Journal: Journal of Discipleship and Family Ministry
Volume: JDFM 01:2 (Spring 2011)
Article: The Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit: The Trinity as Theological Foundation for Family Ministry
Author: Bruce A. Ware

JFM 1:2 (Spring 2011) p. 6

The Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit:
The Trinity as Theological Foundation for
Family Ministry

Bruce A. Ware

Bruce A. Ware (Ph.D., Fuller Theological Seminary) has served as Professor of Christian Theology at The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary since 1998. Previously, he taught at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School, Western Seminary, and Bethel Theological Seminary. He has served the broader evangelical community as president of the Evangelical Theological Society. His scholarly writings are wide-ranging, with several books focusing on the attributes of God, divine providence, and the doctrine of the Trinity. He has also authored Big Truths for Young Hearts (Crossway). He is a member of Clifton Baptist Church. He has been married to Jodi since 1978; they have two grown daughters and one granddaughter. His favorite activities have involved his family—reading, hiking, singing, and travelling together.

The title of this article may raise some immediate questions in the minds of readers: Is there really a connection between the doctrine of the Trinity and the design and practice of family ministry?1 To many persons, the Trinity seems to be nearly impossible to understand and quite removed from real life issues. How could the Trinity truly be relevant to anything that takes place in our daily lives, including the issues related to church and family ministry?

It may come as something of a surprise to some readers that the doctrine of the Trinity is really and truly one of the most practical doctrines in the whole of what we believe in the Christian faith. Why? Because the Trinity helps us to understand how the Persons of the Godhead—the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit—relate to one another and so work in this world, as well as how the triune God has designed many relationships among us humans to take place. Wherever you have human relationships— which is about everywhere you look!—you have the opportunity to ask, “How do relationships among the trinitarian Persons help us understand how our relationships are to be lived out in ways that better reflect something of the triune God and better express God’s designed purposes for us, his human creatures made in his image?”

In order to see how the doctrine of the Trinity is foundational for family ministry, we will consider three areas. First, a brief summary of the doctrine of the Trinity will clarify what it is that Christians ought to believe. Second, we will consider some broad areas of trinitarian relationships in order to see how the doctrine of Trinity provides helpful example and instruction for how we should live in relationship with others. Finally, we will explore how truths about the Trinity, rightly u...