Ever read one of those paragraphs…that you want to read aloud to whoever is in the room and it expresses a new way of thinking or a new way of understanding a complex thought? Sorta an “aha” moment.
Here is one:
I am reading Kevin DeYoung’s book The Good News We Almost Forgot – Rediscovering the Gospel in a 16th Century Catechism. Basically, Kevin takes the Heidelberg Catechism and applies the gospel found in it to modern day. Putting this hard to read or understand or even say in a fluid pattern – something in paragraph form and explaining it. Quite good. More of that later though.
“The Trinity matters for relationships. We worship a God who is in a constant and eternal relationship with Himself as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Community is a buzz word in American culture, but it is only in a Christian framework that communion and interpersonal community are seen as expressions of the eternal nature of God. Likewise, it is only with a Trinitarian God that love can be an eternal attribute of God. Without a plurality of persons in the Godhead, we would be forced to think taht God created humands so that He might show love and know love, thereby making love a created thing (and God a needy deity). But with a biblical understanding of the Trinity, we can say that God did not create in order to be loved, but rather, created out of the overflow of the perfect love that had always existed among Father, Son, and Holy Spirit who ever live in perfect and mutual relationship and delight.” (p 52)
Love this. God didn’t create us because He needed us. My friend, Sean Cordell, preached on this topic as well a few weeks ago at Treasuring Christ here in Raleigh: Pursuing Community. You can not know true community without the knowledge of the true Creator of Community.
We must know love and community only through an intimate relationship with the one who desires to be in community and sent Jesus to die to make that possible.