khanpadawan | trinities 192 - Review of Sanders's The Deep Things of God - Part 1 @khanpadawan | Uploaded September 2017 | Updated October 2024, 4 hours ago.
trinities.org/blog/podcast-192-review-of-sanderss-the-deep-things-of-god-part-1 Dr. Fred Sanders teaches in the Torrey Honors Institute at Biola University. His book The Deep Things of God: How the Trinity Changes Everything, has been recommended by some evangelical professors as a go-to book for evangelicals looking to deepen their understanding of “the” doctrine of the Trinity. In this episode, I start my two-part, in depth review of the book.
As I read it, the book could be summarized as the following letter:
Dear Evangelical Christian,
As you’re among the most spiritual of Christians, you already tacitly “know” everything you need to know about the Trinity. You’re as “Trinitarian” as you need to be. Congratulations! You can rest assured that the doctrine is as biblical as can be. Trust me – if you pick up the Bible, you’ll just see the Trinity everywhere in it. And you really don’t need to worry about any silly, distracting “logical” or “mathematical” difficulties, which wrongly presuppose that the Trinity is no more than a set of dry, abstract propositions, and not the very substance, size, shape, diameter, smell, texture, flavor, color, sheen, hypotenuse, center, circumference, substructure, glossy coating, chocolatey center, shine, and timbre of the Gospel. You just need to be reminded of how Trinitarian the gospel is, and how very Trinitarian your evangelical heritage is. Having been so reminded, you can again let any Trinitarian thoughts recede to the background of your mind, and you can carry on as before. Just try not to confuse together the “Persons” of the Trinity or slump down to some sort of sub-Trinitarian level of thinking. Keep in mind the differences between the Three, but remember that they’re the one God. If this doesn’t make sense to you, not to worry – C.S. Lewis has your back! God is one person, God is three persons – no problem. You see, claims which appear incoherent to us, may well seem coherent to God. There’s your defense, you beautiful Trinitarian, you! Celebrate your Trinitarian Evangelical heritage, and turn your thoughts often towards the Happy Land of the Trinity!
Love,
Fred
That’s the thrust of the book, but there’s a lot more to say about it. In this episode I discuss the book’s presuppositions, and a crucial distinction when it comes to clear thinking about the Trinity: the use of “Trinity” as a singular referring term, which goes hand in hand with thinking the Trinity to be the one God, vs. the earlier use of “Trinity” as a plural referring term, referring to the triad of God (aka “the Father”), his Son, and his Spirit (or spirit), which is compatible with unitarian and trinitarian theologies. I also discuss the book’s main thesis that the Trinity is the gospel (and vice-versa), and note some crucial scholarly information that Dr. Sanders seems to deliberately leave out.
Links for this episode @ trinities.org/blog/podcast-192-review-of-sanderss-the-deep-things-of-god-part-1
The Deep Things of God: How the Trinity Changes Everything (2nd ed.)
Dr. Sanders’s website
Dr. Sanders’s blog Scriptorum Daily
What is the Trinity? (Amazon, other sellers)
podcast 124 – a challenge to “Jesus is God” apologists
podcast 126 – What is an evangelical? With Kermit Zarley
The evolution of my views on the Trinity
What is essential to the gospel according to Luke [in his book Acts]?
Isaac Watts, “A Solemn Address to the Deity“
podcast 174 – The First Sirmian creed (351)
podcast 173 – Eusebius of Caesarea
podcast 172 – The Creed of the Long Lines (344)
Channing vs. Stuart on the Trinity and the Incarnation
John 17:1-3
1 Corinthians 8:4-6
Ephesians 1:3-14
John 20:17
Thomas McCall’s Which Trinity? Whose Monotheism?
podcast 27 – Interview with Dr. William Hasker about his Metaphysics and the Tripersonal God – Part 1
“Trinity” in The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, in The Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy, and in The Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy.
James Anderson’s Paradox in Christian Theology
Robert Letham’s The Holy Trinity: In Scripture, History, Theology, and Worship
How Trinity theories conflict with the New Testament
podcast 146 – Jesus as an Exemplar of Faith in the New Testament
podcast 189 – The unfinished business of the Reformation
21st Century Reformation
This week’s thinking music is “Rotisserie Graveyard” by Doctor Turtle.
