Second Flashcards
When is it proper to call Christ God and why?
Only when referring to the essence, not person. The peculiar properties of the three persons carry an order within them. Since the Father is the beginning and the source, when he is mentioned together with the Son, the Spirit or both, the name of God is peculiarly applied to him.
What is the order within the three Persons?
- The Father is the beginning principium- to him is attributed the beginning of activity and the fountain and wellspring of all things
- To the Son is attributed wisdom, counsel and the ordered disposition of all things
- To the Spirit is assigned the power and efficacy of that activity.
Who proceeds from who in the Trinity?
The Father is first, from him is the Son and from both is the Spirit.
How is the Son eternally begotten?
Since the Son is God, He exists of himself, but not in respect of his Person; indeed, since he is the Son, we say that he exists from the Father.
What is Modalism?
The heresy that the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit are merely ways in which God revealed himself and do not represent eternal antecedent personal realities in God himself.
Why is it important to have a Trinitarian understanding of God to know God?
God is sovereign in his self-revelation. God’s crowning self-revelation of himself is in baptism into the one name of the Father, and the son and the Holy Spirit.
Why is Christian worship distinctively Trinitarian?
The church’s worship is grounded on who God is and what He has done. The basic premise of all of God’s actions- from the Father through the Son by the Holy Spirit
