This paper investigates select contributions of Trinitarian Hermeneutics and Nicene Docmatics presented in On Classical Trinitarianism (Matthew Barrett, ed.) as they interpret texts in John 14-16. In that volume, seventeen authors analyze various biblical texts to identify the necessity of approaching Scripture via the lens of Classical Trinitarianism. For these authors, Nicea defined Trinitarianism, offering what we should understand as Classical Trinitarianism. They argue that by recognizing Nicea as dogmatic for the church today, we can interpret Scripture rightly via the lens of Classical Trinitarianism. Among the seventeen authors writing in the Trinitarian Hermeneutics and Nicene Docmatics section of On Classical Trinitarianism, Steven J. Duby (“The Unity of God and the Unity of the Economy”), Christopher R. J. Holmes (“The Procession of the Spirit: Eternal Spiration”), and Adonis Vidu (“Three Agents, One Agency: The Undivided External Works of the Trinity”) interact consistently with John 14-16.
In Part One of this paper, I offer a synthetic summary of Duby’s, Holmes’s, and Vidu’s approaches to Jesus’s statements in John 14-16. In Part Two, I investigate John 14-16 from a biblical theological perspective that traces the progressive flow of Jesus’s message to the disciples between Judas’s departure in John 13 and Jesus’s prayer in John 17. In Part Three, I identify the Upper Room as a place where systematicians and biblical theologians can reside in peace. I argue that (1) Classical Trinitarianism is necessary for a proper understanding of Jesus’s historical message to the disciples, (2) those employing Trinitarian Hermeneutics could advance their cause by paying close attention to the historical context and progressive literary flow surrounding verses that refer to the Trinity, and (3) the 1700th anniversary of Nicea provides an opportunity for systematicians and biblical theologians to work in harmony for the benefit of Evangelicalism.