“Redefining God in his image”
If you were asked to define God, how would you respond?
Perhaps our first thoughts would be that “God is love”, or that Jesus is our Saviour, Teacher or Shepherd. These are aspects to the God we already know. But what if you didn’t know God at all? How would you respond then?
Most people don’t know God, but instinctively perceive a higher power exists. Paul says in Romans: “Since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made…” (Romans 1:20).
It is the natural tendency to picture God and define him from the standpoint of human thinking. Romans 1 continues: “For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened. Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images made to look like a mortal human being and birds and animals and reptiles.” (1:21-23).
Many ancient religions pictured the divine as a myriad of part human, part animalistic beings, often in conflict with each other in a chaotic universe, forming human beings to relieve them from their hard work. Others define God as a single deity—either a fearsome one whose anger must be appeased, or an aloof grandfather-figure, far from our reality, reclining in heaven. Others define the divine more as a state of being than a deity—a divine spark within, which, once found through higher stages of consciousness, enables one to enter utopia.
The question of how one can define God was once asked by God himself:
“With whom will you compare me or count me equal?
To whom will you liken me that we may be compared?
Some pour out gold from their bags
and weigh out silver on the scales;
they hire a goldsmith to make it into a god,
and they bow down and worship it.
They lift it to their shoulders and carry it;
they set it up in its place, and there it stands.
From that spot it cannot move.
Even though someone cries out to it, it cannot answer;
it cannot save them from their troubles. (Isaiah 46:5-7)
Legend has it that as St. Augustine was walking along the beach on a bright, sunny day, he noticed a child running back-and-forth between the sea and a tiny hole in the sand carrying a pink shell filled with seawater. “My son,” St. Augustine called to the child, “What are you doing there?”
“I’m trying to fit that great big ocean into this tiny hole,” the child called back.
“My child, you could never fit this great, magnificent ocean into that tiny hole!”
Instantly, the child replied: “And neither could you possibly fit the Holy Trinity in your mind.” Then in a flash, the boy disappeared.
Although this account was captured in medieval art, it does not appear in Augustine’s own writings. Whether or not this actually happened, it teaches a profound truth: our small minds are far too limited to comprehend and understand everything about the almighty God, who sits enthroned far above the circle of the earth (Isaiah 40:22). The natural mind either defines God as one, or as many. The natural mind limits God as far beyond our world, far away from our problems and aloof to our needs, or limits him to be within elements of nature, or a spark we must find ourselves.
Of all the different ways humans have sought to define God, no human speculation could have come up with an image of one God yet three distinct and equally divine Persons in perfect relationship, because this is far too complex for natural human thinking.
God first has to reveal himself to us, in the power of his Spirit, through his holy word. In Deuteronomy God himself declares that there is only one God (Deuteronomy 6:4). As he is the Lord who led his people out of Egypt to freedom, they are to have no other gods before him (Exodus 20:1-3). This is the same God who spoke all things into existence in the beginning. Traditionally, this is pictured as God the Father, yet we hear in Genesis that the Spirit of God was also hovering over the surface of the deep, preparing to breathe life into what God would create. On the sixth day, God resolved: “Let us make humankind in our image” (Genesis 1:26). John’s Gospel begins by telling us that Jesus was with God in the beginning and is himself God, through whom all things were made. Jesus revealed the name of God as ‘Father, Son and Holy Spirit’ and all through Scripture each are revealed as eternal, all-powerful and equally divine in being.
Throughout history people have struggled to reconcile how God can be one yet three distinct, divine
Persons. From the standpoint of limited human logic, the positions arrived at are that God is either a single Being, or three separate gods. That God is One, but not Three-in-one, reduces the Spirit to an impersonal power, and the Son as merely a prophet, or specially created being—like the Allah of Islam, and the view of groups such as the Mormons, Christadelphians and Jehovah’s Witnesses (who profess to be members of the Communion of Saints, but are not). If Jesus is not divine, then God did not trade places with humanity on the Cross, and it was merely a man who was crucified, which helps us in no way. We would still be waiting for a Saviour. We would need to achieve righteousness ourselves, we would not have God’s favour, and our debt before God remain unpaid, requiring us to die.
The other outcome—that there are three different gods—denies the scriptural truth that God is one. If Jesus is just one of many gods, which god has ultimate authority, and who is ultimately in command? Each god would limit the other. If Jesus were just a secondary god to others, his sacrifice would be limited and therefore insufficient.
What we believe then, really is a matter of life and death.
That’s why the early church developed the Creeds, based on God’s self-revelation throughout the Scriptures. The Nicene Creed was formulated 1700 years ago, at the Council of Nicea, in the wake of heretical teaching that Jesus was not divine. The Apostles’ Creed is based on the teaching of the Apostles, first formulated as an old Roman Creed circa 180AD, and was used as a teaching guide to prepare people for baptism. It’s still the basis for preparing people for baptism today. Together with the Athanasian Creed, these creeds summarise the scriptural witness of who God is and what he does to bring saving help to the world, so that we can know him and share in his life through faith.
Ultimately this is what Trinity Sunday, and the Triune God himself, is all about. Today’s readings are less about defining God and more about painting a picture of how God works in his world. In the first reading as we hear of God’s creation of the cosmos—which science now knows is home to billions of galaxies—we receive a message contrary to that of the society, that we are the centre of the universe and life is all about us. God himself invites us to lift our gaze away from ourselves and look upward:
“Lift up your eyes and look to the heavens:
Who created all these?
