What About the Father and the Holy Spirit?
Hello, everyone! We’ll get back to Romans in a couple of weeks, but today I want to speak to you concerning a trend I’ve been noticing in churches everywhere.
You know, perhaps, that I am a lover and advocate for the classic hymns and for singing them in personal devotions and in congregational worship. I’m also a champion of the best of today’s new music—especially the modern hymnists, but also the finest songs being produced by contemporary artists. I have never understood why we can’t utilize both in our worship.
The style of music doesn’t usually bother me, nor the age or generation in which a song was written. We need psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs, both old and new, which indicates diversity and variety.
But I am troubled by a trend I’ve been observing for some time—the “Jesus only” nature of some of our praise. A large percentage of Christian songs are Jesus-centric to the exclusion of God the Father or God the Spirit. This really bothers me.
I love singing to and about Jesus, of course. Please do not misconstrue what I’m saying. I’m a product of the Jesus Revolution, and I grew up singing songs like All Hail the Power of Jesus Name. I remember how my mother liked the song—new at the time—Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, There’s Just Something About That Name.
We cannot praise Jesus too often or too intently. One of my favorite hymns is Jesus Shall Reign Where’re the Sun Doth Its Successive Journies Run. Nor do I ever get tired of singing, “This is my story, this is my song, praising my Savior all the day long.” The theme song for my podcast is the old hymn that says, “When morning gilds the skies, my heart awakening cries, ‘May Jesus Christ be praised.’”
If anything, we should praise Jesus more than we do.
But I also grew up singing a lot of songs about God the Father, such as: Great is Thy Faithfulness, O God my Father, There Is No Shadow of Turning with Thee; This is My Father’s World; O Lord, My God, When I in Awesome Wonder; Guide Me; O Thou Great Jehovah; and O God, Our Help in Ages Past, Our Hope for Years to Come.
I also love songs like Spirit of the Living God, Fall Fresh on Me and Spirit of God, Descend Upon My Heart.
Christianity is characterized by our unique biblical doctrine of the Trinity. It’s what sets us apart. We believe there is one God who eternally exists in Three Persons. We cannot comprehend how this could be, but we can state it in simple terms and we can observe it in biblical passages. We are told to baptize our converts in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.
Titus 3:4-5 says that God the Father saved us through the renewal of the Holy Spirit, whom He poured out on us through Jesus Christ our Savior.
The apostolic benediction in 2 Corinthians 13 says, “May the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all.”
In the Bible we read about God the Father, and He is distinct from God the Son and God the Holy Spirit. We read about God the Son, and He is distinct from God the Father and God the Spirit. We read about God the Spirit, and He is distinct from God the Father and God the Son.
We serve one God who eternally exists in Three Persons, and this a mystery beyond comprehension, but not beyond contemplation and celebration. We should worship all Three Persons of the Godhead. The question I want to ask is not, “Why are we singing so much about Jesus?” It is, “Why are we singing about Jesus, only Jesus?”
Why are we singing so little about God the Father? And about the Holy Spirit?
The New Testament Teaches Trinitarian Worship
Again, there is nothing wrong—and everything right—about worshiping Jesus as God and giving Him our praise. But there is something lacking in our worship if we praise Him to the exclusion of God the Father and God the Holy Spirit. And we are living in a particular time when many of our current contemporary Christian songs (and the theology behind them) have become insufficiently Trinitarian.
The New Testament pattern of worship did not exclude God the Father. In fact, I think we can say with biblical and theological accuracy that the characteristic Trinitarian movement of Christian worship is that we are to praise the Father through the Son in the power of the Holy Spirit. Ephesians 2:18 says: “For through Him [Christ] we both [Jews and Gentiles] have access to the Father by one Spirit.”
Notice the formula we read in that verse: Through Christ we have access to the Father by the Spirit.
Ephesians 5:18-20 says, “…be filled with the Spirit, speaking to one another with psalms, hymns, and songs from the Spirit. Sing and make music from your heart to the Lord, always giving thanks to God the Father for everything, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ.”
We are to give thanks to the Father and worship Him in the name of the Lord Jesus with hearts that are filled with the Spirit.
