When was the last time you found yourself sitting around a table with family or friends,
or turning to your seat mate on an airplane or train asking "So what about that Trinity? What do you think
of it?" Let's face it, it doesn't seem to be too important in our day to day lives.
But this Sunday is Trinity Sunday - the first Sunday after Pentecost a time of year that Popes and Bishops, Councils
and Synods, Preachers and Teachers have, for more years than this church has existed thought it good and wise to
remind the millions of seekers - the millions of faithful - for whom they care - that God is a mystery which is
best understood in three ways: As creator -- or Father as redeemer -- or Son and as sustainer -- or Spirit.
There are designated Sundays for a couple of Christianity's central doctrines -- the Incarnation and the Resurrection
-- but these are directly related to the life of Jesus. The doctrine of the Trinity wasn't articulated as such
until Tertullian coined the word in the early third century.
Certainly there were hints before: The fact that God refers to God's own self in our Genesis reading as "we,"
not I. Paul's wonderful closing benediction in his second letter to the Christians in Corinth: "May the grace
of our Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all evermore."
And, of course, Jesus' Great Commission in the final ending of Matthew's Gospel: "Go, therefore, and make
disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit."
The Apostle Paul writes this about God "Since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities - his eternal
power and divine nature - have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made."
He continues to say that: "although they know God from what has been made: "they neither glorify him
as God nor give thanks to him, but their thinking becomes futile and their foolish hearts are darkened. Although
they claim to be wise they become fools and exchange the glory of the immortal God for images made to look like
mortal man and birds and animals and reptiles."
Last week we celebrated the pouring out of the Spirit of God upon the followers of Jesus. We celebrated that presence
- that force - that all of us here have experienced. It is a presence experienced in that power, that person, who
gives shape to much that we see and hear, what we do and say.
Only a few weeks earlier we celebrated the resurrection of a man who is somehow more than a man, one who was a
child of promise - one whom our minds and our hearts tell us was more than a good person - more than a saint -
more even than an angel - and yet - was so much one of us. Jesus our teacher and guide - our shepherd and our friend.
Jesus our Lord, and our God.
God the creator, God the redeemer God the sustainer God is One, Yet God is Three. It is a belief born out of the
experience of ordinary Christians as a real life answer to the question, "Where do we find God?"
Think of the words of Psalm 8 that we read this morning. "When I look at the heavens, the work of your fingers,
the moon and the stars that you have established, what are human beings that you are mindful of them, mortals that
you care for them?" Yet you have made them a little lower than God, and crowned them with glory and honor.
You have given them dominion over the works of your hands; you have put all things under their feet.
We need to go back to why the Creeds, where the doctrine of the Trinity is expressed, were written in the first
place. Over the centuries various people have come up with some wonderful explanations of how the one unique and
holy God became incarnate in common flesh like you and I possess, in the ordinary person of Jesus. I won't bother
you with the details of the various theories because these details are actually remarkably unimportant for the
story. The common thread of these people was that their theories explained God - how they understood God. The Church's
response was to write the Creeds and the Creeds were written to say that you can't understand God. If you could
understand and explain God and Jesus and the Holy Spirit - how these are distinct and how they are one, you are
heretical. The only orthodox approach to God, Jesus and the Holy Spirit is to accept that they are a paradox, not
meant to be solved or explained, but to be embraced as mystery.
J. L. Houlden in his remarkable and very helpful little book "Ethics and the New Testament" makes the
statement that "The church had to build up the rule book which Jesus had failed to provide" (p114). How
do we teach people to obey, when our teacher has not given precise instructions? Of course this begs the question,
are we simply meant to slavishly obey? Are we not meant to think and reason and come to our own conclusions?
Many of us from the 60's generation don't like the word "obedience" for good reason. We learned that
not all adults are worthy of our obedience. And many of us try to raise our children to think for themselves and
have strength to make their own moral choices. Children (especially these days) need to be able to say "no"
to protect themselves, unfortunately from adults whom they are expected to respect and obey, even in the church.
But we may have gone too far in rejecting the concept of obedience. Maybe that's because we see it only in the
negative sense,--that is, acting a certain way to avoid punishment, or submitting to a code of behavior just because
some authority told us to.
In the Old Testament, the Hebrew word "obey" is the same word that is also translated "to hear".
And to hear the voice of God, means not just physically hearing, but also to understand and participate in fulfilling
what the voice says. When one's child is just learning how to walk and talk, you may hear the parent say something
like, "Jimmy, go get your shoes and bring them back here." And with great joy little Jimmy will trot
off to his room and bring back the shoes.
Parents are ecstatic with such behavior. Maybe because they know it will be short lived. Not because that child
did something for them, but because they knew by his response that he understood their words. He didn't get the
shoes out of fear that he'd be punished, or because he had learned certain rules. He got them because he trusted
them, and rejoiced in the ability to hear and obey.
We need to get away from the idea of obedience as a stifling and controlling phenomenon, to a response of a living
and loving relationship, that is worthy of our obedience placed in one we can, and should trust.
God commanded us to tithe for example. Very few do according to the Old Testament standard. Yet if I as your pastor
came to you and said, "I know it's hard to make ends meet some days, and that you probably doubt you'd be
able to survive if you really gave ten percent of your income every week. So I'm going to make you a promise that
if you will try if for just one month, I'll make up the difference for anything you fall short on. Agreed? Of course
(depending on if you trusted me of course.) Now what does that really say? You'd trust a mere mortal like me, with
all my faults, as opposed to a divine all powerful God who can do anything and who has promised you the exact same
thing. So why don't we try?It takes an obedient heart that overcomes all fear! How appropriate then that this is
Memorial Day.
Memorial Day is a wonderful American holiday that not only shoots us into summer but also escorts us back in time.
It offers us a pause to remember the sacrifices made and gifts given to us by those whose journey of faith and
earthly life are over. Originally celebrated as "Decoration Day" in the North, it was begun in 1866 in
New York to honor the Civil War dead. Since then, we've rightly enlarged the emphasis to honor all those who have
gone on before. This morning we remember spouses and parents, children and grandparents, friends and neighbors,
aunts and uncles -special people who blessed our way by their living. Looking back helps me keep my life in perspective.
I see myself as a part of a much larger family and so should you.
So does God, in fact! The wonderful Old Testament and Psalter Lectionary readings of today are perfect for Memorial
and Trinity Sunday. They point us way back to the beginning of time, focusing upon the creating as a gift of a
gracious, creative God who has made this creation and pronounced it "good, very good." William Willimon
writes "Genesis 1 took form during chaotic, desperate days in Israel. When the surrounding world was falling
apart, Genesis proclaims that the world is good and that God has ordered the world for us." (from "Only
Human", a sermon by William H. Willimon from PULPIT RESOURCE, Vol. 27, No. 2, 1999, p.39)
In many ways, we could say that our "surrounding world" is falling apart too. Hard pressed on every side,
these first few days of the 21st Century do seem chaotic and desperate at times. Many of us wish for the past when
life was simpler and people were kinder.. But revisiting the past and taking to heart the central truths that are
there encourages us and empowers us for the days ahead. When we revisit our Biblical heritage, and learn the Truth
within it, we are better prepared "for the living of these days".
We are called to be obedient disciples in this time, living without fear in the name of the one who called us and
has promised to be with us always, even to the end of the age. We are sent in the name of the Creator, Sustainer,
and Redeemer, the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, the beginning, the end, and the in between. Let us go with confidence!
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