Triune Relationship – 11 June 2017 – Holy Trinity Sunday

This Sunday rejoices in the Church having found ways to reason about the three-in-one God of scripture, tradition, and human experience despite the complexities of language. The Trinity is not three “gods” or three “persons” with different jobs. Those who have studied the early church councils know how pin-pointed the arguments came to be in order to fend of heretical conceptions. But that doesn’t leave the preacher with an easy task.

The preacher has this Sunday, however, to help people imagine an impossibility: the relationship between person of the Trinity who are each other. And yet not quite.

Matthew 28:16-20

In a world wherein nothing needs more healing than our relationships, could it be that the understanding of God as Trinity could be the most healing word of all? For what the doctrine of the Triune God shows us is that God is relationship, that each Triune Person is identified precisely by relationship with the others.

The Father speaks the universe into being through the Word who is the Son. The Son is begotten, not made; filiated, not built, and so organically, substantially, ontologically united with the Father, not a product or construction. The Father breathes life into the creation through the Spirit who proceeds through space and time, bringing God's presence into the height and depth, the past and future of all that is.

God with us, always, creating and recreating us, saving and healing us, bringing us into the fullness of relationship that is the very image of God. – Paul G. Bieber

Genesis 1:1––2:4a

This account bears some similarities to the Babylonian creation account, enuma elish, but there are notable differences. In particular, unlike the enuma elish, the Genesis account posits no conflict, does not relate the birth of the gods, nor does it suggest that mankind was created to serve the gods. While many readers are familiar with the opening words of Genesis as “In the beginning God created…,” many may not be aware that the preferred translation (cf NAB and NSRV), is “In the beginning, when God created…” This translation implies further that for the writer there was no “creation out of nothing,” but rather God brought order out of chaos.

It is interesting to observe that the term for a watery chaos. . . bears a striking similarity to Tiamat of the Babylonian creation myth, from whom the world was created. The term for create. . . is reserved for God, who creates by the word, that is, God speaks and it happens. The reference to the Spirit of God in verse 2 is best understood as the wind of God, not a distinct being.

Now although some have found a reference to the trinity in verses 1–3 (God, Spirit, Light), this is untenable. The highlight of the majestic poem is the creation of humankind in the image of God. Humankind is placed in a position of responsibility for the creation and in a real sense, the creation continues in the creative activity of men and women. – Jeffrey Galbraith

2 Corinthians 13:11-13

The interest in this pericope for Trinity Sunday is the supposed reference to the Trinity found in verse 13. While it is clear that Paul does refer to God, Jesus, and the Spirit, in words that are familiar to every churchgoer, it does not follow that Paul had any notion of the Trinity as it was to develop in the following centuries. For example, Jesus is not referred to as the “Son,” but the Lord. God is not referred to as “Father,” but the source of love, and the Spirit is not a distinct being, but rather is the source of community. – Jeffrey Galbraith

Paul Bieber is pastor of All Saints Lutheran Church, San Diego, California.  

Jeffrey Galbraith is pastor of St. Paul's Lutheran Church (ELCA) in Greenfield, Massachusetts, and a professor of business administration at Greenfield Community College.

Homily Service 41, no. 3 (2008): 15-23.

The Spirit is Future Present – 22 May 2016 – Holy Trinity

The doctrine of the Holy Trinity gives us not only the workings of the Holy Three but a powerful inner-reliance within them that forms an image of community. All of this can sound either too practical (they each have a job) or too complicated (three is one?).

God the Creator can be too distant (the Watchmaker god who gets the ball rolling and then departs) or too comfortable (there’s not much that is controversial in acknowledging the universe must have a Source).

God the Spirit can be too easily manipulated (we can say God “told me” through the working of the Spirit what I wanted to hear) or so ever-present and pervasive that it loses the particularity of emanating from God the Son (i.e., the Spirit is in every faith).

God the Face––in Christ Jesus––of Creator/Spirit can be either too neatly drawn (Jesus’ sense of what is right and just is in line with mine) or too scary (he’s asking me to grow and change so that I embrace a larger world than I want).  

Preachers might summon the language of mystery today so that what seems to be too difficult to talk about (lest it become boringly understandable or ungraspably academic) becomes absolutely necessary to faith.

The Church and the lectionary give us this day every year to sum up, as it were, ways to think about our confession of faith: I believe in the God the Father… Son… and Holy Spirit. This is a great opportunity to get down to it!

John 16:12-15

Most significantly, we hear from Jesus’ farewell speech to the disciples, promising that a “Spirit of truth” will come to guide the disciples into the future.

Why did Jesus think his followers needed this kind of divine presence? Why not simply tell them: “You have my words, my sacramental body and blood, you have me with you always.” . . .  Even the two-voice God language is too complex for most of us, since God as a (single) “higher power” is what really matters. Why were Jesus' words and sacramental presence not enough of God for the church to hang onto?

Here's a revealing analogy. A contemporary religious community founded about forty years ago by a revered teacher faced this problem. He was their leader, teacher, saint. So they recorded ten thousand hours of his teachings, and after his death kept his living quarters unchanged as a shrine. When new members joined, they were escorted to the room, and could listen to the tapes. Why bother with the Spirit, if the original founder can still be available in this way? . . . .

One answer might be: geographical, physical mobility in one case, but not the other. The [contemporary religious] community stayed in Philadelphia, the house and room providing immediate access to the past when the leader lived there. By contrast, the earliest Christians were forced to flee; they scattered and moved around and most of them lost that immediate link with the literal places where Jesus had been. Of course, a homeless founder helped this dynamic: there was no “Jesus’ own bedroom” to show new converts! But a more significant aspect is that the Spirit, already has a direct connection to the future. . . prevent[ing] the community from only remembering, preserving, returning to a glorified sacred past. The Spirit promises a future with its own worth, its own challenges and novelties. Yet the promise is also that this future will not be Jesus-less, nor disconnected intrinsically from the mighty events recorded in the gospel. The Spirit takes what belongs to Jesus and the Father, and shares this with those to come. . . .

