In our last article we wrote somewhat about the Trinity ac­cording to article 8 of our Confession of Faith, and further proof of this article is given in the ninth article. This doctrine of the Trinity is very important. If this is undermined, as so often happens in our days, then the whole work of salvation is demolished. Why is this true? Because then there is no room for the Covenant of Grace, which is rooted in the Trinity, nor is there room for the merits of the Covenant. Then the preaching of the Gospel is in vain, because God's justice is not satisfied and therefore we can never be reconciled with God. Many more reasons could be added, but we hope you will understand that everything regarding our salvation is related to the doctrine of the Trinity.

And yet there are so many who mock with it, because they do not understand it. In trying to ex­plain and understand it, we will find that it is impossible to comprehend the Triune God. If it were possible, He would no longer be God! It is a mystery written in God's Word, and it is not up to us to fathom it, but what a blessing when we may come to know the certainty and an experimental knowledge of it!

In these days there are more who discuss faith than who have experienced faith. A child of God with exercises of faith has more knowledge of the spiritual things than a person with only much study. It can happen that a child of God, poor and ignorant in natural things, has more know­ledge than many professors in theology, when they miss the true knowledge. God's Word says, "The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom."

God has revealed Himself as the Triune God in His Word, but also in the heart of His children in the further way of discovery. John wrote, "And this is life eternal, that they might know Thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, Whom Thou hast sent."

The 9^th article proves that which we have heard in article 8, namely, God is one in Essence, but three in Persons. This proof is given in two ways: first, the testimony of God's Word, and second, the testimony in us or the experience of the church. Let us first consider the proofs given in God's Word.

We know that there is a difference in clearness between the Old and New Testaments in several respects, but there are no contradictions. Augustine wrote: The New Testament is hidden in the Old Testament, and the New Testament reveals the Old Testament. The doctrine of the Trinity is clearer in the New Testament, but we can also find proofs of it in the Old Testament. If this were not possible, then the believers of those days could not know that God was a God of perfect salvation. They, too, had knowledge and experience of the works of the Triune God.

We need only look in the very beginning of the Bible for this. Genesis 1:1 states, "In the begin­ning God created the heaven and the earth." God (Elohiem) is plural. The work of creation is especially ascribed to God the Father, the first Person in the Divine Being. Then Genesis 1:2, "And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters." The Spirit points to the third Person of the Divine Being. And lastly, Genesis 1:3, "And God said." Does not the Lord speak through His Son? Thus the first verses of God's Word are already revealing something of this mystery of a Triune God.

In several other texts the Lord speaks of Himself in the plural, such as Genesis 1:26, "Let us make man in Our image," and Genesis 3:22, "Man is become as one of Us." This is not the pluralis majestatis, the plural which is used by kings. For example, when the Queen of the Nether­lands speaks officially, she says, We, Juliana, Queen of the Neth­erlands. This points to the many high offices which she holds. This plural is not known in the Hebrew, and this is not the intention of the Lord. In their explanation of this, the Jews have said that the Lord could have been speaking to the angels, but there is no ground for this at all. In Isaiah 40 it is made very clear that the Lord did not ask the angels for counsel, "Who has directed the Spirit of the Lord, or being his counsellor hath taught Him?"

These are a few of the many texts where the Lord speaks of Himself in the plural, showing that there is more than one Person in the Divine Being. There are also texts where the names of God and God, or Lord and Lord are distinguished, such as Genesis 19:24, "Then the Lord rained upon Sodom and Gomorrah brimstone and fire from the Lord out of heaven." The first name Lord is the Angel of the Covenant, the Lord Jesus, Who had visited Abraham; the second is God the Father in heaven. In Psalm 45:7 and in Psalm 110:1 we find the same distinctions.

More evident are those texts where three distinctions are made in the Divine Essence. In the Old Testamentical blessing (Numbers 6) the Name of the Lord is used three times. Is this not a testimony that there is a Triune God? Especially in Psalm 33:6 it is very clear: "By the Word of the Lord the heavens were made and all the host of them by the breath of His mouth." The Lord is the first Person, the Word the second Person, and the breath of His mouth is the third Person of the Divine Being. We cannot, of course, mention all the texts in the Old Testament which speak of the Trinity, as there are many more. Especially the prophet Isaiah has spoken of it (Isaiah 33:22, 48:16, 61:1, and 63:9 & 10).

One theologian said: The recognition of the Trinity is not dependent on manifold texts. We find the Divinity of the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost all over in the Bible, just as we see many colors in the rainbow. Our confession says: "All this we know, as well from the testimonies of Holy Writ, as from their operations, and chiefly by those we feel in ourselves." What a blessing it would be, young people, when we had not only obtained an historical knowledge from the Bible about the Trinity, but that we experienced this work in our hearts under the administration of the Holy Spirit.

The Lord still works in our days! This is His promise to the end of the world. May we become a subject of this also in the days of our youth.