Colossians 3:15-17 presents the same truth: We sing songs from the Spirit, doing all we do in the name of Christ, and giving thanks to God the Father through Him.
Peter put it like this: “…so that in all things God may be praised through Jesus Christ” (1 Peter 4:11).
Philippians 1:11 says, we are to be “filled with the fruit of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ—to the glory and praise of God.” And a chapter later, Paul said that every tongue should acknowledge Jesus Christ as Lord to the glory of God the Father (Philippians 2:11).
Why do we acknowledge Jesus Christ as Lord? We do it for the glory of God the Father.
So, yes, let’s worship Jesus with enthusiasm. We have New Testament reasons for doing that. The Magi said about the Christ-child: “We…have come to worship Him” (Matthew 2:2). The disciples worshiped Jesus (Matthew 14:33; Luke 24:52). The angels worship Jesus (Hebrews 1:6). Paul spoke of “the Messiah, who is God over all, forever praised! Amen” (Romans 9:5).
But let’s not worship only Jesus. We must also render worship to God the Father, and we must remember that somehow in the mystery of divine revelation, He appears as the First Person of the Trinity, as we traditionally put it. We baptize people in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit (Matthew 28:19).
The Puritan theologian, Thomas Watson, in his book, A Body of Divinity, wrote, “Glorifying God has respect to all the persons in the Trinity; it respects God the Father who gave us life; God the Son, who lost his life for us; and God the Holy Ghost, who produces a new life in us; we must bring glory to the whole Trinity.”
He continued, “The first person in the Trinity is God the Father. He is called the first person, in respect of order, not dignity…. The second person in the Trinity is Jesus Christ…. The third person in the Trinity is the Holy Ghost, who proceeds from the Father and Son, whose work is to illuminate the mind and enkindle sacred motions.”
He continued, “If there be one God subsisting in three persons, then let us give equal reverence to all the persons in the Trinity. There is not more or less in the Trinity; the Father is not more God than the Son and Holy Ghost. There is an order in the Godhead, but no degrees; one person has not a majority or supereminence above another, therefore we must give equal worship to all the persons.”
I believe the New Testament bears this out.
When Mary and Joseph brought Jesus into the temple to dedicate him, the old man, Simeon, took the baby Jesus in his arms and “praised God” (Luke 2:28).
Later, our Lord Jesus Himself taught us this by His example, for He said, “I praise you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth” (Matthew 11:25). When the people of Christ’s day saw His miracles, “they praised the God of Israel” (Matthew 15:21).
Jesus said, “Yet a time is coming and now has come when true worshipers will worship the Father in the Spirit and in truth, for they are the kind of worshippers the Father seeks” (John 4:23).
In Revelation, it was God the Father who is worshipped in Revelation 4, with the supernatural beings crying, “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty, who was, and is, and is to come” (Revelation 4:8). In the next chapter, they also turn their worship to the Lamb (Revelation 5). The Holy Spirit is also present in both chapters (Revelation 4:5; 5:6). There was Trinitarian worship occurring.
Let me quote Revelation 5:13 and 14: “Then I heard every creature in heaven and on earth and under the earth and on the sea, and all that is in them, saying, ‘To Him who sits on the throne and to the Lamb be praise and honor and glory and power, for ever and ever.’”
“Him who sits on the throne” is God the Father, and the “Lamb” is Jesus Christ.
The epistle to James says we are to use our tongue to “praise our Lord and Father” (James 3:9).
The book of 2 Corinthians begins: “Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ” (2 Corinthians 1:3).
The book of Ephesians begins: “Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ” (Ephesians 1:3).
The book of 1 Peter says, “Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ!” (1 Peter 1:3). Three of the twenty-seven books of the New Testament in the New International Version begin with those exact words!
The Church of Jesus Christ Has Always Practiced Trinitarian Worship
Not only is this the tenor of the Bible’s teaching, but it is also a pattern deeply rooted in Christian history. James Fisher, in his exposition of the Westminster Shorter Catechism by Way of Question and Answer asks explicitly, “How is our worship to be directed to this three-one God?” His answer is: We are to worship the Father, in Christ the Son, by the Spirit.