Did Christians begin and remain a kind of “Jesus cult” in just this sense, fixated on one individual founder? In a way, yes. But the Spirit's role is to keep them and us from getting stuck in this past. We have no forced choice between past and future. Someone in the Community of the Beloved Disciple must have grumbled, “Jesus wouldn't have wanted us to move to Ephesus,” but someone else could always invoke the Spirit's guidance. The test isn't “Would Jesus have wanted this?” but “Is the Spirit guiding us here? Does God have a future for us in Ephesus, revealed through the Spirit?” No search of the sayings could answer that. – Lucy Bregman

Proverbs 8:1-4, 22-31

Let the poetry of this passage, rich in concrete touchstones (water, mountains, earth, heavens, skies, sea…), expand the image of what undergirds all of creation by naming it Wisdom. Before all that ever was, Wisdom was born––another name for the One God.

Romans 5:1-5

The litany of Paul’s list of character traits that build upon one another becomes a kind of ladder to greater and greater capacities that strengthen us in this life of struggle. Paul’s words encourage us to look at the gifts that accrue to those who suffer: endurance, character, hope, and finally the experience that “does not disappoint us” which is joy.

Joy comes from participating in the life of the Trinity, the life of the world. Early theologians spoke of the Trinity being like a fountain with love spilling over from Father to Son to Spirit. Here’s another possibility for that fountain:

Imagine a “Trinity fountain” in which the. . . water moves from the Father to the Son and from the Son to the Spirit—but mysteriously reciprocally returns to the Father from the Son, and to the Son from the Spirit, and from the Spirit to the Father. . . a perfect, tri-personal relationship of love communication and covenant faithfulness. . . – Michael A. Van Horn

This is a description of perichoresis, a dance of the Three, to which we are all invited.

Lucy Bregman, professor of religion at Temple University, Philadelphia, has published several books on death and dying and, most recently, The Ecology of Spirituality: Practice and Virtues in a Post-Religious Age (Baylor Univ. Pr.).

Michael A. Van Horn was, at the time of this contribution to Homily Service, assistant professor of theology at North Park Theological Seminary in Chicago, and a pastor within the Evangelical Covenant tradition.

  

Homily Service 40, no. 7 (2007): 3-14.

Being Truly Born – 31 May 2015 – Holy Trinity

Commenting on Holy Trinity Sunday in Homily Service (2006), Stephen Crippen shared a colleague’s caution about the substance of the sermon:

Melissa Skelton, priest of St. Paul’s Episcopal Church in Seattle, offered these warnings in her sermon on Trinity Sunday last year: “Preaching on Trinity Sunday is a daunting task fraught with three dangers: the danger of getting lost in church history, the danger of getting lost in abstract concepts of God, and the danger of getting lost in only talking about God and forgetting what God cares about—us, our lives, this world. And so let’s resist the temptation to talk much about the Council of Nicaea and the heresies of the early church; let’s abandon the abstract symbolism of triangles or intersecting circles; and let’s turn our backs on discussions of homoousia and perichoresis, both arcane terms used to describe the inner life of the Trinity.” – Stephen Crippen

We do not have to abandon theological talk or historical context altogether on this Sunday. But all words need to lead toward the main point which is the hope we have because of God’s power to renew all things.

John 3:1-17

The mission of God is not a human project, capable of being accomplished by “flesh.” Rather, it requires the intervention of God and a new life in the Spirit. Contrary to the manner in which human power and will are exercised, life in the Spirit is received by trusting in the Son of Man who is “lifted up.” Although at this point in the story Nicodemus is unable to understand this allusion to the cross, the reader understands that Jesus speaks of the mystery through which God gives life to the world. – Aaron Couch

This renewal transcends all time and all places. It is not always polite and comfortable. For Nicodemus, it involved stealthy sneaking through the dark. For Isaiah, it was fear-inducing.

Isaiah 6:1-8

Isaiah recounts his experience of being called to serve the LORD. It involved a terrifying glimpse of God’s transcendent holiness, attended by strange heavenly beings. The greatness of God reveals the smallness and insubstantiality of the created order. The holiness of God reveals Isaiah’s sinfulness. Yet the prophet recounts how God removes his guilt, making it possible for Isaiah to offer himself for the sake of God’s mission. – Aaron Couch

Romans 8:12-17

Paul writes about suffering with Christ, the pull of the desires of the flesh, and of being adopted to live as children of God. The church struggles with these realities all the time, but we are accompanied by the power beyond ourselves.

The Spirit, like rain, moves not in a celestial sphere, but right here in our messy, conflicted and hard-to-control communities. We find ourselves in parishes and neighborhoods with plenty of problems and challenges. We’re sometimes delighted to work alongside others in the activities and challenges of the group, but we’re also confronted by—no, irritated and annoyed by—the sometimes cranky and often troublesome people who surround us. The Spirit finds its way in and around communities that aren’t exactly winsome and attractive. Yet it is here, in our ordinary sanctuaries and parish halls, committee rooms and kitchens, that the work of ministry is begun and sent outward, like rain, in all directions, to all places. Dreary work? Sometimes. But delightful, too. So, if we imagine Spirit as Rain, let us by doing so bring life to a parched world. – Stephen Crippen

Aaron Couch is co-pastor of First Immanuel Lutheran Church in Portland, Oregon. 

Stephen Crippen is a psychotherapist and a deacon in the episcopal Diocese of Olympia, Washington.

Homily Service 39, no. 7 (2006): 20-30.