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by Jamsback on January 25th, 2007

Jamsback

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Help answer this question below.

Am I not a Christian if I do not believe in the Holy Trinity, even though I try every day to live a good Christian life? If so, please guide me to WHERE in the Holy Bible it tells me this. What denominations do not believe this?

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Answers. 19 helpful answers below.

  • by TheVirginian on April 23rd, 2007

    TheVirginian

    GREAT QUESTIONS! I'll answer mainly your secondary question, 'what religions do not believe in the Trinity.' Jehovah's Witnesses for one do not accept the "Trinity". That's NOT to say they don't believe in God, Jesus and the Holy Spirit. They DO! And, they are Christians. (That answers your base question. "Yes, you can be a Christian and not believe in the Trinity.") Jehovah's Witnesses believe that Jehovah is God Almighty, the Sovereign of the Universe, the Creator of all things, and that Jesus is Jehovah's firstborn son who had a heavenly existence prior to his birth to the virgin Mary. Jesus Christ is the promised Messiah, and offered his perfect life as a ransom on behalf of all mankind; he is indeed our Savior. JW's believe the Holy Spirit is God's active force and not a "person". Check out this more detailed explanation: http://www.watchtower.org/library/ti/article_03.htm. Also, go to their Official Web Site www.watchtower.org and "search" on "Trinity" for more articles.

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  • by Valparaiso on January 25th, 2007

    Valparaiso

    To be a Christian you only need to accept Christ as your savior.

    The holy trinity is based off the fact that Jesus said "The father and I are one" and often displayed many powers that a human just couldn't have or be trusted with. We also belive that a person that was only human could not have led a perfect life as Jesus did. Hence we belive that Jesus is 100% human and 100% God.

    The Holy Spirit is added in there because you explain what the holy spirit is if it is not a way that God deals with us.

    I don't know what denominations don't belive in the trinity but they are out there. Just run a search or something.

    If you have any other questions about the holy trinity then please don't hesitate to ask me. But no I don't belive you have to belive in the Holy Trinity to be a good Christian or for me to accept you as a Christian. Most Christians do however belive in the trinity.

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  • by Dennis on April 23rd, 2007

    Dennis

    The Trinity is not specifically defined in the Bible although there are numerous places that point towards this doctrine. The doctrine was defined by the early church and codified in the Nicene Creed. If you don't accept the doctrine of the Trinity you are not an orthodox Christian.

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  • by ...trust in the Lord Jesus Christ. on April 7th, 2007

    ...trust in the Lord Jesus Christ.

    Read 1 John 5:7 in the good old King James Version of the Bible. Some of the corrupted new versions of the Bible change, remove, or corrupt this verse in some way, that's one of the reasons I only use the KJV. You may find that many verses in the Bible (OT and NT) support the doctrine of the Trintiy. 1 John 5:7 is one of them. Thank you and God bless you!

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  • by Thom64 on February 2nd, 2007

    Thom64

    Trying to "live a good Christian life" does not count for anything if Jesus was right. He said he would reject many who would claim to have done all kinds of good stuff: "did we not prophesy in Your name, and in Your name cast out demons, and in Your name perform many miracles?' "And then I will declare to them, 'I never knew you.'" (Matt 7:22,23)

    Passages like this lead many Christians to say that Christianity is not a religion, but a relationship. Jesus said the greatest commandment is to "Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind."

    Typically, trinitarian teachers would say that if you don't know who God is as revealed in the Bible, you can't really be as committed to loving and serving God as that greatest commandment requires. Those who reject the doctrine of the Trinity should disagree and debate - but at least have the courtesy to acknowledge that these teachers are right to teach and defend what they believe the Bible teaches about God.

    I believe this is why the Trinity is considered one of the essentials of Christian doctrine by most Christian denominations: there really are people and groups who decide what they want God to be and then interpret the Bible to support what they want to believe. This is not loving and serving God, and it is people like this I imagine Jesus will rebuke: "I never knew you." If you genuinely, sincerely, selflessly seek to know God by studying the Bible, I trust God to forgive honest misconceptions.

    One further thought: if God really is the eternal, all-knowing creator of the heavens and Earth (as the Bible pretty clearly says), we should not expect to be able to comprehend all that implies. One person told me he had reasoned out everything there is to know about God. I don't believe we have words or even concepts in our language to describe such a being - and we should not expect the psychology or personality of such a God to be limited to anything we see in creation. If there are not things about God you don't understand, I think your concept of God is too small.

