As far as Jesus and the Holy Spirit having a beginning, they are co-eternal with the Father with no beginning and no end. {1Timothy 1:17} We affirm with the Jews that God is truly one {Deuteronomy 6:1} and yet with three distinct persons {2 Corinthians 13:14}. It is so incomprehensible but yet so refreshing to know that our God is so much greater than what we could ever imagine or think. To think I am known and loved by this magnificent God who is greater than anything that could come at me in this world. Even further, that I have the privilege of knowing Him personally because of the Fathers’ love, through the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ and by the Holy Spirit, brings great comfort and peace to me. God paints the portrait of Himself to Isaiah and to all of us, “…for I alone am God! I am God, and there is none like me.” {Isaiah 46:9b} What a truth to come to grips with. On my knees in awe filled worship with you before such a great and awesome God! Pastor Dave.
