Love in Communion: Sermon for Trinity Sunday B

I spent the first thirteen years of my professional life teaching middle school English, and one of the most basic things with which many of my students struggled was what was known as “subject-verb agreement.” You know: if you have a singular noun, you use a singular form of the verb attached to it, and if you have a plural noun, you use the plural form of the verb attached to it.

This should be simple—but in English there are always exceptions. One of those exceptions is this: there are some nouns that remain the same word, whether singular or plural. Like “moose.” Or “bison.” Or “news.” Or “shrimp”—unless you are British. With these words, we have to think hard about whether we use “is” or “are” for instance, because we only know if they are singular or plural based on the context.

Trinity, Emmanuel Episcopal Church, Webster Groves

In Christianity, “Trinity” is another one of those words. Sometimes we speak of the Trinity in the singular, as a unity. Sometimes we speak of the Trinity in the plural, as three distinct “persons” or “aspects.” But the problem is, no matter how we try to speak about the Trinity, we run into the danger of limiting the relationship within the Trinity in ways that make one aspect dominant over the others, instead of “one in being,” as we say in the words of the Nicene Creed. It’s not made any easier by the fact that, while various terms for the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit are all mentioned in scripture, the term “Trinity” itself does not appear anywhere in most modern translations of either the Old or New Testaments.

And yet each one of our readings can be seen as describing aspects of the Trinity. The Spirit of God calls to Isaiah and we hear both the singular and the plural in that call: “Whom shall I send? And who will go for us?” And Isaiah plucks up the courage to answer even as the vision he sees overwhelms him. In Romans chapter 8, Christ is described as the one who reconciles us to God, the Spirit leads us and bears witness within us, and the Father adopts us as children. All three aspects work together to redeem us and restore us to proper relationship as beloved children of God. Jesus’s conversation with Nicodemus depicts the Jesus the Son talking about both God the Father and the Holy Spirit coordinating in the work of salvation—and just like us, Nicodemus probably emerged from that conversation more confused than ever.

This encounter between Nicodemus and Jesus reminds us that too often, we are more like Nicodemus than we realize—we may think we have God all figured out, only to find that God upends our comfortable certainties with endless and therefore discomfiting possibilities.

Even saints tread carefully around trying to define the Trinity, and most agree it is far safer to talk about what the Trinity is NOT, rather than what the Trinity IS. It is at this point that I have to tell you how excited I am that we have a visual aid for this right here in the rose window behind me, made by the good people of Emil Frei associates, my favorite stained glass artists. This does not always happen in such a convenient manner for a preacher, let me tell you.

Very useful window...

Have you ever looked at this window? Do you see what’s going on here? I am certainly no scholar of Latin, but you can see an example of that kind of negative explanation of the Trinity right there in the window behind me, visually representing the Trinitarian formula of blessing. The Father is NOT (that’s what “non est” means) the Spirit, the Spirit is NOT the Son, and the Son is NOT the Father. Yet all three are connected at the center to make up God—Deus, in Latin. Thus, the Father IS God; the Holy Spirit IS God; and the Son IS God. Together. All different, yet all working together actively and equally in creation as God.

And God is at the very center, so that as we look at this image, we are reminded that we are drawn by love into God’s very existence, the existence that is the center and gift of our own lives. 

Because language is limited and we are finite creatures, we speak imperfectly about God. St. Irenaeus, one of the so-called Fathers of the Church, argued against heresy that the “persons” of the Trinity were not equal partners, and that the God of the Old Testament was different from and inferior to the God described in the New Testament. One of the most famous metaphors Irenaeus used to talk about proof of the Trinity throughout scripture was based upon the statement in Genesis 1:26, where God says “Let US make humankind in OUR image, in OUR likeness…” Following the argument of St. Justin, Irenaeus argued that the use of the plural “us” showed evidence of the Son and the Spirit in God’s own voice.

In a beautiful image, Irenaeus then refers to the Word (Jesus) and the Wisdom of God (the Holy Spirit) taking part in creation as being like the hands of God that are mentioned in the psalms and elsewhere as molding and shaping creation. Irenaeus said, “In carrying out his intended work of creation, God did not need any help from angels, as if he did not have his own hands. For he has always at his side this Word and this Wisdom, the Son and the Spirit. Through them and in them he created all things of his own free will. And to them he says, ‘Let us make human beings in our own image and likeness.’”(1)

I like to think of that even more specifically: God the Father is the ground of our being, and the Son and Holy Spirit are like embracing arms that draw us into union with God and with each other. Yet I admit that this is just one image, and that for all its beauty it is still too limited to express the full glory of God.

The doctrine of the Trinity, as difficult to define as it is, nonetheless teaches us some valuable truths. First, that no matter what, as Nicodemus was reminded, we can never rest on our own reasoning or knowledge to know God—God is a beautiful mystery, yet at the same time absolutely a loving, involved presence in each of our lives. Second, the doctrine of the Trinity teaches us that relationship in community is at the heart of the life of faithfulness. We know God through God’s initiative, not ours, because God’s very being is love. Whenever we seek out God in prayer, in worship, in joy, in anxiety, in sorrow, God invites us into relationship.

