Steve Stanley’s Reviews > 40 Questions About the Trinity > Status Update
Steve Stanley
is on page 31 of 296
One helpful way of thinking through these questions is the so-called Wesleyan quadrilateral, which is associated with the founder of Methodism, John Wesley: Scripture, tradition, reason, and experience. Although Wesley himself never framed his thinking in this way exactly, it still summarizes a useful method that Protestant theology should aim for.
— Jan 06, 2026 06:17AM
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Steve’s Previous Updates
Steve Stanley
is on page 42 of 296
In order to identify whether or not Jesus or the Holy Spirit stood on the divine or creaturely side of the equation, the early church commonly referred to four markers: appellations, attributes, actions, and adoration.
— 12 hours, 33 min ago
Steve Stanley
is on page 22 of 296
Everything God does outside himself he does indivisibly as Father, Son, and Spirit. But within this action, each of the divine persons acts in a manner fitting to his personal identity; the one act of God proceeds from the Father, through the Son, by or in the Holy Spirit.
— Jan 05, 2026 06:27AM
Steve Stanley
is on page 22 of 296
In God's external activity, the persons are distinguished from one another not by distinct roles and functions but by distinct modes of actions in the one inseparable action of God.
— Jan 05, 2026 06:26AM
Steve Stanley
is on page 22 of 296
These eternal processions ('goings forth') are unique from creaturely processions (like a parent who has a child) in two important ways: (1) they are *eternal*, having no beginning or ending in time, and (2) they are *internal*, so to speak, in the life of God. They do not produce a second and a third God but take place within the one divine essence or nature.
— Jan 05, 2026 06:25AM
Steve Stanley
is on page 22 of 296
In God's inner life, the three persons are distinguished only by their . . . *eternal relations of origin*. The Father is from no one; he is unbegotten. The Son is eternally begotten from the Father; and the Holy Spirit eternally proceeds from (or is 'spirated,' breathed out by) the Father and the Son.
— Jan 05, 2026 06:24AM
Steve Stanley
is on page 18 of 296
[T]he Trinity indicates that there are processions (Latin, *processiones*, 'goings forth' so to speak) and personal relations (*relationes*) in God. . . . God's being eternally goes forth from the Father to the Son and from the Father and Son to the Spirit. . . . Each of the three persons is identical with the divine essence, and they are only distinguished from one another by these eternal personal relations.
— Jan 05, 2026 06:06AM
Steve Stanley
is on page 18 of 296
God is not composed of parts; no one created him or put him together. But at the same time, mysteriously, this one true God exists from all eternity as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. The three are *persons*, not *parts*, of God.
— Jan 05, 2026 06:00AM
Steve Stanley
is on page 13 of 296
Doctrine is important because God is important, and no doctrine is more important than the doctrine of God himself.
— Jan 05, 2026 05:52AM