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  • by Anonymous on February 11th, 2009

    Anonymous

    In Revelations 3:14, in Jesus' own words, He is the beginning of God's creation. There is another verse in the New Testament where it states God in-dwelled Jesus and created everything through and for Him.
    Most Christians will try to make you feel guilty and ignorant if you say you don't believe that Jesus is Deity.
    They are convinced that the "concept" of the Trinity is in the Bible but in actuality, it is not. They are individual beings.
    Jesus was the I Am because He was the first creation of His God the Father. He did communicate with those His Father God created through and for Him. He states His Father God is a Spirit and that His Father God is the only true God.
    He states that He is one with His Father just as He wishes us to be one with Him. Does that make us Deity? No. That doesn't make Him Deity either.
    Jesus is the Son of God the Father as He created Him. Jesus is called God's Christ in heaven by the angels.
    Looking at the Bible this way makes everything fall into place and there are no longer discrepancies. Gee how Satan hates that.
    Jesus is incredibly special and He is perfect because He has a special place with His Father and was the first. He is God's special one.
    When Jesus was asked if he called himself God, he stated, did I not call you gods? This refers to Prophets who allowed God's word to come through their mouths. Jesus was God even more so because He allowed His Father God to work through and speak through Him without any resistance.
    Apparently, the whole concept of the Trinity as being a Creed for Christianity was voted on and the tie breaker vote went to the Trinity. If not for that we would not be considered Christians if we did consider Jesus to be Deity.
    This vote occurred over three hundred years after Jesus was sacrificed and rose again.
    He told the world that His Father God was our Father God.
    What does it take for people to HEAR Jesus?

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  • by Sharona Life is a Tale Told by an Idiot on June 3rd, 2009

    Sharona Life is a Tale Told by an Idiot

    I don't think it's a question of whether you believe it or not, but that you may not understand what it is. It is a description of God and different aspects of the one God. God the Father represents God as creator. Do you believe God created us and everything? I bet you do. Next there is God the son. Now there are going to be a lot of Christians that are gonna fight me on this. Whatever. God the Son represents mankind. I am not saying we have reached the level of the Father, but Christ on earth represents God in human form. God can take any form he chooses of course, but each and every human being has the essense of God within, the soul. God created us in His image and likeness. The soul represents our eternal selves. Do you believe that? And finally God as Holy Spirit, represents the "ether" or what is left without the material. If you think of the parts that we can see, even under a microscope, that is the material. When you think of the unseen, the unfathomable beyond material, that is the Holy Spirit. Its all part of the mystery that is God.

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  • by iwnit on June 4th, 2009

    iwnit

    "Nontrinitarianism (or Antitrinitarianism) includes all Christian belief systems that reject as non-scriptural, wholly or partly, the doctrine of the Trinity—the doctrine that the God of the Bible is three distinct entities in one being, and that these three entities are eternal and equal in nature, authority, and knowledge.

    The absence of the Trinity is not of necessary importance to all nontrinitarians. Persons and groups espousing this position generally do not refer to themselves affirmatively by the term. The Unitarians have adopted a name that speaks of their belief in God as subsisting in a theological or cosmic unity. Modern nontrinitarian views differ widely on the nature of God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit.

    Various nontrinitarian views existed from the time of Jesus, such as Adoptionism, Monarchianism, and Arianism, which existed prior to the formal definition of the Trinity as doctrine in AD 325. Nontrinitarianism was later renewed in the Gnosticism of the Cathars in the 11th through 13th centuries, in the Age of Enlightenment of the 18th century, and in Restorationism during the 19th century."

