Is the trinity like one person with three roles?

Question: Does Central not believe that God the Father, Jesus the Son, and the Holy Spirit is like an egg, 3 parts but still one? I am Frankie the daughter, wife, mother but still the woman I was born. I have 3 parts but just one person. God the Holy Spirit stayed in heaven while He took on man form as Jesus that walked the earth. We cannot see 2 faces when we get to heaven but the shining precious face of Jesus.

Answer: No, Central does not believe that. It is a common way of expressing the concept of the Trinity but I believe it is an inadequate way of dealing with the truths of Scripture. For example, John 1:1 says, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” We see equality with God in the last phrase (equality of nature, I believe) but we see the Word, Jesus, being with God, which indicates distinctness of person. Though I am a father, a son, and a husband, I cannot be with myself in any qualitative sense. When Jesus prayed to the Father, was he really just talking to himself? When he said that the Father knew the day of his return but he did not (Mark 13:32), that indicates that there was a distinction between them. They are not the same person.

The historic teaching of the church on the Trinity is that there are three persons who share the same undivided nature (deity). They have been in union and fellowship with one another from all eternity. They worked together to create the universe and create us. One member of this trinity also took on human nature in addition to divine nature and died on the cross for us. Neither the Father nor the Spirit did that, but they were all part of the plan and execution of the plan. Each had different roles in the plan.

We will see Jesus’ face in heaven, but we will also then, with spiritual eyes in spiritual, resurrected bodies, be able to see the Father and the Holy Spirit.

Here is a link to several articles I wrote on this subject that may be of help.

Follow up question: I believe it is three but all in Jesus. We will be able to see the Father and the Holy Spirit in Jesus. There cannot to me be Jesus standing there or sitting, then the Father and then the Holy Spirit. We would all be running around crazy looking back and forth. I think our focus will totally be on Jesus. Scripture says Me and my Father are one, if you have seen me you have seen the Father. Oh well, Jesus is the way and we believe in Him so that is what counts.

Follow up answer: The Bible says that Jesus is sitting at the right hand of God the Father. In the book of Revelation as the Father sits enthroned the Lamb comes to him to receive the scroll with seven seals (Rev.5:6,7). There is no problem in Scripture having them sitting or standing next to each other. When Jesus said, “I and the Father are one” (John 10:30), he used the neuter form of the word “one.” If he had used the masculine, it could possibly be interpreted that he meant he and the Father were the same person. But in using the neuter he was stating that he and the Father were the same thing, which can be interpreted to mean, the same substance or essence. They are different persons, as the Scriptures clearly teach. But they share the same essence. This is obviously something difficult, if not impossible, for us to grasp. But what would we expect from the infinite God. If He were completely understandable to us, He would not be God.