The Holy Spirit is God. The Father is God. Jesus is God. There are three persons of the One True God.
I am truly trying to understand these things. When God appeared to Moses in the burning bush, was that the same God whose voice was heard from heaven at the baptism of Jesus and at the Transfiguration? In all these appearances, was that not the One True God, the Godhead? When the Holy Spirit descended on the apostles, was that not the One True God, the Godhead? When Jesus performed miracles and forgave sins, was that not the One True God, the Godhead?
I believe it was the same God, whole and entire, manifesting Himself to us in different ways. And it was the same God who lowered Himself to become a human as the son of Mary. Jesus told Phillip that He is in the Father and the Father is in Him, and further, that the Father dwells in Him. The Father and the Son, along with the Holy Spirit are One, and when God appears to us as one of the three persons, all three are within Him. Just so, when Jesus was born of Mary, all three persons were within Him.
“when God appears to us as one of the three persons, all three are within Him. Just so, when Jesus was born of Mary, all three persons were within Him.”
Not exactly. There is an aspect or person of the Godhead which has been manifested in the flesh which is Jesus. There is a person of the Godhead who is a Spirit, that is the Holy Spirit, and cannot be seen because He is spirit. (The Holy Spirit has been manifested in visible form, but cannot be seen in His actual essence because that essence is spirit which is invisible to human eyes. See John 3:5-8 and 1 Corinthians 2:14.) The Father is a person of the Godhead who has not and cannot be seen directly because to see His face would consume and destroy us because His glory is too intense.
This theology explains what might be perceived by some as paradoxes in scripture.
Exodus 33:11
“So the Lord spoke to Moses face to face, as a man speaks to his friend...”
Exodus 33:20
“But He said, ‘You cannot see My face; for no man shall see Me, and live.’”
How can it be that God spoke to Moses face to face, but then says no one can see His face and live?
John 1:18
“No one has seen God at any time. The only begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, He has declared Him.”
It is because ALL of the appearances of God to people in the Old Testament were the pre-incarnate Christ. (See Luke 24:27, John 12:41, and 1 Corinthians 10:9.)
When we read of God walking in the garden of Eden in the cool of the day, it was Christ. (See Genesis 3:8.)
When two angel and another “man” appeared to Abraham on the way to destroy Sodom, Abraham realized the third visitor was God. This was also an appearnace of Christ. (See Genesis 18:2, 33.)
When Jacob saw God in his vision / dream, it was Christ.(See Genesis 28:12.)
When Moses, Aaron and the elders of Israel saw God, they were seeing Christ. (See Exodus 24:9-11.)
When Gideon saw God, he too was seeing Christ. (See Judges 6:22-23.)
When Samon’s parents were visited by a theophany, they realized afterward that they had seen God. This was also Christ. (See Judges 13:22.)
When Isaiah saw the Lord of Hosts in His glory, he was also seeing Christ. (See Isaiah 6:1.)
When the king saw one “like the Son of God” in the fiery furnace, he was seeing Christ. (See Daniel 3:25.)
So when we read that he who has seen the Son has seen the Father, and that the Father is in the Son and the Son in the Father, in John 14:9-10, it does not mean they are the same person. Rather, Christ Jesus is the express image of the Father.
Hebrews 1:1-3
“God, who at various times and in various ways spoke in time past to the fathers by the prophets, has in these last days spoken to us by His Son, whom He has appointed heir of all things, through whom also He made the worlds; who being the brightness of His glory and the express image of His person, and upholding all things by the word of His power, when He had by Himself purged our sins, sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high...”