Christian doctrine is unique in that it is an intellectual response to the historical activity and revelatory disclosure of God. Doctrine is rational reflection upon God’s saving activity in Jesus Christ. Foundational to the idea of “doctrine” is the fact that we need to be told what God is like. It is not ours to determine what kind of God we will believe and obey. It is God’s to determine to show Himself to us. Doctrine is our effort to articulate what He has made known. Doctrine is the divinely authorized attempt to describe God in accordance with how He has revealed Himself in creation, in history, in Jesus Christ and in the Scriptures. In doing so, doctrine also serves to expose false interpretations of reality, false concepts of God. It is the aim of doctrine to make sense of the individual’s and the church’s experience of God as He has made Himself known in Jesus Christ.
Alister McGrath

CCLXXXII. The Threefold Witness.

1 JOHN v. 6-8. “This is He that came by waier and blood, even Jesus
Christ; not by water only, but by water and blood. And it
is the Spirit that beareth witness, because the Spirit is truth.
For there are three that bear record,… the Spirit, the
water, and the blood: and these three agree in one.”

WE are not called on to believe without evidence. There
is a threefold testimony to Jesus. The three agree in bear-
ing witness to Him as the Christ.
I. The testimony of the water.
The reference is to baptism. The baptism of Jesus
Himself, and the baptism which He instituted.
The baptism of Jesus with its accompaniment was the
beginning of His manifestation as the Christ. He not
only submitted to baptism; He perpetuated it. When
the Gospel comes to any country it comes “with water.”
Though many superstitions have gathered round baptism,
it has borne its simple yet eloquent witness to the holy
life and teachings and purpose of Him who instituted it.
II. The testimony of the blood.
The blood shedding of Jesus was really a testimony to
His Divine Sonship; it was the price He was willing to
pay for the world’s redemption, and it was the completion
of His revelation of the Father.
This testimony of the blood abides in the Church. The
cross is interwoven into the texture of Christian thought
and feeling and language. Then the sacrament of the
supper brings us face to face with Christ Himself, and tells
us that His death was for the life of the world.
III. The testimony of the Spirit.
The Spirit which was in Jesus bare witness to Him all
His life that He was the anointed of the Father.
This Spirit He was also to impart. It has been poured
out on the Church. Also it works outside of the Church
striving with men. To reject Christ is to reject not merely
the testimony of Greek manuscripts and Galilean fisher-
men, but the testimony of an inward voice.
Thus we do not believe in Christ without evidence.
T. C. Finlayson, M.A.