How can God be three and one at the same time?

God & the TrinityIn theological review

The short answer

God is three and one in different senses, so there is no contradiction: one in essence, one single God, and three in persons, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Scripture holds both together, confessing that the LORD is one while baptising in the one name of the Father, Son, and Spirit.

The fuller answer

God can be three and one at the same time because the three and the one are not being counted in the same way. The objection assumes Christians claim God is three and one in the same sense, which would be a contradiction. The claim Scripture makes is different: God is one in essence, one God with no rivals or parts, and three in persons, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, each fully God, distinct from one another, from all eternity. The coherence objection deserves a straight answer rather than a shrug, because Christians claim this doctrine can be believed with the mind as well as confessed with the lips.

Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is One.

Deuteronomy 6:4 (BSB)

The oneness is Judaism's and Christianity's shared foundation: hear, O Israel, the LORD our God, the LORD is one. Christians have never surrendered that sentence. Jesus quoted it as the first commandment's ground, and Paul repeated it to the church. Whatever the Trinity means, it cannot mean three gods, a divided god, or a god assembled from pieces, because the oneness confessed in Deuteronomy is the fixed point everything else must fit around, not a problem to be explained away.

Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit,

Matthew 28:19 (BSB)

Within that oneness, Jesus commands baptism in the name, singular, of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. One name, three who bear it together. The three are not three names for one actor changing costumes, because in the Gospels they speak to one another, love one another, and act toward one another: the Father sends, the Son obeys and prays, the Spirit descends and is sent in turn.

The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with all of you.

2 Corinthians 13:14 (BSB)

The church's Nicene Creed simply guards both halves at once: one God, the Father Almighty; one Lord Jesus Christ, of one substance with the Father; and the Holy Spirit, worshipped and glorified together with Father and Son. Analogies like water, eggs, or shamrocks all break somewhere, and Christians should admit it. A reality greater than the universe need not fit inside it. What reason requires is only this: that the claim not contradict itself, and three persons in one essence does not. Mystery remains, and Christians should not pretend otherwise, but mystery is a claim about the limits of our understanding, not an admission that the doctrine contradicts itself.

Sources

Berean Standard Bible (BSB)
The Nicene Creed (AD 325, enlarged 381)

Review status: in-theological-review. Every Contend page passes a human theological review against the Statement of Faith before it is published as approved teaching. This section is in that queue.

Dig deeper

No answer here is a dead end. Follow the question on, test it in practice, or work the method yourself on the Dig deeper page.

What is the Trinity?The Trinity is the Christian confession that there is one God, and that this one God is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, three persons, each fully God, equal in power and glory. The word itself is not in the Bible. The reality is taught everywhere in it, and the church forged the word to protect what the Bible says from being flattened in either direction.Are Father, Son, and Spirit three gods?No, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are not three gods. Scripture insists the LORD is one and that no god exists besides him, and the Nicene Creed confesses one God while naming the Son as of one substance with the Father, so the three persons are the one God, not three beings beside each other.Is the Trinity taught in the Bible if the word is not?Yes, the Trinity is taught in the Bible even though the word itself is not there. Scripture repeatedly shows Father, Son, and Holy Spirit together, distinct and each divine, at Jesus's baptism and throughout his teaching, and Tertullian later coined the Latin word trinitas to name that biblical pattern.Is Jesus the Father?No, Jesus is not the Father; they are distinct persons of the one God. John says the Word was with God and was God, Jesus prays to the Father and speaks of the glory he had with him, and Tertullian's Against Praxeas answered the claim that they are the same person in the early church.Bible Character: JesusThe Son of God, born of Mary in Bethlehem, who preached the kingdom of God, was crucified for our sins according to the Scriptures, and was raised on the third day.Bible Character: PaulThe Pharisee who persecuted the church until the risen Jesus stopped him on the Damascus road, and who became his apostle to the Gentiles, travelling the Roman world and writing many of the New Testament letters.Lesson: I believe in God, the Father almightyThe Creed opens by naming who God is before it says anything about us. Take the first line apart, word by word, with the Scripture under each word.