Today
is Trinity Sunday.
For some that means a Sunday that's a bit of a puzzle, with a subject that
cannot be easily explained. For all of us this should mean a reality of great
mystery, but one that is to be very practically experienced and understood in
our daily living. We
have our being in the God who is Creator. We have been redeemed by the Son who
is our Saviour. We are renewed and empowered by the Spirit within us. That is
what eternal life means. It is life given by the Father, lIved in the Son by
the Spirit who makes him real in our hearts by faith.
As one
teacher simply taught: The Father is God above us; the Son is God beside us;
the Spirit is God within us. A good theologian like Nazarene Tom Noble warns: "We have so
often (or, too often, my addition) taken the trinitarian heart of the Christian
faith forgranted in order to get on with what is thought to be more practical
and relevant."[1] This sermon today is to say that
there is nothing more practical and relevant than the core Christian doctrine
of the Trinity.
Why? Because
Godliness in human life flows out of the central Christian belief in the
atonement of Jesus, the incarnation of the Son of God, and the Trinity, which
makes living union with God in Christ by his Spirit possible and real. Our
shorthand summary above states this: God is the Father above us, our Creator and Life-giver; Jesus
is the Son of God beside us, our redeemer and Saviour; the Spirit is God within
us, renewer and sanctifier. That is how we live: by experiencing the reality
of all three aspects, by sharing in the hilarity and hospitality of fellowship
with God in Christ by his Spirit.
Down through time different people
have tried to explain the Trinity by using mental pictures like metaphors: the Trinity is like Parent, sibling,
child; or, the Trinity is like H20, that is water, steam and ice; or, the
Trinity is like a threefold cord or even a triangle with three equal sides
making up one whole. The real question
is: Who exactly is God? How does God make himself known? What happens when God
shows up? What does this look like, what does this feel like? These are some of
the questions our scriptures and our topic present to us this morning. Who is
this God? And, who will go for him?
Artists and
musicians have tried to answer this question down through the centuries.
Scientists and architects have tried to draw diagrams to portray or explain
him. Johannes van
Eyck, in the Altar piece of the Cathedral of St. Bavo, in the town of Ghent, Belgium, done in 1426-7, used a triptych to do this.[2] On the right hand panel there are
performing angels gathered round an organ. But the organ has 21 pipes (not the
normal 15 of those times) making up three octaves. Then he has the organist
playing three notes, C and G with the left hand, and F with the right hand, to
form two sets of thirds in harmony. All of this is to try to portray, with the middle panel of
God the Father crowned as King with a three-tiered crown, God as Trinity, a God
who brings and creates harmony, that is agreement, peace, and unity.
200 years
later Kircher, in 1650, created a diagram to explain God through an artifact
called "Harmony of the Birth of the World." In this he shows the order of creation. Six
circles above show six days of creation. At the bottom "Trinity" is
portrayed by an organ console where the black keys are all in threes (not twos
or threes as normal) and three levers or stops are shown at the side. And he
concludes: "Thus God's eternal wisdom plays in the sphere of the
worlds." I find
the following scientific analogy helpful: just like the periodic table of the
elements provides a way of understanding the nature of matter, that is the
material world, (like Uranium = 238, atomic number, 92, etc.) so does the
Trinity offer a way of understanding the whole cosmos in its connected whole.
It is comprehended and understood from a non-material point of view as related
to the Trinity. It is a connected community in which the basic unit is triune,
like a father, mother, and child. But also like two friends meeting a stranger
where they learn to understand each other better by crossing a boundary into
another world and they begin to transcend themselves in order to truly
understand who they are in relationships with an Other. Most of all the Trinity
is reflecy
Let's make a
practical start by opening the Scriptures and finding three strikingly
different word pictures of how people saw how God showed up in the past. We
have these scriptures before us today: The first one is Psalm 29, about God in a storm. The psalmist describes vividly the Voice of
God breaking great trees like cedars, God shaking the wilderness, making
Lebanon skip like a young calf. When he speaks his voice flashes forth flames
of fire, he causes oak trees to whirl and strips the forest bare. When we read this like a meteorologist
today, we might smile and say: we can explain all that without God. But to the Psalmist God was like a
mighty storm: untamed and untamable. He is like an untamable storm, like an
unconsumed fire, and like an unshakeable, unfailing friend. When he shows up
beware, be aware, be still, and know that he is God.
For us to
understand God in nature we need to see this through the lens of Jesus in the
New Testament. How did Jesus view a storm on the Sea of Galilee? He slept
through it, and when the terrified disciples woke him, he rebuked them and the
storm, and said "Peace! Be still!
The next picture is Isaiah chapter
six. This offers us another window into the Presence of God: "In the year
that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord, high and lifted up, and the door posts
of the temple shivered and shook, and the whole earth was filled with his
glory," so the
prophet describes his awesome Presence. Serapis cover their faces and yell,
"Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of Hosts!" And Isaiah the prophet
groans, "I am done for!" This time it is not a storm in nature but a
political upheaval caused by the death of a good King, maybe not unlike the
passing of Nelson Mandela last year. What is the nation to do? Who will stand
up and lead? Who will go and do God's work in a new day? Must we look to the
political leader to do this? Isaiah was shaken to his roots by this vision of
God and cried out desperately, "I am done for. i am undone. I am
imploding. My rock of strength has been removed. I live in the midst of a people
who are unacceptable in God's sight.
What am I to do?"
