Trinity Sunday is one of the most difficult Sundays to preach. In seminary we discussed why seminarians are assigned Trinity Sunday. We pondered that our mentors wanted to be sure that we-future priests had a basic understanding of the Trinity and would not preach a heresy, to challenge us, and maybe because our mentors were tired of preaching on the Trinity. The Trinity is important.
The Trinity is the core of our faith. It is the way that God has revealed the enormity and totalness of the Godself. The Trinity is one God in relationship as the Father, Son, and, Holy Spirit. We believe that Jesus is God, the Father is God, and the Holy Spirit is God. The Godself consists of 3. It makes room for and contains the others. The Trinity reminds us of the enormity of our almighty God and to have awe in the mystery of God as the Trinity. Our God-3 in 1. The Trinity makes room for 3 and contains 3. The 3 are completely part of each other.
The trinity was revealed to the early church as a way to understand the significance of Jesus’s death and resurrection. Jesus as God is able to take away our sins, defeat death, and allow us to share in eternal life with the Trinity.
If we look at scripture, there are only a few explicit scripture references that refer to the concept of a Trinitarian God. We have Jesus’s baptism in Matthew 3:16, 17, Mark 1 :10-11, and Luke 3:22-23, The Spirit rested on Jesus and the Father said, “This is my son, the beloved, with whom I am well pleased.” All three persons of the Trinity are present. All three are God in different persons. Jesus’s baptism in the Gospel of John is worded a bit different but has all persons of the Trinity present.
Then we have today’s reading in 2 Corinthians. The Apostle Paul ends it acknowledging the union of the Trinity of God as three in one. He says, “May the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all.”
This is significant as it shows that the early church was thinking of God in a trinitarian way. They thought of God as a God that blesses, helps, and saves.
Today’s Gospel reading, Matthew 28:16-20, the great commission, is the most explicit reference to the Trinity. Jesus tells his disciples, and he tells us to baptize and be baptized in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit so that we can share in the trinitarian life of God. We are baptized into Jesus’s life, the life of our Triune God, and we live it out in the church with one another. That is why Baptism is our primary sacrament. It is entrance into the life of the Trinity through Christ, and entrance into the life of the church.
The Trinity is our baptismal identity. References to the Trinity occur throughout the BCP. We say Father, Son, and Holy Spirit several times in Morning Prayer, Evening Prayer, Compline, Holy Eucharist and all the services of the church.
Morning and Evening Prayer open with the Glory Be, the psalms in Morning Prayer and Evening Prayer end in the Glory Be. The Magnificat, The Song of Zechariah and other canticles, end in the Glory Be. We bless in the name of the Trinity, absolve sins, and pray the Sign of the Cross in the name of the Trinity. Our consecration of the elements at Eucharist involves thanking God the Father, breaking the body of Jesus the Son and the calling of the Holy Spirit to be present in the elements and in us. These references are a reminder that the Trinity is not an abstract concept but that the Trinity is our living, active God. Present in 3 persons. Present all around us.
The Trinity, as it reveals the fullness of the identity of God, also reveals our identity. It is the core of who we are as baptized Christians. We have a personal and communal relationship with God.
As I wrote this sermon, I was reflecting on the Spanish language and the nuances of the language. I love how Spanish concepts and ideas are embodied in persons. They are not abstract. Take for example to say how old we are. In English we say that we are 40 years old. In Spanish we use the verb tener to say that we have 40 years. They are ours. They belong to us.
Brothers and sisters. I want you to have the Trinity. To own it with a passion. To live it. I want you to praise God the Father as creator. To experience God in creation. I want you to know Jesus the Son. Tell his life story. See how your story connects with His story. I want you to feel the power of the Holy Spirit. Pray for perseverance, strength, and help and expect it to happen. Know that the God in all persons is with you and will never leave you. Know that God blesses, helps, and saves.
As a church community we share in the life of our Triune God with each other. Our God makes room for and contains the others. It is a model for us as we live out our earthly life.
We are interconnected. We live a life where we consider our actions. Sometimes making room for others means we must adapt. It may be uncomfortable. Maybe, we must give something up. Share a space. Share our resources. It may be painful. But the discomfort and the pain are shared.
During this covid19 pandemic, we have seen how connecting with others is vital to our health and well-being. It has reminded us that our human connections are deep. I have a friend who is a young mother. She just delivered her new daughter in the hospital without her husband or her mother. In the midst of COVID19, she was thankful to have a nurse with her. Another friend has a mom in a nursing home. Her yearning to be with her mom prompted her to stand outside her mom’s window and write her messages. Seeing her mom on Zoom did not work as her mom has the beginnings of Alzheimer’s and she does not understand that her daughter is talking to her through the tablet.
Right now, our church is Zoom. It cannot take the place of St. Thomas’s beautiful sanctuary, or of shaking hands, or of hugging but it gives us a small sense of connection. It helps us appreciate the gift we are to each other. We yearn for the day when we can shake hands again with each other and with strangers, pass the peace in church, and visit loved ones in nursing homes.
We live in community with the Trinity, when we are connected with each other.
I hope, and I pray that each of us stay connected with our triune God personally and communally with each other.
In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.
Trinity Sunday Sermon delivered on Zoom
Matthew 28:16-20
June 7, 2020 -Deacon Bernie Hartsough