Timothy George on the Trinity

I have been reading A Theology for the Church, edited by Daniel Akin, and came across something worth sharing from Timothy George. He writes:

“Though followed by many orthodox theologians, there is a subtle danger in the former pattern (de uno deo). The danger is that it can lead to a low-grade unitarianism that reduces the doctrine of the Trinity to an afterthought. If we begin by treating the essence and attributes of God in the abstract and then come along and say, “Oh yes, this God is also a triune reality,” the latter affirmation can easily become a secondary or even dispensable element in one’s theological system…

We should introduce one further distinction before turning to some key biblical texts. The economic Trinity refers to God’s works ad extra, that is, what God has done outside himself in creation and redemption, while the immanent Trinity denotes God’s relations ad intra, that is, his eternal intratrinitarian communion as the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. The immanent Trinity is also called the “ontological” Trinity…

The doctrine of the Trinity is the necessary theological framework for understanding the biblical account of Jesus as the true story of God-and if what the Bible says about Jesus is anything other than that, we have no gospel.”

Here, George discusses the tendency to discuss the one God over and above the Trinity. On the surface, this seems harmless, but it tends to cause one to think theologically about God as a single modality instead of the triune God that He is. For God to be a solitary modality would mean something like a "low-grade unitarian." This is why the church, early on, spoke about God as one, in essence, three in person.

George also introduces the distinction between economic and immanent or ontological Trinity. The economic Trinity explains how the Father creates, the Son saves, and the Holy Spirit sustains us. It's what he means when he says that the doctrine of the Trinity is the necessary theological framework for understanding the Gospel. Foundational to everything is the ontological Trinity. The idea is that a personal God existed from all eternity, who loved, had volition, and created all things, including us, in His image.

I appreciated how George handled the doctrine of the Trinity in this section. As I read through A Theology For The Church, I found many sections to be brief, to the point, and without the complexities common in other theology texts. From the publisher:

A Theology for the Church, an immense 992-page work edited by Daniel Akin, with contributions from leading Baptist thinkers Albert Mohler, Jr., Paige Patterson, Timothy George, and many others, addresses four major issues in regard to eight Christian doctrines.

What does the Bible say? Each Christian doctrine is rooted in the Bible’s own teaching in both the Old and New Testaments.

What has the Church believed? Christians have interpreted these doctrines in somewhat different ways through the centuries.

How do the doctrines fit together? Each Christian doctrine must cohere with the other doctrines.

How does each doctrine impact the church today? Each Christian doctrine must be meaningful for today’s church. It’s sure to become a widely-used resource in systematic theology study.