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John 17:5, 24-And now, O Father, glorify Me together with Yourself, with the glory which I had with You before the world was…Father, I desire that they also whom You gave Me may be with Me where I am, that they may behold My glory which You have given Me; for You loved Me before the foundation of the world.
The Bible teaching of the Godhead/Trinity is one of the most important teachings of Scripture: for it helps us to understand why we were created. You see, some hold that God created the universe and mankind because He was alone and bored. So, those would maintain that God’s creation of humanity was inherently motivated by selfishness.
However, the Nature of God revealed in nature and Scripture shows us that this is not the case. One reason this is the case is because God “needs” nothing from us.
Acts 17:25-Nor is He worshiped with men’s hands, as though He needed anything, since He gives to all life, breath, and all things.
Indeed, the very nature of love shows us that God has not existed as a solitary Being throughout all eternity. Love (the Greek word agape) has love for another as its object and goal. But since God is love (1 John 4:8), and since love demands relationship by its very nature (ie, “Another” to love), then relationship has always existed within God. As the Word of God reveals: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
This is illustrated in one of my favorite books, the Shack. Mackenzie has been invited by God to the Shack where the bloody clothes of his murdered daughter were found. There, Mack meets up with God-the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit! One author brings out some remarkably powerful and Biblical insights about the Trinity from this:
“For Young’s Papa, if God were alone and solitary from eternity, then being other-centered would be out of the question, for there would be no other to be centered upon. Relationship itself and fellowship, even being open, personal, and approachable, would be quite foreign to the very nature of such a solitary God. “Love,” C. S. Lewis says, “is something that one person has for another person. If God was a single person, then before the world was made, He was not love.” 2 According to Saint Victor, “No one is properly said to have charity on the basis of his own private love of himself. And so it is necessary for love to be directed toward another for it to be charity. Therefore, where a plurality of persons is lacking, charity cannot exist.” 3 Young, Lewis, and Saint Victor raise a great issue. If there is no relationship within God’s eternal being, then there is no real basis in God’s nature for caring about something other than himself, no basis for altruistic devotion to others or for loving a thing for its own sake. The love of a single-personed God would be inherently self-centered, narcissistic, and ultimately about God, not others. A solitary God could love others for their benefit only by shutting off, as it were, the fountain of his deeper and true nature…This, it seems to me, is a huge point. Are we loved for what we can potentially bring to God’s table, or are we loved for our own sake? Does the love of the Father, Son, and Spirit come with strings attached? Is our existence about relationship, or is it about performance? Is the universe the product of divine self-interest, or need, or perhaps boredom? Are we here to do something for God, for God’s benefit? …If God is alone and solitary, then in one way or another we were created for God’s benefit, not ours. 4 But given that God is Father, Son, and Spirit, and given that relationship and love form the core of the trinitarian being, then we were “created to be loved” (99), and to live loved, and to love others without agenda (181f.). As Lewis says, “God, who needs nothing, loves into existence wholly superfluous creatures in order that He may love and perfect them.” 5”. (C. Baxter Kruger, The Shack Revisited: There Is More Going On Here than You Ever Dared to Dream, 117-119 (Kindle Edition): Faith Words)
God, by His very Nature, is perfectly self-sufficient. If He weren’t, then He would just be another part of the created universe, dependent on something outside of Himself. As such, He already has perfect love and joy within Himself.
1 John 5:7-For there are three that bear witness in heaven: the Father, the Word, and the Holy Spirit; and these three are one.
We were not made from any “need” that God had.
Instead, you and I-and the entire universe-were made to be the recipients of God’s lovingkindness (cf. Psalm 136:1-9). As another author has expressed it:
“God’s essence is existence. He does not “have” existence or “get” existence from any cause; he is existence by his own essence. That is why he can give existence to everything else, which is what is meant by “creating” it. Everything else, every being, is dependent on him for everything it is; he is not dependent on anything.…And now comes the ultimate answer to the ultimate question. The reason God is a Trinity is because God is love, true love, total love, complete love, self-giving love, altruistic love, agape love of the other. Love of self, self-love, may be good, but it is not altruistic love, which means love of the other. In order to be not just a lover but love itself, in himself, in order to be complete love, God must include otherness in himself. Thus he must be more than only one Person…God lacks nothing. He does not need us or the world. Therefore his love is not needy, it is not the desire for something he does not have…And if God is complete in himself, and thus his love is altruistic not egotistic, then the only possible motive for him to create us and the world must be altruistic, not egotistic. We and our world have been loved into existence.” (Peter Kreeft, Why Does Everything Come in Threes? 67-68 (Kindle Edition): San Francisco, CA: Ignatius Press)
Stop and let this sink in:
You were made from love, to be loved, by the God Who is love.
You cannot do enough good to make God love you more, nor can you do enough evil to make God love you less. He loves you just as you are, wherever you are, and whoever you are. Yet His love is so powerful, He refuses to leave you as you are.
His love for us calls forth a response from us.
John 14:15-If you love Me, keep My commandments.
Acts 2:38-Then Peter said to them, “Repent, and let every one of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins; and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.
1 John 4:7-11-Beloved, let us love one another, for love is of God; and everyone who loves is born of God and knows God. 8 He who does not love does not know God, for God is love. 9 In this the love of God was manifested toward us, that God has sent His only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through Him. 10 In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins. 11 Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.
1 John 4:19-21-We love Him because He first loved us. 20 If someone says, “I love God,” and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen, how can he love God whom he has not seen? 21 And this commandment we have from Him: that he who loves God must love his brother also.
Thank You God-Father, Son, and Holy Spirit-for showering us with Your love. Thank You for making us, and for Calvary. Thank You for Your plan of salvation. Help us to go forth and rejoice in Your love and share it with those around us. Help us, help our families, help our friends, help our neighbors, and help our enemies. May we be some of the instruments of Your grace to others. Amen.