    "Nontrinitarian followers of Jesus fall into roughly four different groups:

    - Some believe that Jesus is not God, instead believing that he was a messenger from God, or Prophet, or the perfect created human. This view was espoused by ancient sects such as the Ebionites. A specific form of Nontrinitarianism is Arianism, which had become the dominant view in some regions in the time of the Roman Empire. Arianism taught the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit but held that the Son was not co-eternal with the Father. However, Arians did not consider worship of Jesus as wrong.[citation needed] Another early form of Nontrinarianism was Monarchianism.
    - Others believe that the one God who revealed himself in the Old Testament as Jehovah revealed himself in his Son, Jesus Christ. This is a doctrine known originally as Sabellianism or modalism, although it is explained somewhat differently in the churches which hold these beliefs today. Examples of such churches today are Oneness Pentecostals and the New Church.
    - Denominations of the Latter Day Saint movement (including the largest, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints) teach the divinity of God the Father, his son Jesus, and the Holy Spirit; however, they also teach the Godhead is composed of the three distinct, separate persons. Conversely, some of the movement's denominations are Trinitarian.[citation needed] The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints specifically holds that the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost are three separate and distinct individuals (D&C 130:22), but can and do act together in perfect unity of purpose as a single monotheistic entity (the "Godhead") for the common purpose of saving mankind, Jesus Christ having received divine investiture of authority from Heavenly Father in the pre-mortal existence.
    - Some denominations within the Sabbatarian Church of God tradition accept the divinity of the Father and Jesus the Son, but do not teach that the Holy Spirit is a Being. The Living Church of God, for example, teaches, "The Holy Spirit is the very essence, the mind, life and power of God. It is not a Being. The Spirit is inherent in the Father and the Son, and emanates from Them throughout the entire universe". This view has historically been termed Semi-Arianism or Binitarianism."

    "[nontrinitarian] Groups

    American Unitarian Conference
    Arian Catholicism
    Bible Students
    Christadelphians
    Christian Conventions (aka, Two by Twos) publish no doctrinal statements; classified as non-Trinitarian by observers
    Church of Christ, Scientist
    Church of God General Conference (Abrahamic Faith)
    Church of the Blessed Hope (also known as the Church of God of the Abrahamic Faith, but not part of "General Conference")
    Creation Seventh Day Adventist Church (Not to be confused with the Seventh-day Adventist Church)
    Doukhobors
    Jehovah's Witnesses
    Living Church of God
    Molokan
    Monarchianism
    Muggletonianism
    New Church
    Non-Trinitarian churches
    Oneness Pentecostals
    Polish Brethren
    Socinianism
    Swedenborgianism
    The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church; see also Mormon)
    The Way International
    Unification Church
    Unitarian Christians
    Iglesia ni Cristo
    True Jesus Church
    Members of the Church of God International
    United Church of God"
    Source and further information:
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nontrinitarianism

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  • by Anonymous on December 24th, 2007

    Anonymous

    In the New Testament, the Father was mention in verses, the Son also was mention, but in different verses, and the Holy Spirit was mention in differetn verses also. The Catholic church combined the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit altogether, then called Trinity. I believed that St. Augustine said, " God exalt Himself. " I hope this help.
    Central Kansas

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  • by daisymae19 on April 7th, 2007

    daisymae19

    can I ask what part of the holy trinity do you disbelieve? Does it help if you think of the Trinity in this way..

    Look at your hand..it is made up of three individual parts...your fingers, your thumb and your palm..they are each a seperate thing...but when combined they also make up your hand...The Holy Trinity is the same...3 individual parts..God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit (all are displayed at different times in the bible...God the Son is the *Word* spoken of in Genesis as well as Jesus, and The HOly Spirit appeared in the form of a dove at the baptism of Jesus as well as at Pentecost)...each of the parts of the Trinity are seperate..but together they form the Holy Trinity or GOD.

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  • by MadTom on July 25th, 2010

    MadTom

    Share your answer...

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  • by MadTom on July 25th, 2010

    MadTom

    Share your answer...

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  • by Gone! on June 12th, 2010

    Gone!

    You say you live a good Christian life? That means you are a follower of Christ? You strive to be like Him everyday? You've confessed with your mouth that Jesus is Lord, and believed in your heart that God raised him from the dead?... then you're saved. That's what Romans 10:13+ teaches. Do we have to understand every aspect of how God can be tri-une but One to be saved? No... Where you see the Father, believe in the Father. Where you see the Son, believe in the Son. Where you see the Holy Spirit, believe in the Holy Spirit revealed to you through scripture.

    Blessings.

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  • by Anonymous on July 25th, 2010

    Anonymous

    Basically, the whole of it is laid out in the Apostle's Creed if you accept the Christian faith as the only means of eternal salvation.

    According to that:
    If you believe that Jesus died for your sins, you're good.
    If not, you're doomed.

