May 31 ~ Holy Trinity

https://video.wixstatic.com/video/3ef8bd_263bbac5d97d49168e6f3622a90ac427/720p/mp4/file.mp4

Genesis 1:1—2:4a

Psalm 8

2 Corinthians 13:11-13

Matthew 28:16-20

Sermon by Pastor Joel

When was the last time you truly felt God? Was it during prayer, alone with your thoughts, hoping for clarity with a problem? Was it when, in a moment of choice between right and wrong, you heard the words of Jesus in your mind, reminding you to be kind and forgiving? Was it the perfect sunset, the shade of a tree, the wind rustling in the leaves? Perhaps, if we are lucky, it has been in all those places.

This Sunday is Trinity Sunday. Our National Bishop Larry Kochendorfer wrote a sermon for our 40th anniversary as a national church and those churches who might not have a minister today, and in that sermon, he joked about the many pastors who wished for a guest preacher so they could get out of trying to explain Trinity Sunday. 

The church has spent a lot of words and time arguing about the meaning of the Trinity. Is it three separate identifies of God, that you could sit in seats beside one another? Is it meant as a metaphor for one, diverse creator? Is it a way for us to understand the vastness of God?

St Augustine once said: “The Trinity is a mystery. Whoever tries to understand it fully will lose [their] mind.”

Martin Luther, who put great stock in the Trinity as a concept of God, nonetheless rejected simplistic versions—that God could be explained as three slices of one pie, or three separate beings. To try to pin down the Trinity, Luther said, was folly. 

"Why, then, do we poor wretched people rack our brains over the nature of God?” Martin Luther asked. “To take upon ourselves to understand it is a very dangerous thing, through which we may stumble and break our neck.”

Much later, theologians tried to ignore the Trinity altogether, focusing on ethics. Some viewed it a symbol of God’s all-encompassing love. Others objected to the limiting gendered language that locked out other, more diverse understandings of God.

Some suggest that the Trinity reflects God’s actions, and you can find support for that position in our gospel this morning. Jesus leaves the disciples with three callings: to baptize the next followers of the gospel in the name of God, Jesus, and the Spirit. To teach the lessons that Jesus first taught them. And to trust that Jesus is always with them, even when he is not physically present. With these instructions, has Jesus not, in essence, thus defined the trinity? The God who deems us worthy, Jesus who teaches us the way, the Spirit who weaves the presence of the divine throughout the world.

To be honest, I have always found these debates about the meaning of the Trinity too dogmatic, a bit like arguing about what God looks like. Can there truly be only one way to understand this concept of God? Is God contained in one definition? Or does God, as Luther suggests, defy our understanding?

What’s more, we live in modern times, where much of the world is not explained, and much of it remains a mystery. We have the education and awareness to live with complexity. For as much as we know already, we are still discovering new animals, new ideas, and new solutions in the world each day. The world will continue to reveal itself to us, all our lives – surely we know this now. Why shouldn’t our understanding of God do the same?

For myself, I find the Trinity a comforting idea. I am okay that it is fuzzy around that edges, for in that mystery lies more of the divine yet to be revealed to me. The Trinity as a guiding concept reminds me to look for God, in large and small ways, in the gift of baptism, in the words and life of Jesus, and when I am not looking for God at all, but sense the presence of something beyond myself and the world I know.

In the end, what we decide about the definition of the Trinity matters not one iota if we do not do anything with it – if we don’t go out into the world, and show generosity and wisdom, follow the gospel, or bring the presence of divine beauty to the lives of others. 

Bishop Kochendorfer reached the same conclusion with a closing prayer in his sermon, calling us to breathe peace into fearful lives, welcome the stranger, forgive sins, and serve on bended knee, to all in need of care. 

In other words, to be like our God who loves, Jesus who teaches, and the Spirit who brings comfort.

So, let me ask you again, when was the last time you have felt God? If you can’t remember, I hope that when you leave here today, you keep an eye open for those moments, that sense of a higher calling, that feeling of the divine in your life. That is the Trinity, and to try figure it all out, as Luther said, will leave us wracking our brains. And yet that is the gift: we do not need to know the answer to everything. We only need to be open to what we cannot understand, and watch for the moments when the divine touches our lives and inspires our actions. 

Amen