For preachers, words are everything. Yet as anyone who has learned English as a second language will tell you, the hardest thing about English is that there are so many words! And many words have meanings that are different than other words that sound just like them. Here are four common theological words that are often confused:
Imminent—about to occur, impending.
The return of the Lord is imminent. The angels told the disciples, “Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking into heaven? This Jesus, who was taken up from you into heaven, will come in the same way as you saw him go into heaven” (Acts 1:11). When will this happen? Jesus said, “But concerning that day or that hour, no one knows, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father” (Mark 13:32). This provoked John to pray, “Come, Lord Jesus!” (Revelation 22:20).
So, the return of the Lord is imminent.
Immanent (adj)— existing or remaining within; inherent.
Any description of how God relates to himself is a description of the immanent Trinity. Doctrines such as eternal generation and divine simplicity are examples of doctrines that are immanent in God—in other words, as God relates to himself. This word is often used in contrast with economic. God can be described in terms that relate to the economic Trinity (as God relates to others), in contrast with the immanent Trinity (as God relates to himself).
Immanence (n)—God’s presence and activity within creation and human history.
There is a Christian paradox—God is both transcendent and yet in his immanence he is accessible through creation. If “immanent” the adjective refers to God as he relates to himself, “immanence” the noun refers to the reality that God can be experienced by us. This has the potential to be confusing—ok, this is super confusing—because when immanence is used in contrast to transcendent, it means basically the same thing as economic when it is used as an antonym for immanent. In short, words do different things when they are paired with different words, and immanence when paired with transcendence means God experienced in the world, while immanent when used with the Trinity means the opposite of that.
Here are two sentences to help: “In the immanent Trinity, there is an order (Father, Son, Spirit) but not an authority.” Whereas, “the immanence of God does not cancel out his transcendence; it should not fool us into believing that God is just like us.”
Eminent—standing out so as to be readily perceived or noted. Famous.
God is eminent, in that “the heavens declare the glory of God, and the skies proclaim his handiwork” (Psalm 19:1).
If you are tracking with me this far, then you will love this sentence:
“The imminent return of Jesus will once again demonstrate that the incarnation is the most eminent proof of God’s immanence, and will represent the fulfillment of the divine plan of redemption, which involves the Father sending the Son, and then together they send the Spirit—this pattern (Father, Son, Spirit) shows that even in the economy, the Immanent Trinity is truly revealed.”