    I don't necessarily believe that myself but that's what the religion says.

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  • by MadTom on July 25th, 2010

    MadTom

    I think of the Trinity as a Rube Goldfarb contraption -- kind of like an automatic toilet lid closer. When Jesus said, "Suffer the little children to come unto me, for of such is the Kingdom of Heaven made", did he expect children to understand something so obtuse as the doctrine of the trinity? It is one thing to accept something, on faith, that has never been proven, but quite another to believe in something that one simply does not even know what it is. God in three persons???
    Does that mean three separate entities, three gods? Should we think of three persons as "persona", that is merely roles or manifestations of God? The former negates the "greatest commandment" as per Jesus that God is one. The latter actually puts limits on God, rendering him as less than sovereign and almighty. God can manifest himself (or herself or itself) any way that he, she, or it chooses. The whole doctrine of the trinity is to me just another form of idolatry. I understand that there are no statues, carved or molten images involved, no work of our "hands", but the work of our hands is really only the work of our minds which control our hands. The doctrine of the trinity is just a mechanistic work of our minds. We invented it and shaped it just as surely as if we had chiseled a statue. Idols invariable are too little and too much. They never portray all that is God and always give something that is not God. The doctrine of the trinity does the same. It gives us too many gods while not giving us enough God. God is one and he is not limited by some anthropomorphic mechanistic model. If the doctrine of the trinity is the true and necessary doctrine, why did not Jesus and the apostles just simply expound it in a way that even "little children" could grasp it or must we be super intellectual to be saved?

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  • by Firebrand on February 2nd, 2007

    Firebrand

    You do not need to believe in the Trinity to be a Christian. If you believe Jesus Christ was the son of God and you live a decent life you are a Christian.
    Do nnot worry about the Holy Trinity that is for we Catholics to take care of.

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  • by Anonymous on October 27th, 2010

    Anonymous

    To be a Christian, you must believe and accept the Apostle's Creed which features the words "I believe in God, the Father almighty, creator of heaven and earth. I believe in Jesus Christ, his only Son, our Lord... I believe in the Holy Spirit"

    If you do not believe this, you are not a true Christian.

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  • by Ziggy1975 on October 27th, 2010

    Ziggy1975

    I am going through the same thing. The trinity does not make sense to me - How can the SON of God BE God - All the scriptures relate to him as God's SON - his FIRSTBORN. Jesus constantly referred to the Father as being GREATER than him. He said He(Jesus) came to the the will of his Father. He asked if the cup could be removed from him, but not his will be done, but God's will. (2 seperate persons). Trinitarians often refer to a scripture that says the Father and Son are 'one', BUT if they read on - Jesus was speaking to his apostles when he said that and he went on to say --- You and I are 'one' = just as the Father and I are one. ONE IN UNION - in thought BUT NOT ONE PERSONAGE. A scripture I like to share is when Jesus was referring to the Last Days and he said, "NO ONE knows the day or hour - NOT EVEN THE SON, but *ONLY* the Father. To me - there is the Father - Heavenly Father, His Son, Christ Jesus and the Holy Spirit. A 'force' they both use, but not a person. And in reference to your question --- No, I don't think you have to believe in the trinity to be a Christian. If you do a search, you will find that the 'early' Christians did NOT believe in a Triune God. Jesus said "WHOEVER believes in me shall be saved". No mention of believing in a mystery. : )

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  • by Lydia1616 on May 30th, 2010

    Lydia1616

    Im a Christadelphian and i certainly do not believe in the trinity
    Biblical proof
    *God is not a man (1sam15vs29, Num23vs19)
    *Jesus was a man (Acts17vs31, 1tim2vs5)

    *God cannot be tempted (james1vs13)
    *Jesus was tempted (heb4vs 14-15)

    *God cannot be seen (Ex33vs20, john1vs8)
    *Jesus was seen (matt2vs11, 1cor15vs4)

    *God cannot die (Deut32vs40, psalm90vs3)
    *Christ died (1cor15vs3)

    *God knows everything (acts1vs7, rom11vs33)
    *Jesus didnt know everything(Mark13vs32, Luke2vs52)

    *God has no god ( Isa 44vs 6-8)
    *Jesus has a god ( John 20vs 17)

    How can the trinity be right? That evidence pretty well squashes that idea.

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