Digder,
Like you, I do not like to debate the Trinity, as nothing ever really gets accomplished, and understanding it, accepting it, or not accepting it, is not essential to salvation.
I grew up Roman Catholic, and believed in the Trinity, as that is what Dominican nuns taught as part of our Catholic education. While the Trinity was not a big deal to me, I still found it a difficult doctrine.
When I was about 20, I became a JW. One of the reasons is that I liked their approach to understanding that God is Jehovah the Father, and Jesus was his first creation, and thus the Son of God. I also found the 'personification' of the Holy Spirit to be interesting, but not entirely satisfying. But, as a JW, I accepted the Watchtower teachings on this topic.
When I left the JWs, I did not return to belief in the Trinity. Instead, I stayed neutral, and did not judge anyone on this belief. I did not know what to believe for sure. When I later joined a Baptist Church, one of the conditions was acceptance of the Trinity. When I was quizzed by the pastor, I simply said that whatever the Bible teaches about God, I believe it. Wherever it says that Jesus is God, I believe it, and wherever is says the Holy Spirit is God, I believe it. I was accepted into Church membership. My response did not really say anything, because I never committed to anything outside the Bible.
About four years ago, while engaged in long research project that took me about two or three years, I ended up reading all of the early Church writers. When I got to Ignatius, who was Bishop of Antioch while the Apostles Peter, Paul, and John were still alive, who was a student of John, a friend of Paul, and groomed by Peter to be Bishop, and who also died as a martyr, I felt I had found a very credible writer ... and he accepted Jesus as God. He had been a Bishop for over forty years when he died about the year 105 AD. I found that all of the early Christian writings that supported the Trinity, did so long before the Council of Nicaea in 325 AD. And it was the writing of Ignatius that finally convinced me that Jesus is both God the Son, and the Son of God.
When I read the Holy Spirit speaking in first person, and quoted expressing his will in the book of Acts ... and it was still that way in the NWT, as the Watchtower forgot to doctor up that verse, I knew that the Holy Spirit was a person. His speaking in first person in a historical narrative does not lend itself to the poetic tool of personification ... it was a slam dunk. Acts 13:2: And as they were ministering to the Lord, and fasting, the Holy Ghost said to them: "Separate me Saul and Barnabas, for the work whereunto I have taken them."
Finally, a 2nd century writer that is universally accepted, Tertullian (160 AD to 225AD) - over a hundred years before the Council of Nicaea, made the most eloquent argument in great detail for the Trinity in his book, Against Praxaes. See: http://www.earlychristianwritings.com/text/tertullian17.html About 20 years earlier, Clement of Alexandria also clearly detailed the Trinity. And, of course, Ignatius of Antioch was clear about Jesus being God in the year 105 AD. These early Christian writers fought all sorts of heresies and in so doing, laid out a long path of history that culminated in the Council of Nicaea in 325 and in 391. These Ecumenical Councils decided against Arian, who attended, while Athanasius was barred from attending. The Council based its decision on early Christian writings and long accepted Christian teaching. I could no longer continue the believe the fraud the JWs promoted. So, I re-accepted the Trinity.
I still do not judge what anyone believes. I do not like to debate the issue, as I prefer to let people believe what they will. And, acceptance of the Trinity is not a requirement for salvation ... but I believe that when one does accept it, it makes the faith fuller, richer, and more meaningful to know that not just some creature came to earth to live among us and die, but it was a person of God himself. And that when the person of the Holy Spirit dwells in us, it is really being a part of God Himself.