God as Trinity declares that God is, by nature, relational: Father, Son, Holy Spirit, as we hear in our Book of Common Prayer. Earth-maker, Pain-bearer, Life-Giver, in the words of the New Zealand Prayer Book. Creator, Redeemer, and Sanctifier. No matter the terms we use, they can only partially express the active love of God in our lives. The three “persons” of the Trinity nonetheless are mysteriously but ultimately one, bound together in what can only be described as a dance of love into which we, as God’s beloved children, are invited, even if we ourselves think we only have two left feet. Yet we are made to dance, because if we are created in God’s image, that means we are created also to be fully who God created us to be only when we too live in community and communion with others.

Archbishop Desmond Tutu reminds us of the relationship and community at the heart of God’s very nature in his book he co-authored with the Dalai Lama, entitled The Book of Joy: Lasting Happiness in a Changing World. He writes, “Certainly in our sort of prayer, it is never the alone speaking to the alone. Our concept of God is of a God who is one, but who is a fellowship, a community, the Trinity. And we are made in the image of this God. When you become a Christian, you are incorporated into a fellowship." (2)

We are thus reminded that relationship is at the heart of being Christian. This is tonic in a society in which so many people feel isolated, marginalized, and beseiged, a society in which we see a marked tendency by many to define themselves against those who are different from "us."

But that is contrary to the very nature of God. The fellowship of love at the heart of God, and to which we are called, is not limited by the walls of this building, nor by race, nor by flag, nor by nationality. The fellowship to which we are called by God’s love is a fellowship with all creation. The Trinity is a celebration of interdependence, a true unity in diversity. What could be a more necessary miracle in this day and age?

Relationship is at the heart of who God is: pure love, as the first letter of John has been reminding us throughout the Great Season of Easter. Fierce, active, enduring, limitless love-- that is the foundation of fellowship, of communion with God, and with each other.

In the words of Orthodox theologian John Zizioulas, “the being of God is a relational being; without the concept of communion it would not be possible to speak of the being of God.”(3)  That word “communion” is important, for the eucharistically-shaped life we commit to in the Episcopal Church is one of the most obvious ways we ourselves are invited into the relationship of the Trinity. Through communion and thanksgiving, through God’s grace and invitation, the divine circle of love is expanded even more dramatically, to include all creation through each and every one of us gathered around this altar.

Listen! Soon you and I, all of us together, will ask the Father to accept our gifts of bread and wine, taken from this good earth. We will ask the Father that the Holy Spirit be present to us to sanctify those gifts and us, making Christ present to us, here and now. It is only through the loving activity of the Trinity, acknowledged in our Eucharistic prayer, that we may receive the Body and Blood of our Lord Jesus Christ, that we may be present and one with him-- and one with each other.

We are not called to this sacrament only for ourselves, but rather so that we can be strengthened to go out into the world as participants in God’s reconciliation and redemption in the world. We take our place within the embrace of the Trinity through ourselves cultivating real love—love that doesn’t count the cost, but rejoices in the beloved. Love that is the basis of ongoing creation—since God creates us through a desire for relationship with us, and that then draws us to share that love with all that is.

It is only this divine love which we wonder at in the Trinity that can satisfy the hunger for meaning that plagues this time in which we live—and just look at the response to Presiding Bishop Curry’s sermon at the royal wedding to see how deep that hunger runs in the world.

I am convinced that the doctrine of the Trinity, when taken seriously, reminds us to be and remain humble, and to admit that we need to never lose our sense of wonder, of awe, of mystery—a real challenge and yet opportunity in our blasé, cynical world. We can rediscover that sense of wonder, awe, and mystery each and every time we gather together with our hands upraised and hearts open to partake in Christ’s Body and Blood, given for us so that we may then carry and reflect that love into the world for the sake of the world.

The love embodied in the Trinity is calling to us to be its vessels in the world, that love may overflow our hearts and spill into all the corners of the Earth. The voice of that sacramental love-- that is God, Unity in Trinity-- calls to us: “Whom shall I send? And who will go for us?” Sustained by wonder and nourished by Trinitarian, sacramental love, may we each dare to answer, humbly, joyfully, compassionately, “Here am I; send me!”

Amen.


Preached at 8:00 and 10:00 am at Christ Episcopal Church, Rolla, on May 27, 2018.

Readings:
Isaiah 6:1-8
Psalm 29
Romans 8:12-17
John 3:1-17

References:
(1) Irenaeus, Against Heresies, 4.20.1
(2) Desmond Tutu and the Dalai Lama, The Book of Joy: Lasting Happiness in a Changing World, p. 131
(3) John D. Zizioulas, Being as Communion: Studies in Personhood and the Church, p. 17

Images:
(1) Greek icon of the Trinity in communion
(2) Trinity window from Emmanuel Episcopal Church, Webster Groves, MO. Photo mine.
(3) Trinity rose window at Christ Episcopal Church, Rolla, MO. Photo mine.
(4) Celtic Trinity image.
(5) Sweet Olivia at the communion rail. Photo mine.