Simply Trinity: The Unmanipulated Father, Son, and Spirit (Barrett)

Description

To truly know God, we must understand God as Trinity. But what if the Trinity we've been taught is not the Trinity of the Bible?

In this groundbreaking book, Matthew Barrett reveals a shocking discovery: we have manipulated the Trinity, re-creating the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit in our own image. With clarity and creativity, Barrett mines the Scriptures as well as the creeds and confessions of the faith to help us rediscover the beauty, simplicity, and majesty of our triune God. What we believe about the Trinity also has untold consequences for salvation and the Christian life.

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Contents

Acknowledgments
Foreword by Scott R. Swain

1. Trinity Drift

Part 1: How Did We Drift Away?

2. Can We Trust the God of Our Fathers? Retrieving Biblical Orthodoxy
3. Since When Did the Trinity Get Social? The Manipulated Trinity

Part 2: How Do We Find Our Way Home?

4. How Does God Reveal Himself as Trinity? Eternity and the Mystery of the Gospel
5. Why Must God Be One to Be Three? Simply Trinity
6. Is the Son Begotten from the Father? Paternity and Filiation, Part 1
7. Is Eternal Generation Central to the Gospel? Paternity and Filiation, Part 2
8. Is the Son Eternally Subordinate to the Father? A Son Worthy of Worship
9. Is the Spirit Spirated? Spiration 10. Do Father, Son, and Spirit Work Inseparably? Communion with the Indivisible Trinity

Conclusion
Glossary
Notes
Bibliography

Endorsements

"The Trinity is one of the Bible's more challenging doctrines, and yet Matthew Barrett ably guides readers through the issues to present clear and cogent teaching. He opens the treasures of the past and draws on patristic, medieval, Reformation, and contemporary theologians to explain the doctrine of the Trinity. But he also usefully shows where some have gone astray and charitably speaks the truth in love. People would do well to read this book and plumb the depths of the Bible's teaching on the nature of our triune God."
—J. V. Fesko, professor of systematic and historical theology, Reformed Theological Seminary, Jackson, MS

"Simply Trinity successfully aims to put the church back on the path of confessional fidelity. Matthew Barrett helps us understand that how we read the Bible and whom we read it with is imperative to beholding the triune Author who reveals himself to us in his Word. You will see how our understanding of God affects our understanding of salvation and what we forfeit if we get it wrong."
—Aimee Byrd, author of Theological Fitness and Recovering from Biblical Manhood and Womanhood

"I hope this accessible book is widely read and discussed, especially by evangelicals. It will challenge some things taught in recent decades. But Barrett's arguments from Scripture and tradition are to be taken seriously, since we all long for our speech and worship of the triune God to be faithful."
—Kelly M. Kapic, Covenant College

"Simply Trinity delivers an accessible scholarly introduction to historic and biblical understandings of the Trinity, and demonstrates how much is at stake in the trinitarian debates that have recently roiled the evangelical community. I recommend it highly."
—Thomas S. Kidd, Baylor University

About the Author

Matthew Barrett is associate professor of Christian theology at Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary. He is the author of None Greater; Canon, Covenant, and Christology; and God's Word Alone. He is also the executive editor of Credo magazine and the host of the Credo podcast.