Holy Trinity

 

June 4, 2023

 

 

Matthew 28.16-20

+ Well, this is the first Trinity Sunday sermon I’ve preached in at least three years.

Since Deacon John was ordained, I usually let him take this Sunday to preach.

I do that because I’ll be honest…I’m not very good at preaching about the Trinity.

And Deacon John always does a good job talking about it.

I know that sounds awful.

After all, I taught Systematic Theology for 10 years.

You would think I could preach something worthwhile about the Trinity.

I’m going to be blunt with you.

After ten years of systematic theology, after 20 years of ordained ministry, after forty years of searching after God, I don’t understand it.

I don’t understand it all.

I will never understand it.

And that’s just fine.

And I’m not alone.

There are, no doubt, a few anxious preachers out there in the world.

There is probably more than one who is going into the pulpits of churches quaking a bit over the sermon they have to preach today.

I think it’s all for naught, personally.

For me, as for everyone here this morning, it is all a mystery.

And there is nothing wrong with preaching on the mystery of God.

And letting it all remain a mystery.

We are not some ecclesiastical Hardy Boys or Nancy Drews.

It is not our job to solve the mysteries of God.

I like just letting it be a mystery.

That doesn’t mean I am not confused by this mystery some times.

And it doesn’t mean that I don’t occasionally doubt it all sometimes.

In our Gospel reading for today, we find that some worshipped Jesus when they saw him resurrected.

And we find that “some doubted.”

I think that was a normal reaction for those people, who were still struggling to understand who Jesus was, especially this resurrected Jesus.

And the fact that we too doubt things like the Trinity is normal as well.

It IS difficult to wrap our minds around such a thing.

It’s complicated and it’s complex.

And, speaking for myself, sometimes the more I think about it, the more complicated it seems to get.

Especially when we try to think in the so-called correct (or orthodox) way about it all.

But the doubts, the complications and intricacies of God are all part of belief.

Belief is not meant to be easy.

It is meant to be something we struggle with and carry around with us.

And doubt isn’t always a bad thing.

We all doubt at times.

Without doubt we would be nothing but mindless robots of God.

There are moments when the mystery of who God is does confuse me and I am filled with doubts.

Sometimes my most common prayer is, “Seriously, Lord? Really?”

I am one of those people who occasionally just wants something simple in my faith life.

I just want to believe in God—the mystery of God, the fact that God is God and any complexity about God is more than I can fathom.

I sometimes don’t want to solve the mystery of God.

In fact is the very mystery of God that I love the most about God.

One of my major influences as a poet, R.S. Thomas, the great Welsh poet who was also an Anglican priest, once said,

“If there is God, if there is deity, then He, even as the old hymn says, He moves in a mysterious way and I'm fascinated by that mystery and I've tried to write out of that experience of God…”

I love the mystery of God.

I don’t want God defined for me.

I sometimes don’t want theology.

I sometimes just want spirituality.

I sometimes just want God.

But, as a Christian, I can’t get around the fact that as much as God is here with us, God is also so far beyond us as well.

And so I struggle on, just like everyone else.

Yes, I have my doubts.

Yes, my rational, intellectual mind prevents me from fully understanding what this Trinity could possibly be and, as a result, doubts creep in.

However, every year, on Holy Trinity Sunday, I place the Andrei Rubelev’s famous icon of the Trinity in the Narthex.

I will post this icon on Facebook and on my blog.

Be sure to take a  look at it and see how truly beautiful it is.

In it you’ll find three angels seated at a table.

According to some theological interpretations, these three Angels represent God in multiple forms.

In a sense, this icon is able to show in a very clear and straightforward way what all our weighty, intellectual theologies do not.

What I especially love about the image is that, in showing the three angels seated around the table, you’ll notice that there is one space at the table left open.

That is the space for you.

In a sense, we are, in this icon, being invited to the table to join with God.

We are being invited to join into the work of God.  

This icon is saying to us: no matter who you are,  no matter what your divisions are, come, sit here with the Divine Presence.

Sit here in the presence of the One in whom there are no divisions.

Sit here in the presence of the One in whom those dark and terrible things that divide us have no place.

Sit here at this table and become one with the One who invites us there.

And I think that is why this icon is so important to me.

It simply allows me to come to the table and BE with God.

It allows me to sit there with God and be one with God.

No need to wrestle with God, or debate God, or doubt God.

And we realize, certainly in our own life here at St. Stephen’s, that God is still calling to us to be at the table with God.

Here, at this altar, we find God in some form, God our Parent, God in the flesh or God in the Spirit inviting us forward.

And from this table, at which we feast with God, we go out to do the ministries we are all called to do.

We go out to do the work of God.

We don’t need to rationalize everything about our faith in God.

We don’t need to sit around and despair over it.

We don’t need to risk our sanity.

Or our salvation.  

God goes on, in that eternal, wonderful relationship with us.

 And no matter how much we might doubt in our rational minds, we are still being called to the table to sit and to serve with God.

So, let us do just that.

Let us sit down at that table.

Let us bring our doubts and uncertainties with us.

And let us leave them there at the table.

Let us let God be God.

And let us go out from this table to do the work each of us has been called by God to do.

Jesus today, in our Gospel reading, commands us to go and make disciples of all the nations.

By doing so, we are joining in that communion of God.

And by doing so, we know, despite our doubts, despite our uncertainties, that God will be with us always.

Always.

Even to the end of the age.

Let us pray.

Holy God, you are a mystery even to those of us who long to know you; help us to live within the bonds of the mysteries of our faith that in seeking you, we may truly find you; we ask this in Jesus’ holy Name. Amen.