before we get into our study here today on God and the Holy Trinity from Chapter 2, Paragraph 3. And I want to thank David Jones for the fine job that he did in terms of defining so many things. I looked at your notes and studied them again once again last night. And brother, that was encouraging. That was really good. There's so many things that we have to learn theologically and yet there's a great mystery, isn't there, to the divine trinity that do we ever really comprehend the great three-in-one? Well, in some ways we don't. And we should worship and adore and realize that that is the case so that we might understand the greatness of our God, that He's beyond our comprehension at many points, and yet we still should press on to know the Lord and to learn more about the Lord. Let me read this paragraph to you again. I think it's a powerful paragraph. In this divine and infinite being, there are three subsistences. And in the Westminster Confession, I think it says persons. the Father, the Word, or Son, and the Holy Spirit of one substance, power, and eternity, each having the whole divine essence, yet the essence undivided, the Father is of none, neither begotten nor proceeding. The Son is eternally begotten of the Father, the Holy Spirit proceeding from the Father, and the Son, all infinite without beginning. Therefore, but one God, who is not to be divided in nature and being, but distinguished by several peculiar relative properties and personal relations. which doctrine of the Trinity is the foundation of all of our communion with God and comfortable dependence upon Him. Now, the truth of God's unity, His simplicity, is something which may make it appear that God somehow is distant from us. or that when we see that all of His attributes are actually one in Him, and yet He knows how to sovereignly apply those things according to His decree and infinite wisdom, it may appear to us at first glance that our God does not have the depth of feeling that the Bible conveys to us very clearly that He does. And so we need to understand as we study this material that I'm taking you through, that our God is a God who delights in his people. Our God is a God who delights to reveal himself to us, his people. Amen. Amen. Amen. And that's good to remember, isn't it? All of these truths that are related to the Trinity, to the Divine Trinity, that God is one, but in this one, awesome, infinite, holy God, our three divine persons, or as it says in our confession, subsistences. And this is what we're trying to come to terms with, and hopefully come to practical terms with these truths that we learned together. The last time I was speaking to you, I said to you that the word Trinity is not found in the Bible. And indeed, if you look at the history of the church, It took quite some time for the doctrine of the Trinity to be set forth in various confessional ways that the Council of Nicaea and then subsequent councils defining these things, setting them forth, having great convening of bishops to try to figure these things out. in the church of the living God. What an amazing thing it is to read history, by the way. It's a good thing to read the history of the church, go back and see just How many generations of true Christians had to grapple with, first of all, the doctrine of God, and then the doctrine of the Trinity, and great theological battles were fought over these things. Arius and Pelagius being heretics and trying to introduce great heresy into the church, and yet God raised up men, Athanasius, various ones that we could talk about and mention. Gregory Nazianzus and John of Damascus and so many dear men who took their stand for truth in the midst of a almost overwhelming flood of heresy back there in the time of Augustine. Augustine doing the same thing. Many of these men losing their lives for this truth that we're studying here this morning. So it really is a practical doctrine because our whole faith rests upon a correct view of God and of Christ. And we need to understand that as we study these things. I also mentioned to you that this doctrine is very practical because in the Great Commission you see the divine trinity set forth. Not the word trinity, but the But the name, as it says there, go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and Son and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age. So as Christ was sending his disciples forth, he's telling them that he's sending them forth to be able to preach and to teach people to observe in relation to the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. And so we need to be able to communicate that, I said to you, to people around us who may waver or maybe they've never understood the truth, whether they're Christians, professed Christians, real Christians, or whether they're unbelievers who've never heard this truth before. We need to be able to communicate to them in very simple language, these things that we're talking about here this morning. So I want you to turn with me over to Matthew chapter 3 because I want to take you in the study of the Trinity to many verses of the Bible and open them up so that you will be able to see these things for yourself and then also that you'll be able to communicate these things to others. Matthew chapter 3 in verses 13 to 17. It says here, then Jesus came from Galilee to John at the Jordan to be baptized by him. And John tried to prevent him, saying, I need to be baptized by you. And are you coming to me? But Jesus answered and said to him, Permit it to be so now, for thus it is fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness. Then John allowed him. When he had been baptized, Jesus came up immediately from the water And behold, the heavens were opened to him, and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and alighting upon him. And suddenly a voice came from heaven, saying, This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased." Now you'll notice that in John's baptism, it was different than Christian baptism in this respect, In the Great Commission, we've just seen that the name is mentioned, the triune God is set forth for us there. Here, we're seeing a baptism of repentance. That's what John's baptism was. Now, it's not as though that those baptisms were not linked, and it was not as though that that repentance is not linked to salvation through faith, by grace through faith, because it is. And so those who were truly repenting of their sins, turning away from them and coming to recognize that John was the forerunner of the Christ, they were understanding that repentance is something that does need to be taught alongside of faith with Christ, and indeed, as Christ was coming into his own ministry, his