“And he is before all things, and by him all things consist” ~ Colossians 1:17

Since I have embarked on my journey of specializing as a chemistry teacher, I have had some time to reflect and also reconcile the science with the God who creates and sustains science. In my day to day life, if opportunity allows I work to use science as a vessel to live unto my high calling of glorifying God.

One of these ways to show science as a visual for an unseen God. No greater a challenge might I undertake than to explain the Trinity in a concrete way. Although I can argue it is not fully possible and nothing will be entirely accurate, I recently had a thought that might be able to offer some understanding.

The problem with explaining the Trinity of God is that nearly everything goes back to a heresy called modalism. If you take St. Patrick’s approach of explaining the Trinity as a 3-leaf clover, it can be said that this is “Partialism.” St. Patrick put forth that each of the leaves is a single member of the Trinity make up the whole. But this isn’t quite sufficient, God does not consist of three parts that make up a whole. God is three distinct persons in one. None is a part of God, they are all God fully (1 John 5:7-8)!

Or perhaps it has been taught that God is like the three states of water. This model puts forth that the three distinct persons of God are like ice, liquid water, and water vapor. But once more, this is a classic heresy known as “Modalism.” God does not present Himself in three modes, but He is three distinct persons in one.

But let me take a stab at this. Once again, my model has limitations but maybe it can at least speak to the mystery of the Trinity. In 1926, Erwin Schrodinger put forth an equation that first accurately described something called “wave-particle duality.” This theory puts forth that the electron, the little negative particle that revolves around an atom is a particle and – catch this – a wave. It is a little mass-filled dot but somehow it is also a wave. How is this?

Your guess is as good as mine. But hey, this has never been disproven and there is far more proof that it is true.

Just like God. There is the Father who is coequal with the Son who is coequal with the Holy Spirit. They are three distinct persons in one (Colossians 2:9-10).

I am not asserting that God is two persons like a wave and a particle. But as for the nature of it, I want to show that there is so much mystery. But the mystery is what makes up the known world around us (1 Corinthians 8:6). The mystery of the Trinity makes up the known world around us.

The world made of matter and energy consists only by the perfect composition of God and therefore, we should praise the mystery and accept it precisely how Scripture would have us to.