In the name of
the Father and of
the Son and of
the Holy Spirit. Amen.
If you’re hoping for
a definitive, rational,
post-Enlightenment
understanding of the Trinity
try again next year.
Maybe I’ll read Katherine Sonderegger’s book
Systematic Theology, Volume 2:
The Doctrine of the Holy Trinity:
Processions and Persons
on my sabbatical.
You’ve probably heard, rightly,
that this is the only liturgical observance
of a doctrine —
not a person or an event.
Yep.
It’s only been as universal
as a Western Christian observance gets
for about 700 years.
So what are we to do,
what am I to do
in this pulpit
at this ambo
today?
Like the Rev. Cn. Dr. Kara Slade says,
“Preach the ding dang gospel.”
Trinity Sunday,
and all our passages from Scripture today
are about God’s love for us.
“God so loved the kosmos
that he gave his only Son,
so that everyone who believes in him
won’t perish but will have eternal life.
God didn’t send his Son into the kosmos
to judge the kosmos,
but that the kosmos
might be saved through him.”
In today’s gospel text we have Nicodemus
coming to Jesus in the night,
in the dark,
talking to Jesus through the night.
Presumably he leaves in the morning,
in the day,
in the light.
Nicodemus comes under the cover of night
and asks
nothing
of Jesus.
He just observes,
“Rabbi,
we know that you are a teacher
who has come from God,
for no one could do these
miraculous signs that you do
unless God is with him.”
The author of the Fourth Gospel
writing 60-some years after the Ascension
has Jesus say, in short,
“You have to be baptized
to enter God’s reign.”
As uncomfortable as this might make us feel,
this was a defining line.
It was in or out.
In 90 the temple had been destroyed
20 years ago.
It had been barely a decade
since Vesuvius erupted
covering Pompeii and Herculaneum.
Followers of Jesus
were an internecine squabble
within Judaism.
Choosing to be baptized
in the name of
the Father and of
the Son and of
the Holy Spirit
was a sharp line.
It was not the Greek or Roman Pantheon
nor did traditional followers of the God of
Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob
accept unity in this formulation of God.
“‘How is it possible
for an adult to be born?
It’s impossible to enter the mother’s womb
for a second time and be born…
isn’t it?’
“Jesus answered,
‘I assure you,
unless someone is born of water and the Spirit,
born through the womb of the church,
baptized in the name of the Trinity,
it’s not possible to enter God’s kingdom.”
Sounds harsh.
Has to be at the time.
Baptism wasn’t something you got done
because it was expected when you were 6-12 or so.
Baptism wasn’t something
that you wanted to happen
because it was family tradition.
Active soldiers couldn’t be baptized.
When John is writing,
rejecting your family and friends
leaving your life’s work,
was a hard line.
Going into the water
in the name of the Father
and of the Son
and of the Holy Spirit
was potentially literally
a life and death decision.
Through death in the water,
buried with Christ’s death,
you understood you were being born to new life
joined to his resurrection
on the other side.
Being born anew,
being born from above
wasn’t because you thought
you were better than everyone else.
Those of us who know John 3.16 from memory
probably know it as a prooftext
for the superiority of Christianity
and a scare text
to keep you out of hell.
That’s why I’ve been disappointed
that the memory verse challenge
isn’t John 3.16 and 17.
“God so loved the kosmos
that he gave his only Son,
so that everyone who believes in him
won’t perish but will have eternal life.
God didn’t send his Son into the kosmos
to judge the kosmos,
but that the kosmos
might be saved through him.”
God who has always existed
had such an overflowing love
that God made creation.
God (the Father) created time
and let the products of creation
make choices.
They weren’t always good.
God (the Son) stepped into time
as Jesus —
fully human, fully divine —
and by joining the finite and infinite
utterly changed both.
God (the Spirit) is with us now,
ushering us into God’s work of redemption
pulling us toward God’s
hope of reconciliation
not just at the end of time
but that all peoples might be restored to unity
with God and one another.
The Rev. Dr. Robin Meyers said,
“I have been a non-trinitarian minister
for my entire life.
Three-in-one and one-in-three
(like fully human and fully divine)
not only makes no logical sense,
but it sells the mystery of God short.”
I joked as I began about
a definitive, rational,
post-Enlightenment
understanding of the Trinity.
Unfortunate for Dr. Meyers,
as I take account and experience God
and their Spirit working through the church,
most of this doesn’t make logical sense.
I’d actually be pretty anxious and skeptical
if the mystery of God
has to make logical sense.
Paul writes to the church at Corinth,
“Jews ask for signs, and Greeks look for wisdom,
but we preach Christ crucified,
which is a scandal to Jews
and foolishness to Gentiles.
But to those who are called—
both Jews and Greeks—
Christ is God’s power and God’s wisdom.
This is because the foolishness of God
is wiser than human wisdom,
and the weakness of God
is stronger than human strength.”
God loving the world
makes no logical sense.
Look at what we’ve done with it.
But God does.
God joining us to help us
makes no sense.
But God did
instead of tossing us into the bin
and starting over.
God drawing us into God’s work,
again, look at what we do,
makes no logical sense.
Yet we celebrated the arrival of the Spirit last week.
We want points and measures,
we want a gamified existence
where we can know our score
and hopefully weight less than a feather
when our heart is put on a scale.
That’s not God’s love though.
That’s not God’s illogical, wreckless,
saving the kosmos love.
“God so loved the kosmos
that he gave his only Son,
so that everyone who believes in him
won’t perish but will have eternal life.
God didn’t send his Son into the kosmos
to judge the kosmos,
but that the kosmos
might be saved through him.”
In the name of
the Father and of
the Son and of
the Holy Spirit. Amen.