earthly ministry, this is what they needed to see. They needed to repent and believe in the gospel. They needed to repent and then prepare their hearts to receive the truth of the fact that they were sinners who needed a savior. And this is what we need to show people ourselves, by the way, in terms of repentance. We need to teach repentance to people around us. We very desperately need to teach repentance to people in this society, whether they are Christians or not Christians. And by the way, as a Christian, it is a part of your perseverance in your faith. that you will continue to repent as long as you live when you find sin in your heart or your actions or your life. I hope that you see that. But now in these verses that I'm bringing to your attention, it says that Jesus came from Galilee to John at the Jordan to be baptized by him, and John tried to prevent him. I think this is precious. This is very precious. Let me ask this question, why was John trying to prevent Jesus from being baptized? It's because Jesus didn't have any sin to repent of. Now John knew that. John knew that spiritually it had been revealed to him. If we were to go over to John 1, which we will here in just a moment, but John knew that. He tried to prevent him. He said, I need to be baptized by you. Why did John need to be baptized by Jesus? And in what sense did he need to be baptized by him? It's the Holy One that baptizes the unholy one. I mean, you sort of think of it in that sort of way. John recognized that Jesus was more holy than he was. Amen. Amen. John recognized that he was a sinner at points. In fact, in one place he says, he must increase, I must decrease. In terms of the attention that was being brought to John, because he was a great preacher. And he did preach in such a way that many thousands of Israel came out and were baptized by him. Even the Pharisees were coming out to be baptized by him, and he had to call them a brood of vipers because they weren't coming for the right reasons to be baptized. John tries to prevent him saying, I need to be baptized by you, and He is speaking of spirit baptism as well as water baptism in the sense that we're talking about. They both baptize it says in the Gospel of John. At one point it says that John was making more disciples and baptizing more than Jesus was. But Jesus had the right attitude towards all of that. He knew that it wasn't a matter of popularity or it was a matter of truth. That John was preparing the way for him. He says I need to be baptized by you and are you coming to me and Jesus answered and said to him permit it to be so Permit it to be so now and so he did he went ahead And he allowed him it says He allowed him Now what was the meaning of this what was what was the reason that Jesus had to be baptized if he was not a sinner and Yeah, that's exactly right, Brian. He was saying, I'm taking the place of sinners here. I'm identifying with sinful people here and coming to be baptized because I am the one who's going to go to the cross and suffer and die for their sins. I'm going to be the one who has to undertake to obey the law on their behalf and fulfill it, to fulfill all righteousness, which is what he did. This is really precious, isn't it? Really precious. Because you see, right at this point where he's baptized, you see the Divine Trinity. That's what I want you to see here. When he had been baptized, Jesus came up immediately from the water, and behold, the heavens were opened to him, and he saw the Spirit of God descending upon him like a dove, and alighting upon him And suddenly a voice from heaven, whose voice was that? The father's. The father's, and we know that from the way it's said here, don't we? A voice came from heaven saying, this is my beloved son, in whom I am well pleased. So you have the divine trinity here. You have the father, the son, and the Holy Spirit. I want you to turn over with me to John chapter one. I mentioned it a few minutes ago, but there's more for us here. John chapter one. In verse 18. This is really an amazing verse. It says, no one has seen God at any time. The only begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, He has declared Him. Now this is an important verse for us to understand in terms of the divine trinity, and especially of our Lord Jesus Christ, because when it says here that no one has seen God at any time, we stop and think about the fact that Jesus was seen by men over and over again in his ministry when he was here upon the earth. So in what sense should we understand this verse, John 1, 18, when it says that no one has seen God at any time? How do we understand this? How should we understand this? Amen. Amen. The divine essence is invisible. It's one of God's attributes. Very good, David. And that is the reason that he cannot be seen by any man. See, we shouldn't stumble over this when we think about Christ being God, because he was God made manifest in the flesh. I'm not explaining it the way that I should. It says, no one has seen God at any time. The only begotten God who is in the bosom of the Father, He has declared Him. The only begotten Son, it says in some of the translations. But actually, if you do a study on this, you'll find that there's every reason, there's very much evidence to believe that this can be interpreted in this way that our translation does. The only begotten God who is in the bosom of the Father. That's exactly right. That's exactly what they say. Some wios and some theos. That's exactly right, David. And yet it says here that He has declared Him. He has declared Him. He has declared God. What does that mean to us here today? Yes, He's exegeted Him. And that word is there too, isn't it? In the original Greek, He has exegeted Him. Amen. So that we can understand. Because how else would we understand? One who is from all eternity being born of a virgin coming into this world as fully God, fully man, two natures in one blessed person. Well, this is really a good study for us, isn't it? We're going to go on to think about the personhood of God, God and his persons, God and his subsistence. We're going to look at the word hypostasis next Sunday, Lord willing. And so pray for me as I prepare this material. I want it to be something that we all learn from together and grow by. Well, let's pray together. Father, we thank you for this time around the Scriptures, around this doctrine, and we pray that it would become very precious to us, very practical to us in terms of not only our being able to understand it better as much as we can, but also in being able to tell others and declare to others of what you are and what you are like. We pray and ask these mercies in your blessed name, Lord Jesus, Amen.