So we have
these three windows through which to look and see God present: the first one is God in the storm (in nature); the
second one is Isaiah, in the temple (where most of us expect to find God); and the third is face to face across the
table where Jesus the Teacher teaches the great teacher of Israel, Nicodemus,
how to find God in his heart. That is the supreme dwelling place for God: in
the heart of his people. Let's listen one more time to Tom Noble right at the
start: Jesus in the heart religion in isolation doesn't work. "The
doctrine of the Christian life, including sanctification, cannot be articulated
in isolation as a separate doctrine. If it is, the danger is that it will become
an individualistic, introverted, subjectivist, and spiritually self-centered
quest. The sanctifying of the Christian can only be understood in the context
of the sanctifying of human relationships within the church, the people of God.
And the sanctifying of human relationships among those who are drawn into the
church can only be understood in turn by seeing that the fellowship enjoyed
within the church is the mutual fellowship of the Father with the Son, which is
the fellowship of the Holy Spirit."[3]
Whether we
smile or frown or laugh at these efforts, can we see that down through the ages
people have struggled to discover that the God who is Creator of Heaven and
Earth is also intimately and practically present to his creatures everywhere.
He is triune, and it takes three faces, as it were, to describe him: that of
Parent, child, and inner advocate and friend. And this God sends his Son to
say, "I have not come to condemn the world, I have not come to declare you
a sinner, I have come to tell you that you are adopted into the family of God.
You are precious and you belong to me. I would rather die than live without
you."
Nicodemus is
puzzled by this kind of message. The Gospel writer in John says, "No one
has seen God at any time; the only God, who is at the Father's side, he has
made him known." And how does Jesus make God known? Jesus makes the bold
and blunt truth clear: "Nicodemus, unless you are utterly transformed from
above, unless you are born again, that is, not by a fleshly re-entry into your
mother's womb, but you must. Be born of water and the Spirit. Then you
will be ushered into the kingdom of God. Here I am, Nicodemus, standing right before you to say to you
that we have come to make our abode in you. The God who created you, the Son
who has come to redeem you, and the Spirit who is like the wind that breathes
in the trees, will breathe into you the breath of life, that you may live and
know eternal life. We will come and make our abode in your heart,
Nicodemus!"i
On this
Trinity Sunday may we not be as puzzled as Nicodemus, and as preoccupied with
little diagrams and pictures or ways to describe the Trinity. May we come to
grasp that God is not "the Big Man upstairs" nor the "Big Buddy
and Friend" who chums up to me, nor some wild and exotic emotion that zaps
me, but God is an awesome and gracious host who entertains me by welcoming me
into the hospitality of the kingdom, what some have called the hilarity of the
kingdom, where God regales the whole household with his generosity and
laughter. This begins in a new reality right within the domain of my own heart,
here and now.
"How
can these things be?" is the way we typically respond. We want to believe
but this all sounds stupendous and out of reach. One way is to become ready to
say, "Here I am Lord! What is it you want me to do?" This is to
rethink how we think about God. Ask yourself these questions? Is God a King or
a Lover? Is God a Friend or a Judge? Is God a warrior or a shepherd? Is God a
Loving Spouse or an accusing Critic? Or, in some strange way, all of these and
more?
Our answers
will tell us a lot about ourselves. And a lot of the time we are really doing
nothing more than excusing ourselves and rationalizing our behavior. One
glimpse of God radically changes everything.
Isaiah had
pinned his hopes for the kingdom of God on an earthly King and good ruler, King
Uzziah. When he died, the young prophet was devastated. He lost faith. His
hopes were crushed. Was that why he could see the Lord as if for the first
time, in the temple which was supposed to be the dwelling place of Almighty
God.
"I saw the Lord, high and lifted
up," he says. The foundations of the temple shook. The sanctuary was
filled with smoke. That is how the young man described the scene. He saw his
whole life shaking and being consumed. He saw himself and he was devastated.
"I am lost. I am undone. I am disintegrating," he cried. "I have
been taken apart piece by piece." I am imploding.
This is not
the Gospel declared by many modern preachers: "Come to find yourself. Come
to find peace and joy. Come to discover Jesus as a wonderful Buddy for the rest
of your life." Nor is it the Gospel of fire and brimstone declared by many
other preachers: God will judge you. God will send you to hell if you do not
repent. When God in Jesus stands in front of you,and the Spirit of God whispers
in your heart, this God our Creator is saying, imperiously, "Surrender!
Give us your heart. Open up to the One who created you and who speaks to you by
His word made flesh in Jesus. Allow the Spirit to whisper in your inner heart
the assurance that you belong in the family of God."
Yield to the
King who is the supreme Lover of your life. Bow before the Judge who is the
great advocate for your freedom. Listen to the Spirit who is the Spirit of
adoption whereby you are enabled to cry, "Abba, Father!" God's Spirit
will bear witness with your Spirit that you are a child of God."
Conclusion
Now is the
time to Listen to the Voice of the Lord saying, "Whom shall I send, and
who will go for us?" (Isaiah 6:8)
Then I said,
"Here I am! Send me."
And the Lord will say, "Go" but do not
expect easy results and quick responses. Go, and speak in my Name, but be
prepared for people to hear and not understand, to see and not perceive, to be
consumed, but not with love.
But go, and
I will be with you.
And who is
this God?
My
grandmother answered for me when I was about three years old:
Absolutely tender, absolutely true
Understanding
all things, understanding you,
Infinitely
loving, exquisitely near,
This is God our Father, what have we to fear?
This is God our Father, what have we to fear?
Amen
By Prof. David P. Whitelaw
[1] Page 5 of 224, Tom A. Noble, Holy
Trinity: Holy People, The Theology of the Doctrine of Christian
Perfecting. (Didsbury Lecture
Series) Eugene, OR:2013.
[2] Done with his elder brother Hubert,
and reputed to be one of ten most famous works of art To survive in the modern
world. Wikipedia: Johannes van Eyck.
[3] Noble, ibid. page 20 of 224
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