05/26/2024: Trinity Sunday

Invitation into the Circle

 

Trinity by Kelly Latimore

 

 

            It’s the Second Sunday in the season of Pentecost or the beginning of Ordinary time if you are Catholic. It is also Trinity Sunday. You know the Sunday when we explore our three in one God, sounds like a new flavor of gum---three, three mints in one. Many have used diagrams of triangles to explain the inter-relationships or like St. Patrick found a three leaf clover to show how the three make one or the one is made of three. I am going to take another approach and get kind a mystical on you and use our Hebrew scriptures and art to talk about the Trinity.

            Before I go there, I wish to share with you that hardly anyone asks me about the Trinity, ever, except Muslims. When I lived in the Middle East Muslims would often ask how it was that we believed in the same God if we had two others---Jesus and the holy Spirit. They would remind me that they love prophet Jesus, but he wasn’t a god. These were sincere theological questions. I would usually answer this way, “You have 99 names for Allah, describing all the many qualities of our unknowable and divine maker. I would then ask which one or ones do they most often use in prayer. Then I would say we worship a God who is our creator, who is our redeemer, and our sustainer. These three qualities make up our Triune God. At this point, the person who asked me this question either wishes he or she hadn’t or is thankful for such a thoughtful answer. This explanation might be helpful for you too today.

            However, I have recently come across a few other ways of understanding our Triune God. One begins with the premise that God is love, creative love energy, and that out of that love God created us--- out of the mud and tenderly breathed life into us. In the beginning was also the Word and the Word was in God. God’s love gave life to us and to Jesus, the Word-made-Flesh. Let me break it down into our story. God the parent gathered a particular group of people and groomed them to be the recipients of the word-made-flesh. The word-made-flesh’s name was Jesus; he came to continue the formation of God’s beloved community by showing us how to behave. When Jesus left to return to his parent, he gave us the Holy Spirit to guide us “into all truth.” To conclude, God’s love is made flesh in Jesus and then remains with us through the Holy Spirit.

            Our Trinitarian God---Parent, Son, Spirit now invites us into this circle of love not unlike what is happening in Kelly Latimore’s icon on the cover of your bulletin. This modern icon is inspired by 15^th century Russian icon painted by Andrei Rublev. It shows the hospitality of Abraham at the great tree of Mamre when he welcomed three strangers who then turned into angels with blessings. The three are co-equals yet wearing different colored dresses. They are holding hands. Note that the two on the end are beckoning you or us to join.

            Many Christians have envisioned the relationship between God the father, the Son, and Holy Spirit looking something like this which is why this icon is still so popular.  Our three in one God is not exclusive but rather a God of hospitality and relationship. Dear Ones, the triune nature of our God has always existed. It did not emerge in order to explain Christian dogma but rather the inclusive relational nature of our God from the beginning of time. All are welcome at God’s table is not a UCC expression of faith nor even a Christian one. It’s an expression of God’s inclusive love.

            Dear Ones, it is only in relationship that we can experience the fullness of God. Rev. Nadia Boltz Weber says, “This is not a me God but a we God.” When we begin with three, we see that this is the nature of our one God---community, connection, and communion. Richard Rohr in his book The Divine Dance says that “God is flow. God flows. God is not rigid or immutable.” Let us remember this when we try to freeze God into a dogma that excludes others or privileges some over others.

            Before addressing how the Spirit is related to truth, I would like to fold into our mystical conversation one more example from the late great writer C.S. Lewis. It is from a radio broadcast on Sunday, February 1944 about how an ordinary Christian prays. Listen to his words and see if they match your experience or understanding about prayer. “Her prayer is directed toward God but is also prompted by God within her in the first place. And at the same time, she stands with Jesus as part of the body of Christ. God is three things for her: the addressee she is trying to reach, the impetuous within her, and her beloved companion along the way. Thus, the whole three-fold life of the Triune God is actually going on around and within her.”

            Now that your head is spinning with new ideas about our God, let’s return to our scripture this morning which says the Spirit will lead us to the truth, or is the Advocate of Truth. I invite you to ponder what truths you might have been led to in your life? Were you making conscious decisions or listening for God?

            In this time period of calculated misinformation, lies, and deception about what is true and what is not, how do we allow ourselves to be led by the Spirit of Truth? How do we know when something is true or not? Do we know how to be led by something not quite knowable or rational?

             I end with this Trinity Sunday with a Sonnet by the English priest and poet Malcom Guite:

 

            Dear Ones, go and improvise your own music and sing the chord that calls you to the dance, the one that has three notes resounding from a single tone and don’t forget we are made in their image and for each other’s inspiration too. 

 

Celtic Trinity by Jan L Richardson