The load-bearing beliefs
Christian theology, from the ground up
Theology is what you already believe, made explicit and checked. This path covers God, Scripture, creation, humanity, Christ, salvation, the Spirit, the church and the last things, and it marks clearly where Christians disagree.
Built for the days between Sundays
This is eternal life, that they should know you, the only true God, and him whom you sent, Jesus Christ.
What you'll come away with
What this path is for
Not a reading streak. These are the things you should be able to do on your own once you have worked through it.
Use the vocabulary correctly
Justification, sanctification, atonement, incarnation, providence. You will know what each term means and what is at stake in it.
Tell centre from edge
Some beliefs hold the structure up; others are genuine questions among faithful Christians. Knowing which is which prevents a lot of unnecessary conflict.
State the main views on disputed points
Baptism, the Lord's Supper, the gifts, the millennium, sovereignty and freedom. You will be able to state each side in its own terms.
Read your own church more clearly
You will start to recognise the tradition behind what you hear on a Sunday, and where it sits among the alternatives.
How the tutor works
A tutor, not a search box
The same eight habits run through every path. They are what make this study rather than summary.
Questions first
Open a passage and Trinity asks what you noticed. Your reading comes first, then the explanation.
Greek and Hebrew, one tap away
Tap a word to see the Greek or Hebrew behind it. See what it can mean and where else it shows up.
Follow the thread
Pick one image, promise, or line. Follow it from Genesis through the prophets into the Gospels.
Context that clicks
Who wrote it, to whom, and why. Get the background the first readers already knew.
A plan that bends
Miss a week and nobody guilt-trips you. Your plan fits the time you actually have and picks up where you left off.
Bring your doubts
Ask the question you'd never ask out loud. Trinity takes it seriously, no judgment.
Pick up the thread
Every session ends with a short recap of what you read and what's worth coming back to.
Every side, fairly told
On baptism, the end times, and more, you get the main views and their best arguments. Disputed questions are labelled as disputed.
The path itself
What you'll study, in order
Each unit builds on the one before it. Lessons live inside Trinity; this is the shape of the ground you will cover.
God and revelation
How anyone claims to know anything about God
Scripture: inspiration, authority, and what they mean
God's attributes, and what the words are doing
The Trinity, stated carefully
What the early creeds settled, and why
Creation and humanity
Creation out of nothing
Providence, and the long debate about it
The image of God
The fall, and what sin actually damages
Views on origins, presented fairly
Christ and salvation
One person, two natures
Why Chalcedon chose the words it chose
Atonement: the main models compared
Justification, and the Reformation question
Sanctification as the work of a lifetime
Spirit, church, and the end
Who the Holy Spirit is
Gifts: cessationist and continuationist readings
What the church is actually for
Baptism and the Lord's Supper: the positions
Last things, and four views of the millennium
I've led a small group for six years, and honestly I was mostly repeating Sunday's sermon. Trinity kept asking what the passage actually said before it would tell me anything. Our Thursday nights are better for it.
I was baptized in March and still couldn't find anything in the Bible. I asked what a psalm even is, which felt embarrassing to type. It showed me Psalm 13, a man complaining to God. I didn't know that was allowed.
I mostly use it for word study. When I'm stuck on a Greek term, it walks me through what it can mean without pretending the question is settled. It's told me "scholars disagree here" more than once, which I respect.
Forty years in church and I'd never finished the Bible. I'm in Numbers now. Not thrilling, but I'm still going. Most days I read it before the kettle's boiled.
I'm not sure I believe any of it yet. I came in wanting to argue, and I still do. It argues back properly. It names the best objection before I can, and it doesn't sulk when I won't concede.
I ask it what a fifteen-year-old would really ask about a chapter. It gives me the awkward questions, not the tidy ones. Twice now it's sent me off to study properly, which I suppose is the point.
I read on my phone during my eleven-minute break, and it never tries to make it an hour. Last week it caught that I'd misread who was speaking in Job. It was one of the friends, not God. Changed the whole chapter for me.
I work in two languages, so I'm fussy about words. I asked why one Hebrew word is lovingkindness in one place and steadfast love in another. I got a real answer about hesed, not a devotional paragraph.
I worried it would hand my people easy answers to hard chapters. It mostly doesn't. Someone asked it about hell, and it laid out what Christians have held and said plainly which parts are disputed. I can work with that.
I sit with dying people, so I don't have much patience for cheerfulness. I'd been avoiding the lament psalms. It walked me through Psalm 88, which ends in the dark and stays there, and it didn't rush to fix it.
I'd abandoned three reading plans before this one. I went quiet for a while, came back, and it just carried on. No lecture. I'm in Isaiah now.
Before you start
Questions people ask about this path
Everyone who says anything about God is doing theology. The choice is between doing it carefully and doing it by accident. This path is written for people with no training and no intention of getting any.
Broadly evangelical, with the sixty-six book Protestant canon. Trinity says so plainly rather than pretending to no position, and it presents Catholic, Orthodox and other Protestant views accurately when they differ.
By naming them as disagreements. Where Christians of good faith differ, you get the main positions, their strongest texts, and what each one has to explain away. You will not be told there is one obvious answer when there is not.
God and revelation. Almost every later question depends on how you answer how we know anything about God, so starting elsewhere means borrowing answers you have not examined yet.
Start this path today
The first unit is free, and you do not need to know anything going in. Trinity will ask what you noticed before it explains a thing.
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