Communicating the Trinity

After the worship service, Kazuko¹ and I were sipping green tea and chatting in the church kitchen. She had been a Jehovah’s Witness for years, but she had begun to ask questions after her husband recently told her she was being brainwashed. So she decided to visit our Thursday morning Bible study, and eventually she also came on Sundays. Over tea, she told me that she enjoyed the worship services and studying the Bible with the Japanese pastor, but added that she still couldn’t accept the “illogical” doctrine of the Trinity. She was surprised when I replied that I thought the Trinity doctrine was both logical and essential for understanding the Bible.

From her years with the Jehovah’s Witnesses, Kazuko had come to believe that the Trinity doctrine was illogical, non-biblical, and invented by heretics in the fourth century. She had learned some of the biblical basis for the Trinity from her studies with our Japanese pastor, but she still felt that it was a contradiction of logic and impossible to believe. Even though my Japanese was quite limited at the time, I felt the Holy Spirit prompting me to try to help her to understand. With a piece of paper, a pen, and a pair of scissors in hand, I began to share. What follows below is an expanded version of the lesson I shared that day.

Mr. Flat’s World (Taira-kun no Sekai)²

In small groups, you can draw Taira-kun and his world as you speak. For larger groups, I prepare foam board sketches ahead of time (see photos). For details, see my bilingual, three-message series, The Trinity God, on YouTube.³

1. Imagine that a young man named Taira-kun lives in a two-dimensional world. (Draw Taira-kun and his world. Include some clouds, grass, and a sun. Make sure everything is depicted as being within a two-dimensional world.⁴)
2. Can you imagine what Taira-kun’s world is like? It is a flat world, a two-dimensional plane.
3. If I add a triangle, what does Taira-kun see? He sees only a line. (Draw a triangle and then hold the picture almost edge-on to help people imagine what Taira-kun sees.)
4. What if I add a circle and a square? To Taira-kun, it looks like three lines. (Draw a circle and a square and tilt the picture again. Make sure everyone understands.⁵)
5. Since Taira-kun sees only three lines, how can he tell the difference between the triangle, the square, and the circle? Maybe he will walk around the objects and feel for the corners.
6. What if I cut a hole and put my finger through Taira-kun’s world? He will still see only a line since he cannot see above or below the hole. (Cut a hole and put your finger through the hole, then tilt the picture to help people see Taira-kun’s view.)
7. What if I cut more holes and move my finger between the holes? Taira-kun will see a line that magically appears, disappears, and then reappears in a different spot. (Cut two more holes and move your finger between the three holes to demonstrate.)
8. What if I put fingers in all three holes? Taira-kun will see three lines. (Put fingers through all three holes and tilt the picture to demonstrate.)
9. Now, imagine that one of my fingers speaks to Taira-kun and says, “You see three lines, but we are really one hand.” I can offer evidence of my power by performing my appearing and disappearing “miracle” and “creating” new triangles and other things in his world, but I cannot prove to Taira-kun that my message is true because he cannot rise above his two-dimensional world to see my hand.
10. Will Taira-kun believe my message? What do you think? (Let people give different answers; encourage them to think about it and share.)
11. Taira-kun cannot see the reality of my hand because he is only two-dimensional. Similarly, we would not be able to see the reality of a four-dimensional being.
12. How many dimensions does God have? We don’t know. Maybe God has infinite dimensions. The difference between God and us is much greater than the difference between us and Taira-kun. The Bible doesn’t tell us how many dimensions God has, but it does reveal that God is transcendent over space and time. The Bible also records many miracles of God, but for God, these miracles may be as simple as when I moved my finger between holes to appear and disappear in Taira-kun’s world.
13. In the Bible, God reveals himself as God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit. There are many verses that show this—one is Matthew 28:19, where Jesus commanded, “Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit” (NIV). There are three persons in this verse, but “name” is singular. In another place, the Bible says, “Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one” (Deuteronomy 6:4).
14. God reveals that he is one being but three persons. This is the Trinity—three persons in one God. It is not illogical; it simply recognizes that God is transcendent over our world.
15. While we have Taira-kun with us, let’s learn another lesson. Do you think Taira-kun is lonely? I think he needs a wife. (Draw a wife for Taira-kun.)
16. They are a happy couple, so they hug a lot. But no matter how close they get to each other, I can get even closer to both of them. I can see inside their heads; I can touch their hearts. (Place fingers where their hearts would be.)
17. Similarly, God can see inside our minds and hearts; he can see our thoughts and feelings. God knows us perfectly, inside and outside.
18. When we invite Jesus into our hearts, he is with us forever and he remakes us as new people from the inside out. (Touch the happy couple’s hearts again.)

Conclusion

That day I shared with Kazuko in the church kitchen, she seemed excited by our talk and said she would think about it. A few months later, Kazuko was baptized. Afterwards she thanked me, saying that the Taira’s World lesson had been very helpful. Since then, I have used variations of this lesson a number of times, and it is always well received.

Like most attempts to explain the Trinity, the Taira’s World lesson relies on an analogy. Like all analogies, it breaks down if examined too closely—for example, my three fingers are parts of my hand, but the members of the Trinity are not “parts” of God. However, the power of the Taira’s World lesson is that it is not really an explanation of the Trinity. Instead, it is an analogy that shows why we have trouble understanding the Trinity. Used together with other Trinity explanations, I think it can be helpful for many Japanese.

Whatever approach is used, I think it is essential that we do our best to help people understand the Trinity. For most of Christian history, the Trinity doctrine has been the clear line of division between true Christianity and pseudo-Christian fringe groups. If we fail to teach the Trinity, we leave our congregations vulnerable to the pseudo-Christian groups of our time.

1. This name has been changed to protect privacy.
2. I first developed this lesson after reading Edwin Abbot’s classic book, Flatland: A Romance of Many Dimensions. Others have developed similar talks with roots in the same book.
3. Direct link to my bilingual series on the Trinity: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL5tX4VD4w87UP143TcxXt8OC5pwO5tZdr (accessed Sept. 15, 2020).
4. Practice ahead of time to avoid mistakes (e.g., a face should be drawn as a side-view silhouette. Otherwise Taira-kun is looking up out of his two-dimensional world, which is impossible for him).
5. My experience is that Japanese find it easier than Westerners to imagine a two-dimensional world, but almost everyone gets the idea within a few minutes.

Photos submitted by author