In an elementary art class, a teacher walked up to a little boy named Fred who was furiously coloring a blank sheet of paper.
“Fred, what are you drawing?” the teacher asked.
Without looking up, Fred said, “I’m drawing a picture of God!”
The teacher smiled gently. “But Fred, nobody knows what God looks like.”
Fred kept coloring. “They will when I’m done.”
The Ultimate Identity Tech
We like to think we have God figured out, or we write Him off as an unexplainable, ancient mystery. If you’ve grown up around church, you probably know the baseline truth found in Deuteronomy 6:4: “Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one.”
Ancient scripture describes wild, invisible spiritual realities—angels, cherubim, and terrifying cosmic creatures. But there is only one Creator who designed them, their realm, and our entire universe. His name is so fiercely honored that scripture replaces it with the title “LORD” (written in ALL CAPS in most English Bibles) to mark Him as the ultimate, singular God.
But if you read closely, the text drops some massive clues that force us to look deeper.
- The Conversation: In Psalm 110:1, David writes, “The Lord said to my Lord: ‘Sit at my right hand, until I make your enemies your footstool.’” Who is the LORD talking to? It’s not a solo monologue, and He isn’t talking to David.
- The Challenge: In Proverbs 30:4, a writer named Agur challenges us with cosmic questions about the Creator and then asks point-blank: “What is his name, and what is his son’s name? Surely you know!”
- The Mission: In Isaiah 48:16, a speaker who identifies as the First and the Last—the one who laid the foundations of the earth—shocks the reader by saying: “And now the Lord God has sent me, and his Spirit.”
The apostle Paul, a brilliant scholar, connected these dots. The Son isn’t a metaphor for a nation; He is a person: Jesus. Jesus is the one whom David called Lord, the one invited to sit at the right hand of majesty. When Jesus ascended into heaven, He left His followers with a definitive command: Go and baptize all nations “in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit” (Matthew 28:19).
Notice He said in the name (singular), not names (plural).
The Cosmic Self-Portrait
The apostles weren’t confused. They didn’t check their brains at the door and chalk God up to a frustrating contradiction. They understood exactly what God looked like because they looked in the mirror.
Paul told the Romans that God’s invisible attributes are clearly seen through creation, leaving no excuses. From the very first chapter of Genesis, the Creator started painting a self-portrait: “Let us make man in our image.”
Think about an artist’s self-portrait. It can never hold the physical depth of the painter, but it tells you what they look like. We can’t look directly at the invisible God right now, but we can look at how He engineered us.
How many of “you” are there? Only one. Yet you are entirely multi-dimensional.
1. The Interface (Body)
You have an outside. It’s your physical body. It’s how you interact with the world, how people recognize you, and how the fullness of who you are is expressed. If someone sees your body, they see you.
2. The Command Center (Soul)
You have an inside. God breathed life into the first man, and he became a living soul. Your soul is your mind, your willpower, and your emotions. The body has feelings and desires, too, but it is the Soul who ultimately decides what to do with them. Even when the body gets damaged, broken, or uncooperative in this flawed world, your soul keeps driving the best it can.
3. The Core (Spirit)
Ever argued with yourself? There is a deeper conscience inside you that challenges your mind—your human spirit. It’s the place where your truest, rawest motives live, even when your conscious mind tries to ignore them.
Which one is the real you? Your body, your thoughts, or your underlying motives?
The answer is yes. All of them. They are all entirely you, yet you are not three different people. You are one. Why would it be difficult to recognize God is similar.
Grounded and Whole
When this temporary, physical shell wears out, the story isn’t over. Scripture says to be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord (2 Corinthians 5:8). And when Christ returns, He resets the system—transforming our broken, corrupted bodies into whole, indestructible bodies like His own.
Fred was right. The picture isn’t confusing when you see the final product.
Our God is completely One:
- The Father: The source who plans, wills, and purposes.
- The Son: The visible expression who executes the plan and pays our dues.
- The Holy Spirit: The internal presence who makes the reality of Jesus come alive in us today, who guides us and tells us the motives and pleasure of our God.
Not different ones at different times, not multiple gods at one time but one LORD, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit at the same time.
He gives you a self portrait, stamping His likeness directly onto you, so you can uniquely understand and seek him through Jesus.
Patrikin - Kinship through The Father 