BIBLE NUMERICS
The Number THREE
Two and One is Three. A division in unity or a unity in division is a
trinitarian formula making three. We have this thing very much in
evidence in the Trinity itself. The Trinity is only divided at the
second one. The Bible says God is a spirit (John 4), and then we read
that the Holy Spirit is spirit; but the Son was a man. There is your
division. One, two--division. There is a tri-nature, a tri-unity, a
trinity. Three stands for something else, but notice that two is
division. Now, I realize that there is no controversy in the Godhead.
I realize that the Holy Spirit is referred to as the Lord in the book
of Acts where Agatha says, "Thus saith the Holy Ghost." I realize that
the Holy Spirit is referred to as the Lord in I Corinthians where it
says, "the Lord is that Spirit." I realize the Lord Jesus Christ is
the Everlasting Father and so forth and so on. But from the practical
standpoint, the only one of the three who appears in flesh, actually
walking around (I mean, the flesh itself), is the Son. Now, Jesus
said, "He that hath seen me hath seen the Father," but of course He
wasn't referring to the Father's body, but the Father's soul. He said,
"The Father dwelleth in me and I in him," and "As I live by the
Father, so you'll live by me." The Lord Jesus Christ is the duo in the
Trinity. The divider is that one member of the Trinity who becomes
flesh and dies. God can't die. There is your division.
Then three brings a thing back together. Three universally is a lucky
number. I don't know of any language or any nation or tribe anywhere
in the world where three is considered to be an unlucky number. Three
is a basic structure for things. Time is divided into three: past,
present, and future. Space is divided into three: breadth, length, and
width, those three. Man has a tri-parted nature: body, soul, and
spirit. God the Father has a trinitarian nature; God the Father, God
the Son, God the Holy Ghost. You have this thing throughout
constantly, this trinitarian thing--this three that brings it back
together.
Did you ever wonder about the Bible itself? The Bible itself has two
Testaments--division: the Old Testament which ends with a curse
(Malachi 4), and the New Testament which ends, "Even so, come, Lord
Jesus. The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all. Amen."
There's real division. John says, "The law came by Moses, but grace
and truth by Jesus Christ." There is division between those
Testaments. They're not alike, but they need a third thing to top it
off. What do you reckon the third thing is?
Did you ever think about that?
There are two Testaments. Isn't that an incomplete Bible?
Do you know what the rest of that Bible is? It is Jesus Christ. How
about that? John 1:1 says that He was the Word; Revelation 19 says
that his name is called the "Word of God." He is the third Testament.
There are only two of them in print. The Bible says that in heaven
there are three that bear record, "the Father, the Word, and the Holy
Ghost." You've got an incomplete Bible without Jesus Christ. How about
that?!
The Neo-orthodox fellows put all the emphasis on Jesus Christ at the
expense of the Bible. Sometimes we fundamental, Bible-believing people
tend to put all the emphasis on the Bible at the expense of Jesus
Christ. It is both: it is the incarnate Word, and it is the carnate
word. There are three Testaments; only two are in print and the third
one completes it and brings it back to where it ought to be: Father,
Son, and Holy Spirit.
All right, three points to the Trinity. There is not much doubt about
the number three. The number three represents the Godhead, Himself, in
three persons, manifested throughout the universe in three phases.
History is divided into past, present, and future. Every verse of
scripture has three applications: historical, doctrinal, spiritual. We
find throughout the universe this three manifested.
I read a book by a man one time who insisted that time was the fourth
dimension. He didn't mean you had to go backward and forward in time
to get into another dimension. He said that reality (what you lived in
or experienced right now), was a combination of three dimensions,
making the fourth dimension. He proved that thing by taking out any
one of the other dimensions and showing you that without any one of
the other dimensions, you'd be unconscious and dead; the whole
universe would be unconscious and dead. He proved conclusively that
you can't have a line without three dimensions. There is no such thing
as a two-dimensional line. Did you ever think about that?
So a thing has to be three to be complete. That is the trouble with an
unsaved man; one part of him is missing. He is a two man; he is
divided; he is divided against himself. An unsaved man has a live body
and a dead spirit and a live soul. Only two parts of him are alive--
his soul and his body. That's division. He is not complete until he
gets a live spirit--that's a Trinity--and then he is born again.
Now these things are basic--they're fundamental. I haven't even begun
yet a discussion of chapter and verse headings in detail. I'm talking
about basic fundamental things that are apparent to anyone who reads
any Bible at all. Three stands for those things.
If you are working on a mathematical problem or a social problem or a
family problem or an ecclesiastical problem or a spiritual problem or
a problem in physics or a problem in chemistry, and the solution
escapes you, let me tell you something: Look for three sides and
you'll have it. When you don't have the answer, it is when you only
have one side or two sides. No problem is complete until the third
side has been found. Hegel worked on this. Hegel called this
"dialectic reasoning," having a Thesis, an Anti-thesis, and a
Synthesis. He began with A, opposed it with B, and got C, and thought
he had something new. He had something that is fundamental to leaf
structure and animal life. He had something that the writer of Genesis
knew about before Hegel's grandmother had the syrup taken out of her
formula. If you can't find an answer, it is because you don't have
three parts to the answer. That goes for fixing an automobile, or
sewing a dress. Three is a fundamental, fixed, mathematical figure
that controls the nature and function of reality; and so has God
ordained it and set it up, and thus shall it ever be, world without
end. Amen. It works by threes.
When a man believes properly according to Romans 10, he believes on
the "Lord Jesus Christ," not just "the good Lord," not just "my
blessed Jesus," not just "the Christ." Have you ever noticed how all
these false Christian gods have something hacked off their names? Did
you ever hear some rural Christian people say, "O, Lordy," "O the good
Lord," "Lordy, Lordy," "Lordy me," etc.? You haven't got ALL of it.
Did you ever hear these holiness folks sing, "My Jesus," "Blessed
Jesus," or "My Sweet Jesus"? That is interesting, but you have to be
careful. Did you ever hear these modernists talk about the "Christ of
Calvary," the "Christ of the open rood," etc.--meaning the spirit that
was in Christ who helped the socialists and the reformers centuries
later. You have to watch that kind of business. It is THE LORD JESUS
CHRIST. It's the Lord--so much for God the Father. It's Jesus--so much
for God the Son. It's Christos--anointed, the Holy Spirit--so much for
the Trinity. Three is a picture or revelation of the Godhead.
All of the light in this solar system and all of the heat in this
solar system have their eventual source in the sun. I'm not saying
that there aren't light bearers independent from the sun, but I'm
saying that if the sunlight went out there wouldn't be any phosphorus
in the water, or light in the lightning bugs, because the bugs would
all die. The chemical elements of the water wouldn't be there. It
would be a dead, blasted planet like the moon. I'm saying that all the
rays that come down to this earth are alpha rays, beta rays, and gamma
rays; three types of rays--light rays, heat rays, and actinic rays. It
is a manifestation, a type, of the Godhead so much so that Paul says
in Romans 1 that the invisible things of Him, God, "are clearly seen,
being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power
and Godhead; so that they are without excuse."
There is no doubt about the number Three, absolutely no doubt at all.
Index of Preacher's Help and Notes
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