This week's thinking music is "Rotisserie Graveyard" by Doctor Turtle. freemusicarchive.org/music/Doctor_Turtle/The_Double-Down_Two-Step/Rotisserie_Graveyard freemusicarchive.org/music/Doctor_Turtle
trinities.org/blog/podcast-192-review-of-sanderss-the-deep-things-of-god-part-1 Dr. Fred Sanders teaches in the Torrey Honors Institute at Biola University. His book The Deep Things of God: How the Trinity Changes Everything, has been recommended by some evangelical professors as a go-to book for evangelicals looking to deepen their understanding of “the” doctrine of the Trinity. In this episode, I start my two-part, in depth review of the book.
As I read it, the book could be summarized as the following letter:
Dear Evangelical Christian,
As you’re among the most spiritual of Christians, you already tacitly “know” everything you need to know about the Trinity. You’re as “Trinitarian” as you need to be. Congratulations! You can rest assured that the doctrine is as biblical as can be. Trust me – if you pick up the Bible, you’ll just see the Trinity everywhere in it. And you really don’t need to worry about any silly, distracting “logical” or “mathematical” difficulties, which wrongly presuppose that the Trinity is no more than a set of dry, abstract propositions, and not the very substance, size, shape, diameter, smell, texture, flavor, color, sheen, hypotenuse, center, circumference, substructure, glossy coating, chocolatey center, shine, and timbre of the Gospel. You just need to be reminded of how Trinitarian the gospel is, and how very Trinitarian your evangelical heritage is. Having been so reminded, you can again let any Trinitarian thoughts recede to the background of your mind, and you can carry on as before. Just try not to confuse together the “Persons” of the Trinity or slump down to some sort of sub-Trinitarian level of thinking. Keep in mind the differences between the Three, but remember that they’re the one God. If this doesn’t make sense to you, not to worry – C.S. Lewis has your back! God is one person, God is three persons – no problem. You see, claims which appear incoherent to us, may well seem coherent to God. There’s your defense, you beautiful Trinitarian, you! Celebrate your Trinitarian Evangelical heritage, and turn your thoughts often towards the Happy Land of the Trinity!
Love,
Fred
That’s the thrust of the book, but there’s a lot more to say about it. In this episode I discuss the book’s presuppositions, and a crucial distinction when it comes to clear thinking about the Trinity: the use of “Trinity” as a singular referring term, which goes hand in hand with thinking the Trinity to be the one God, vs. the earlier use of “Trinity” as a plural referring term, referring to the triad of God (aka “the Father”), his Son, and his Spirit (or spirit), which is compatible with unitarian and trinitarian theologies. I also discuss the book’s main thesis that the Trinity is the gospel (and vice-versa), and note some crucial scholarly information that Dr. Sanders seems to deliberately leave out.
Links for this episode @ trinities.org/blog/podcast-192-review-of-sanderss-the-deep-things-of-god-part-1
The Deep Things of God: How the Trinity Changes Everything (2nd ed.)
Dr. Sanders’s website
Dr. Sanders’s blog Scriptorum Daily
What is the Trinity? (Amazon, other sellers)
podcast 124 – a challenge to “Jesus is God” apologists
podcast 126 – What is an evangelical? With Kermit Zarley
The evolution of my views on the Trinity
What is essential to the gospel according to Luke [in his book Acts]?
Isaac Watts, “A Solemn Address to the Deity“
podcast 174 – The First Sirmian creed (351)
podcast 173 – Eusebius of Caesarea
podcast 172 – The Creed of the Long Lines (344)
Channing vs. Stuart on the Trinity and the Incarnation
John 17:1-3
1 Corinthians 8:4-6
Ephesians 1:3-14
John 20:17
Thomas McCall’s Which Trinity? Whose Monotheism?
podcast 27 – Interview with Dr. William Hasker about his Metaphysics and the Tripersonal God – Part 1
“Trinity” in The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, in The Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy, and in The Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy.
James Anderson’s Paradox in Christian Theology
Robert Letham’s The Holy Trinity: In Scripture, History, Theology, and Worship
How Trinity theories conflict with the New Testament
podcast 146 – Jesus as an Exemplar of Faith in the New Testament
podcast 189 – The unfinished business of the Reformation
21st Century Reformation
This week’s thinking music is “Rotisserie Graveyard” by Doctor Turtle.
This week's thinking music is "Rotisserie Graveyard" by Doctor Turtle. freemusicarchive.org/music/Doctor_Turtle/The_Double-Down_Two-Step/Rotisserie_Graveyard freemusicarchive.org/music/Doctor_Turtle