He who brings out the starry host one by one
and calls forth each of them by name.
Because of his great power and mighty strength,
not one of them is missing.” (Isaiah 40:26).
The human view of the self is often that we are very, very big when in reality we are very, very small. The magnitude of the universe causes us to reconsider our view of self-importance and entitlement. We are but a grain of sand on the shore and part of a bigger creative work throughout thousands of years. God does not need us and the universe could easily exist without us, and if we do not humble ourselves, we will sooner or later be humbled by the relentless cycle of life.
Yet Genesis gives us another message contrary to that of society—we have an incredible worth and dignity that evolutionary theory or any other belief system can never come close to giving us, to quench the endless human thirst for self-esteem. The basis of our worth comes from above and transcends far above anything that humans can assert of themselves. For we have God-esteem given by what God says about us and does for us. God created us quite deliberately, intentionally and lovingly as the highest point of his creation, not sparing any attention to detail, even numbering the hairs on our head. God pronounced us to be very good and very beautiful as we are, without any weight loss, Ai editing, or plastic surgery. God does not need us but chose to involve us as his partners to work with him in his world. He blessed us to share in his own creative nature, to fill the world, engineer, build up, and care for. God did this even when he knew we would corrupt his image with sin.
But even when we did, God did not bring about an end to his wonderful creation. He kept on lovingly working towards a new future with blood, sweat and tears where sinners could be reconciled to him. He held nothing back when he sent his own Son who was conceived by the Holy Spirit to become born in flesh and bone—true God, Son of the Father from eternity, and true man, born of the Virgin Mary. At great cost he saved us, not with silver or gold but his own holy and precious blood, giving up his life to triumph over sin death and hell for us.
All authority has been given to Jesus from his Father, authority he uses to bring blessing throughout the world so that people can not only know about God, but know God personally, and share in his life forever. In our Gospel reading the risen Jesus commissions his disciples to make disciples of all nations by baptising them in God’s name—the Father, Son and Holy Spirit—and teaching them to obey everything he has commanded. After Jesus went up into heaven to be crowned as king, the Father poured out the Holy Spirit through Jesus upon people from all nations at Pentecost, to speak and hear the Good News of Christ in their own languages, so that whoever calls upon the name of the Lord will be saved. Through the Holy Spriit, God comes to be with us and give us such faith. God the Father has poured out the Holy Spirit upon you through Jesus. The Spirit has come to give you a new heart to believe in Christ and love what he commands, so that by believing you have life in his name, and have the right to be called the children of God.
Just as the Father, Son and Holy Spirit have always been inseparable, working together as One God in divine love in the world, so too they have been at work for you and in you. You are a Temple of the Holy Spirit, and the Father and Son have also made their home in you, as the inseparable Three-in-One. The Spirit reminds you of everything the Son has said, so that you know Jesus not only as Lord but your personal Saviour—and through Jesus, not an almighty God of which to be terrified, but your Father almighty—a forgiving Father; a gracious and merciful Father who hears all your prayers offered in the power of the Spirit in Jesus’ name, and answers you for Jesus’ sake.
The Triune God is about love, communion, and inspiration, about the healing of brokenness and triumph over death, the redemption of a people once alienated from him by sin, and the power of divine love to change hearts as he overcomes all obstacles to his continual work of creating and redeeming. It is about God achieving this for you. The Swedish Lutheran theologian Bo Giertz said:
“We know God as holy Trinity not because he has given us a set of theoretical teachings. But he has stepped forward and dealt with us as the Father, our Creator; as the Son, our Saviour; and as the Holy Ghost, who works in the church and in our hearts…
All of Trinity Sunday’s Scripture lessons examine the mystery of God’s nature and how he has revealed himself to us. The important thing is not to understand how he can be all three at once—Father, Son and Holy Ghost—but rather to meet him as he really is so you can believe in him as your Father, your Saviour, and your Helper, who leads you down the right path.”[1]
And so, in the words from Paul’s Letter to the Corinthains: “the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Spirit be with all of you.” Amen.
Pastor Tim Ebbs
St Paul’s Lutheran Church, Glenelg
Festival of the Holy Trinity, 2026
QUESTIONS FOR REFLECTION
“You are a Temple of the Holy Spirit, and the Father and Son have also made their home in you, as the inseparable Three-in-One.”
- What are some images of God people have? What image of God do you have?
- From what experiences have you shaped God in this way?
- Which aspect of God’s greatness (power, wisdom, authority, creativity) stands out most to you and why?
- Do you ever find it difficult to relate to a God who is so vast? Why or why not?
- How has the Triune God caused himself to relate to you?
- What is one area of your life where you need to trust God’s power more fully?
- How can remembering God’s magnitude help you face fear or uncertainty?
- How can God’s personal creation of you and care for you bring comfort in difficult situations?
- In what ways can you grow in trusting that God truly sees and values you?
- What does it look like to live authentically before a God who knows everything about you?
- How might your relationships change if you reflected God’s attentiveness to others?
- Why is it important to hold together God’s greatness and his personal care—not just one or the other?
- What happens in our life of faith when we do?
- How does the fact that the God over all there is has made his home in you strengthen your faith and devotion to God?
[1] Giertz, Bo (2008) To Live with Christ Tr Richard Wood and Bror Erickson. CPH: St Louis, 385-386
