Mark 14: 36 “Father,” he prayed, “my Father! All things are possible for you. Take this cup of suffering away from me. Yet not what I want, but you want.”
I have not seen God. This is a factual acceptance of the truth that in my entire life, God never appeared to me and revealed his identity directly as One and Three persons. It was indeed quite difficult to believed and finally owned and loved the God whom I cannot see. But despite God’s objective inappearance to me I hold on believing that there is One but Three divine persons in God. How do I come to this truth? I discovered my faith in God not in an instant but processual. It is a faith that was formed out of a continuous desire to seek God in my daily existence. This was brought into light by the wisdom of reading the Traditions and teachings of the Fathers of the Church, reading of the scriptures and of the thoughts of individuals whose wisdom were preserved in the thousand of books expounded and discussed inside the walls and field of classroom endeavours. Another is the gift and grace bestowed upon each of every experience that comes along with me everyday. This education and experience were my bridge to meet my longing to know God. Here below, i will be mentioning terms like "economic and immanent trinity". To put it simply, economic trinity means that Trinity as revealed by Jesus while immanent trinity means trinity as they are in themselves which is not known to us.
As far as “economic trinity” is concern, I would always look at the incarnation of the Son as the effective means of revelation of the identity of God. [When I speak of God’s identity I mean of the economic identity of God for the Trinity as they are in themselves cannot be known (Immanent Trinity) yet it was through the Son that they can be known.] It was through the incarnation of Jesus that opened that avenue of knowing God. It was through the Word made flesh that we have come to know God. I cannot forget a very dear friend when she told me that “so you think you know me well huh?” Spontaneously I told her that “no, its too presumptuous on my part to say I know you well for I know you only as much as you have allowed me to discover the part of you.” I mean, knowing somebody depends on his/her willingness to be known. And i guess, it has some bits of connections in knowing God since we knew God only through the revelation made by the Son. Indeed, it was through the willingness of God to reveal himself to human beings is that part that we can know much about. And it was made real through the mystery of incarnation. The Son revealed the identity of God and taught us to call him as “Father.” However, there were problems regarding unity and distinction of the Trinity. How can it be that the three persons become one?
In the Trinity, there is only one nature, which is the divine nature. The Father, the Son and the Spirit share the common divine substance. As for their distinction, the Father as the unbegotten generates or begets the Son, while inspiration is the Spirit of the Father and the Son. In the Old Testament, the distinctions of the three divine persons in the Trinity were not fully revealed. Delineation took place in the New Testament because revelation happened in Jesus. From eternity God is already trinity but revelation happened in time (OT not yet but it was symbolize) – it took place in Jesus Christ.
It was like all signs and fingers pointing to one direction when I asked myself who is the God that I have been believing all along? The image of Christ on the cross captures the whole point of understanding God. The Jesus Christ hanging on the Cross shows us two directions and these directions tells us an appropriate story and history of God who wish to reveal himself to human being. One direction points to the past (OT) while the other to the future. These directions project the Trinitarian – human reality in the eternal person of the Son – for salvation. The Son is the revelation of the “Abba.”
All predictions and signs made by God through the prophets, kings, and the people of Israel point towards Christ. Jesus as Christ fulfilled that promise that God has made with his people Israel. He did not only fulfill the promise but he revealed his true identity. It was a revelation of God of Himself in the person of the Son. That is why the death of Christ is a necessary event in his life to let the whole world know of God’s tremendous love. His crucifixion became the summit of God’s revelation of his great love and of his greatest identity.
As regards the future, the image of the cross fulfilled the promise of God to bring salvation to all. More than fulfilling the promise, part of the revelation is the inauguration of the coming of the Holy Spirit. It was through the death of the Son that new life began – a life with the Spirit. In Mt. 28:19, Jesus commanded the disciples to “go into the whole world, preach the Gospel to all nations and baptize the people in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.” It was then an assurance of Jesus that the Holy Spirit as the Spirit of the Father and the Son would remain as an active guide in preaching the good news and in doing the mission of God.
As regards my experience, aside from the intellectual quest for God, the reality of pain and suffering became central to my understanding of God as a personal God. The meaning of my purpose in living was slowly unfolded due to the desire to find the reason why bad things happened in the world and why bad things happened to me. Pain and suffering became the means to find the bridge that connects me to the deepest secret of my existence. Those pains that I have been through with were necessary for they have allowed me to see things beyond their appearance. I mean, I have learned the art of transcending my pains and that is by seeing them in the eyes of Jesus. I have realized that I am meant for something because I was created by Someone – and that Someone is God.
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