‘To pray’ means to connect with a deity to seek help in worldly affairs. It sprouts from the idea that a greater power could assist us in our everyday endeavors. The concept of prayer has always been a part of human history. It’s also an idea that goes hand in hand with ideas of faith and worship. It’s associated with complete insubordination before a sacred figure. Man has prayed from time to time to different Gods, including the Gods of the Sea, Nature, and Fire. The faith of Christianity ensues with the birth of Jesus in 4 BC. While many consider Mary and Joseph to be Jesus’s parents, Christians believe Mary to have born the child alone.
Who Do Christians Pray To?
Religions in the world can have more than one God. Believers of polytheistic religions seek assistance from different Gods for different problems. E.g., the God of Rain is prayed to in the case of a draught. Christianity understands God to be an amalgam of three different figures. Read to know more about who Christians pray to.
The Holy Trinity
The Holy Trinity is the defining belief of Christianity as a religion. It insists that there is one God who is the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. The three of them are prayed together. God the Father is the Creator of both God the Son and God the Holy Spirit. God the Son is Jesus himself. There are variations in the account of who is referred to as the Holy Spirit. The majority of Christian denominations believe the Holy Spirit to be the Spirit of Jesus Christ.
The New Testament similarly uses the word Spirit. Verses from the New Testament.
‘But the Advocate, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send you in my name, will teach you all things and will remind you of everything I have said to you.’ – John 14:16.
Religious portraits in Christianity represent the Holy Trinity and the Cross as symbols of worship. God is unified in the Holy Trinity with Jesus as the Chosen messiah of Christianity.
The Symbolism of the Trinity
The Trinity together is one God to be worshipped by Trinitarian Christians. If we then look at the orientation of the Trinity, we have an Invisible God (the Father), a man-like God (the son), and the Holy Spirit (a worldly invisible existence). Scholars have time and again emphasized two potential mysteries the Holy Trinity embodies:
- The infusion of three Gods as one
- The unison of manhood and Godliness in the figure of Jesus
In religious symbolism, the Holy Trinity is represented through an equilateral triangle. Three intersecting circles in a triangle’s shape also denote three independent deities connected.
The symbolism of the Holy Trinity still intrigues religious scholars. Its symbolism combined with the symbolism of the cross and that of number three remains a point of debate in Christian theology.
The Son of God
A prominent deity worshipped in Christianity is Jesus Christ. The word Christ is borrowed from the Greek word ‘Christos’, which means ‘The Messiah’ and ‘The Savior’.
Jesus is the Son of God who would preach the religion. All of his apostles were called ‘the Sons of God’. The word in the said connotation means a person who has a special relationship with God or whom God has chosen for something special. The term has recurred in the Hebrew Bible in the same context.
Solomon is also talked of as ‘the Son of God’. Honest and just men of Israel are also referred to as the ‘Sons of God’. Additionally, many apostles in the Bible feature as sons of God. The phrase ‘Sons of God’ is different from God the Son. In the Trinity, the Son refers to Jesus Christ.
Non-Trinitarian Christians
Non-Trinitarian Christians are Christian denominations that disagree with the idea of three different deities operating as one. The Church of Latter-day Saints and Oneness Pentecostals are Christian groups considered non-trinitarian.
Non-trinitarians take Jesus Christ to be the supreme creation of God through which every other entity was created. They do not believe Jesus to be the Divine himself but as the best manifestation of the Divine. While the moral principles within the non-trinitarian church remain the same as trinitarian Christians, they only hold God as the Divine power. Jesus is taken as God’s messenger and the messenger of God’s commandments to His people.
Some primary ideas of non-trinitarian Christendom include:
- Subordination: submission before God
- Adoptionism: The belief that Jesus was adopted by God at birth
- Monarchianism: The belief that Jesus is the absolute creation of God, but not God Himself. The belief affirms the godliness of the Father who non-trinitarian Christians pray to.
We understand Jesus and Christianity through ideas imparted during Sunday services and mass gatherings. We should take up the charge of finding answers to difficult questions embedded in the history of Christianity. Commentaries and lectures by religious scholars are the perfect way to sustain a connection with God. They bring you closer to God in a way you can hardly imagine. Religion isn’t all theology. It’s a fine blend of faith and commandments. Religious commentaries of the gospel serve this purpose of uplifting man to do better with the life God gave them.
The majority of Christians pray to the Holy Trinity. Apart from worshipping, a prayer may be a personal supplication to God sung in the form of a chorus. Hymns and litanies use the word God for supplication. The Bible narrates God to be one. The Holy Trinity, with its three distinct Godheads, still comes to symbolize a unified Christian God.
Our Final Thoughts
The concept of the Holy Trinity is the primary basis of the Christian faith. It is who Christians pray to. Besides the Trinity, faith in the Angels, God’s Book, and the Day of Judgement constitute some foundational beliefs in almost all denominations of Christianity. Non-trinitarians are a small group of Christian subsidiaries who believe in the oneness of God the Father. They take Jesus to be the most exalted of all human beings. All Christian denominations agree on man’s creation in the Image of God.
No matter the deity, all religions pray to a kind and merciful God. A Lord that calls humanity to the best of acts and deeds. All Christian denominations have complete faith in Jesus’ God being the most compassionate.
