Greetings once more from a typical warm and balmy day in Texas! You have heard me speak of the “Triune Life” often in my blogs. Let me delve deeper into the term, and make it more plain for you.

What is the essence of the “Triune Life” which I write so much about in my Blog, Bulamanriver, The Miracle of Triune Living? It speaks of community in relations. “Triune Life” means a believer who lives the 3-dimensional life with the Triune God, as opposed to the ‘solitary’ 1-dimensional life man lives in himself. It means God, as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, lives and walks in the Bulamanriver* who lives the “Triune Life.” Man’s union with the Triune God, makes the “Triune Life” possible. It’s made possible by Jesus, who Himself from eternity, is one in substance and reality with the Triune God, who took our humanity and glorified it in the very Being of the Triune Godhead.

What is this life we share with the Triune Godhead which I call the “Triune Life,” or “Triune Living?” I think author John P Murphree best articulate what goes on in the life of the Trinity we are privileged to share, in his book, The Trinity and Human Personality. He says, “In the Trinity, each Person “occupies” the Others’ personalities (Father, Son, and Holy Spirit). This occupation is what we have called relational oneness. Each of the three Persons becomes a “home” for the other two. One is Host and the Others are Guests. As each inhabits the Others, each is Host to the Other two, and each is a guest to the Other two. It is so reciprocal that each one feels more at home with the Others’ personalities than His own. Trinitarian Persons do not exist in isolation; they live in and through one another, which makes their personalities relational. Each is “at home” with the Others. In this occupying relationship, each has intimate access to the Others’ deepest thoughts and feelings at all times” (The Trinity and Human Personality, Pg.135, emphasis added).

The Trinity Community Bound by Persons in Loving Relations. Human Relationship is Based upon the “Triune Life” of God. Rublev’s Famous Icon of The Trinity (Wiki Commons)

The very foundation of the “Triune Life” we are privileged to live through and in Christ by the Spirit’s power is a Loving relationship with the Father as described above. Murphree goes on, “Our being filled with the Spirit is patterned on the Trinitarian model, but the pattern shifts a bit, making the analogy asymmetrical. In the Trinity, each person fills or occupies the Others in the same way. But we do not fill or occupy the Spirit of God in the same way that He inhabits us. There is an important sense, however, in which we do occupy the personality of Christ. His personality becomes our emotional and spiritual home. When we are wrapped up in our own personalities, we feel like aliens, estranged from our emotional home. We are made to reside in a brighter personality than our own.” (Pg.135)

As I said on more than one occasion, as humans we stress much of what we do as to the right and wrong of individual actions, instead of seeing them as arising out of a “conditional” response. That’s the foundation from which actions are generated. This kind of autonomous thinking arises principally from the human “solitary” state of existence as opposed to the “Triune” state of being. So, the concept of spiritual occupation we read above, refers to a person being controlled by an occupying force, thus creating the “condition” which in turn generates human activity. When we are occupied by the Spirit in the flow of His Love, we come under His control. If we are occupied by the spirit of fear of the devil we come under his rule.

United in Love, believers become the Christian community or church, emulating the Trinity, hence the “Triune Life.” Like the Trinity, we discover the fullness of our identity in the discovery of each other through Christ. It is Jesus who makes our relationships personal, one-on-one, and one-in-one, creating a community that’s occupied and bonded in God’s Love.

Humans – Created to be Free and to Find Meaning In Relationships (Wiki Commons)

Beware, because of the lopsided and skewed influence of the “solitary” state of existence of humans in the world, we can get caught unawares and find we have drifted away from the life of being centered in people through Christ’s Love, into a community as a group organism. (2 Pet.3:17) One’s identity shifts from people on a one-on-one Love-basis, to a group as a group organized and dominated by the legalism of rules and do’s and don’ts. In turn, the community loses the essence and quality of Loving relationship in the Spirit, to where the group has become society. This is how religion and denominationalism, provincialism, nationalism, racism, sexism, and disruptive idealism arise and take over and rule the community.

What happens is individual freedom is lost in pursuance of the corporate ideal. It becomes more compelling than our commitment to persons, personalities and the gifts of individuals, where respect for each other’s freedom in the Loving relationship of the “Triune Life” is left on the wayside and eventually forgotten. This is how “religion” as a corporate body has taken over the group, and Jesus becomes powerless. Jesus said this about the religious leaders of His day, “Their worship is a farce, for they teach man-made ideas as commands from God. These people honor Me with their lips, but their hearts are far from Me” (Matt.15:9,8, NLB). Thus, Love is numbed and life succumbs to gradual emptiness.

We are not led by men to form cliques with humanly motivated convictions. We are led by the Spirit, as John tells us clearly, “But you have received the Holy Spirit, and He lives within you, so you don’t need anyone to teach you what is true. For the Spirit teaches you everything you need to know, and what He teaches is true–it is not a lie. So just as He has taught you, remain in fellowship with Christ” (1 John 2:27). Also the Covenant says, “No longer will they teach their neighbor, or say to one another, ‘Know the Lord,’ because they will all know me, from the least of them to the greatest” (Heb.8:11). This passage does not speak of an “every-man-for-himself” platitude, but rather it points us away from self-serving men to our true leader in the Spirit who lives in you. The unity of the Church of all Spirit-led believers are united by the Spirit, not men.

I hope you will answer the call of your Savior Jesus and participate in the inter-personal “Triune Life” He offers all humanity.

If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to write me in the space provided below, or email me on bulamanriver@gmail.com.

Blessing:

Until we meet again in my next post, may the blessings of the God who ceaselessly expresses Himself in His dependable Triune Love, be with you always. May the Spirit enliven your spirit and make all things concerning you possible as you live the Triune Life as a Bulamanriver.*  Be strong in the Lord’s joy.

Kiang,  

* Bulamanriver” is the metaphor describing the union of man with the Love of the Triune God flowing in humans, making possible the “Triune Life” – the source of the miraculous life in man. To read the many facets of life of the Bulamanriver, go to my website www.bulamanriver.com where you can order a copy of my Book.

All scriptures are taken from the NIV Version 2011, unless stated otherwise.

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