Imagine living in a two-dimensional world, where everything is flat.
There is only height and width, but no depth. All of existence is contained on
a flat plane, like a huge sheet of glass which extends in all directions as far
as the eye can see.
The people living in this two-dimensional world have various shapes.
There’s Timmy Triangle, Cindy Circle, Sammy Square, Reggie Rectangle, and that
free-spirited non-conformist, Trevor Trapezoid.
These flat people can move forward and back, left and right. But in their
two-dimensional world, there is no such thing as up and down.
One day Timmy Triangle said to Cindy Circle, “Hey, guess what? Sammy
Square just told me there is someone who is made up of six separate squares but
is actually one person.”
“Impossible,” Cindy replied. “It’s either six different people or it’s
one. It can’t be both at the same time.”
“Sammy says it’s true.”
“What does he know? He’s a blockhead. And you, Mr. Triangle,” Cindy
continued, “You’re so pointy-headed you actually believe that nonsense.”
“Well, maybe it is true,” Timmy said.
“C’mon, do the math! How can six separate square people be consider one
person at the same time? It makes no sense!”
Well, she’s right. It makes no sense...in a two-dimensional world. Six
separate squares cannot at the same time be considered one thing.
But what if, unbeknownst to our flat people, there exists another
dimension? What if the third dimension, depth, really exists and the
two-dimensional flat people simply are unaware of that fact? They’ve been
living their entire lives on a single plane, going forward and back, left and
right, not realizing that they could also go up and down.
With three dimensions, you can take six separate squares and arrange them
into one cube. For we human beings, living in our three-dimensional world, this
is obvious. But to the flat people, living in their two-dimensional world, it makes
no sense. They cannot comprehend how six can equal one.
Maybe this is why it’s so hard for us to comprehend the concept of the
Holy Trinity. The Christian faith teaches one God in three persons, Father,
Son, and Holy Spirit.
Many people hear that description and say, “Oh, so Christianity is
polytheistic. You guys believe in many different gods.”
“No,” we explain, “We believe in one God, who exists in three persons.”
And just like Cindy Circle, the reply is, “Impossible. It’s either three
different gods or it’s one. It can’t be both at the same time. I knew you
Christians were blockheads.”
Maybe we’re like the flat people, constrained by our three-dimensional
time-space existence, and unaware of an additional dimension. We cannot
comprehend how one God can exist in three persons.
But from the heavenly perspective, outside of time and unconstrained by
physical dimensions, it may be plain and obvious—as obvious as us knowing that
six squares can equal one cube.
As Christians we celebrate the Feast of the Holy Trinity this week. We
celebrate it, but in all honesty, we really don’t understand it. It is an
article of faith. We believe that our eternal, all-powerful, all-knowing
Creator left the heavenly dimension in the person of Jesus Christ and entered
into our earthly three-dimensional world. He did it to guide us and teach us
and most of all to save our souls.
You see, we each have a soul. It is eternal. In our finite,
three-dimensional, time-space existence, a little bit of the next dimension has
been given to us: our souls.
Today, many folks deny this. They say the soul is fiction. They claim all
our thoughts and emotions, desires and dreams, are nothing more than complex
electro-chemical reactions formed by zillions of years of evolution.
Piffle. That’s a close-minded Cindy Circle explanation.
We should know better. We should realize that the core of our being—all
those ideas and memories and longings known as our higher consciousness—is not
purely physical and natural. There is something supernatural and spiritual
about it. It is our eternal soul.
Unlike Cindy Circle, who had no way of knowing that another dimension
existed, we have evidence that there is something beyond what we can see and
touch. We have our souls, which point us heavenward. And we have Jesus Christ,
who came from that realm to assure us that it truly does exist, and showed us
how to get there.
As it says in one of the shortest but most profound verses in the entire
Bible: “God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who
believes in him might not perish but might have eternal life.”
And as the great hymn says, “Praise the Holy Trinity, undivided unity.
Holy God, Mighty God, God immortal be adored.”
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