That echoes the words of Justin Martyr, who wrote in about A.D. 155 that a minister presiding over the communion service “gives praise and glory to the Father of the universe, through the name of the Son and of the Holy Ghost.” Two chapters later, describing ordinary Sunday worship in the early church, Justin Martyr wrote that believers “praise the Maker of all through His Son Jesus Christ, and through the Holy Ghost.”
Centuries later, The Westminster Confession stated, “Religious worship is to be given to God, the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost; and to Him alone.” In the next paragraph, it says that prayer and thanksgiving are to be offered to God “in the name of the Son, by the help of His Spirit.”
All three Persons of the Godhead are to be worshipped, but there is a New Testament Trinitarian order to worship. Basil the Great, who lived in the 300s, advanced two doxologies for Christians to proclaim:
- Glory to the Father through the Son in the Holy Spirit.
- Glory to the Father with the Son together with the Holy Spirit.
That is the proper balance. We are to worship the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit; but we should not be unaware of the Trinitarian order or arrangement. Revelation 5:13, remember, says, “To Him who sits on the throne and to the Lamb be praise and honor and glory and power, forever and ever.” And remember, the Holy Spirit is also present on the scene.
The characteristic New Testament pattern of Christian worship is Trinitarian: We come to the Father through the Son in the power of the Holy Spirit. It is not Jesus, only Jesus. Yes, He is the only name given among men whereby we must be saved (Acts 4:12). But His is not the only name before Whom we bow or to Whom sing. We praise Him with all our hearts, but not to the exclusion of God the Father. When songwriters say that we should worship no other person but Jesus, I understand what they are trying to say. But I want to stop the song and say, “Not true! There are two other Persons we are to worship.”
The Great Hymns Acknowledge Trinitarian Worship
Let me say one other thing. Many of the great hymns of the faith acknowledge Trinitarian worship. These hymns were often written by biblical scholars such as theologians and pastors, and they wrote with theological accuracy. Take the wonderful anthem, “All Creatures of our God and King,” for example. It says:
Let all things their Creator bless,
And worship Him in humbleness,
O praise Him! Alleluia!
Praise, praise the Father, praise the Son,
And praise the Spirit, Three in one!
O praise Him! O praise Him!
My favorite hymn of thanksgiving is “Now Thank We All our God” by Martin Rinkart. The third verse says:
All praise and thanks to God the Father now be given,
The Son, and Him who reigns with Them in heaven,
The one eternal God, Who, earth and heaven adore
For thus it was, is now, and shall be evermore.
The famous Doxology of Thomas Ken tells us to “praise Father, Son, and Holy Ghost.” And perhaps the greatest hymn of them all is “Holy, Holy, Holy” by Reginald Heber, which says:
Holy, holy, holy, Lord God Almighty!
Early in the morning our song shall rise to Thee.
Holy, holy, holy, merciful and mighty,
God in Three Persons, blessed Trinity.
Again, these hymns were written by pastors and by scholars steeped in theology, not simply by songwriters. The answer to Jesus-centered worship is not less Jesus. It is more Trinity. We should sing to the Father who loved us and sent His Son, to the Son who loved us and gave Himself for us, and to the Spirit who indwells and empowers us—and we should learn again the great biblical movement of worship: to the Father, through the Son, in the Holy Spirit.
When I preach and write, I try to use biblical and theological precision in what I say. I believe modern hymnists and modern songwriters should do the same. This is why I’m troubled by lyrics that say the Second Person of the Trinity is the only one who “deserves the glory” and that there is no other person we should worship or to whom we should bow, but Jesus, only Jesus.
I understand what the writers mean. But are those statements, taken literally, true? Are they accurate? Is the Father not worthy? Does the Holy Spirit not deserve glory?
If this were only an occasional worship theme, I could overlook it. But it has become a trend. And I believe the days are too evil and time is too short to become careless in the way we express our praise to God. Theology is often spread more through our songs than through our sermons. This is an important issue. Praise be to the God and Father through our Lord Jesus Christ!
So here is my conclusion to the whole matter. We should sing more about God than about us—praise God from whom all blessings flow.
And we should praise Father, Son, and Holy Ghost.
To learn more about the great hymns of the faith and the stories behind them check out my series of books, Then Sings My Soul, Books 1, 2, and 3, and also the related product, The Origin of Hymns. You can find them wherever books are sold.