The Trinity is something that we disagree on more than we should. Some groups believe it’s a thing, and some don’t. This is another one of those big God things that we humans with our infinitesimally small brain power struggle to comprehend because it is, in and of itself, a paradox on the same level as “Can God make a rock so large he can’t lift it?”
But I think if we frame the Trinity in a way to make it not a paradox, it becomes easier to understand. So, I’m going to do it with a metaphor representing God as light. When my old youth pastor explained how Jesus could be God and man at the same time, he used paint, and that works, too, but I am irrationally delighted by the idea that I’m using God to represent God—since God is light, and I’m using light as the comparison in the metaphor (Okay, I’m probably the only one who cares about that, but anyway…).
To start, let’s get a light breakdown. First of all, light is the only reason we can see color. Without the radiation bouncing off of objects and into our eyes, we would be blind. Second, there are 7 main wavelengths of light that make up the visible spectrum. You may recognize them: Red, Orange, Yellow, Green, Blue, Indigo, and Violet—rainbow colors! Third, any wavelength of light can be seen separately from the others. And fourth, they can all be seen together.
Now, I’m no color scientist, so that’s as deep as I’m going to go on this, but just keep the last two statements in mind as we move on to the real metaphor. I’m simplifying the light spectrum down to something that we humans have developed and use pretty much every day: The RGB color model. This model is used to display images on pretty much all of your electronic devices. It’s made up of three basic wavelengths of light: Red, Green, and Blue. These three wavelengths of light work together to display pretty much any color you could ever want, up to 16,777,216 colors, which is awesome!
But the amount of colors it can display isn’t what I want to talk about. The great thing about color, and the great thing about light, is that while white light is light, the parts that make white light: red, green, and blue, are still light as well. The wavelength of light that makes the color red is still red when it’s with green and blue to make white. They don’t form together to create a super wavelength. It’s like doing a math equation where you add 100 + 100 + 100, but you get 100.
Let’s really get into this metaphor, then. Let’s say that God the Father is Red light, God the Son is Green light, and God the Holy Spirit is Blue light. If you take Red light away from Blue and Green light, that Red light is still light, right? As in, you wouldn’t see red light and say “well, that isn’t light because it’s not white,” right? Or, you don’t say, “Well, that’s less light because it’s blue light,” right? Of course not. A red spotlight is just as much light as a white spotlight. The same for Blue and Green. Separately from each other, they’re still light.
When you put them together, though, they don’t become more light, right? Nope! Red, Green, and Blue light together are just light. It’s not mega-light. It’s not super-light. It’s still just light.
And another thing about that, too, those colors of light still exist separately to the light you’re seeing when they’re together. That’s how seeing color works with natural light. When you see a red object, what’s really happening is that the object you’re seeing has absorbed all the other individual wavelengths of light and has reflected the red wavelength back to your eyes. If the red wavelength disappeared to make light happen, then no objects would be red. Things could literally only be white—lit up—or black—not lit up.
So, taking this back to God. God the Father exists separately from the Son and the Holy Spirit, but He is still God. Just like Red light is still Red light when not with Blue and Green. God the Son is still God when He is separate from the Father and the Spirit, and the Spirit is still God when He is separate from the other two persons of the Trinity. Yet, when you put them together, their definition doesn’t change. They’re still God just like light is still light when you put it together or take it apart.
God is still God whether He’s with the other persons of Himself or not. He’s not a fraction where 1/3 + 1/3 +1/3 = 1 God. He’s light, so He’s light when He’s only a certain wavelength of light, and He’s light when He’s all of light. He doesn’t become less light, and He can’t become more light. He’s just light.