A Trinitarian Redemption

By God’s unique plan, the means of our salvation requires the involvement of all three persons of the Trinity. Before the world was even created, God knew his yet-to-be-created humans would need to be redeemed from the way of sin they would choose. So, an agreement was made within the Trinity that, when the time was right, the redemption plan of the Father would be initiated. Peter alludes to this in his first epistle when he tells us we were redeemed, not with perishable things, but with the “precious blood of Christ,” going on to say (1 Peter 1:21) that “He was chosen before the creation of the world, but was revealed in these last times for your sake.” The second person of the Trinity was chosen before the worlds were created to provide our salvation.”

The Old Testament ceremonial law and sacrificial system were designed in the mind of God to point to the coming Savior who would be the final sacrifice for sin. With Jesus’ birth, perfect life, death, resurrection, and ascension, there are no more bulls and goats needed and no more temple (which was destroyed by the Romans less than 40 years after Jesus’ ascension and never rebuilt). No longer needed. The Holy One to whom the sacrifices pointed had come to earth to work out complete righteousness for us. We simply have to recognize and accept it.

God knew, though, that however desperately humans needed his forgiveness and the salvation offered through Jesus, they would not, of their own accord, be able to reach out to receive it. This is where the work of the third person of the Trinity, the Holy Spirit, is required. He is the one who draws us to the Savior we need so much. In John Owen’s words, “He (God the Father) sends them his Holy Spirit, to quicken them (John 6:61), to cause them that are ‘dead to hear his voice’ (John 5:25), and to work in them whatever is required of them to make them partakers of his righteousness and accepted with God.”*

When we respond to the Spirit’s call upon our hearts and accept the redemption offered by Jesus Christ, we are reconciled to the Father for all of eternity. It is a plan conceived in the Father’s loving heart, carried out by the grace and sacrificial generosity of Jesus, and made accessible to us by the power of the Holy Spirit – our invitation to enter the fellowship of the Triune God!

“In that we are members of the mystical body of Christ, we see the joyful love of the Father through the eyes of the Son. And with every breath, we breathe the Holy Spirit.” -Carl McColman

*John Owen, Communion with God (Fearn, Ross-shire, Scotland: Christian Focus Publications), p. 270.