Sermon
I was advised by a Facebook meme this week, not to try to say anything about this complicated Christian doctrine called the Trinity today, and instead show videos of kittens. Well that was tempting!
It does seem odd to set aside a day on the church calendar to celebrate a piece of church doctrine, when we don't typically preach a particular set of beliefs. The doctrine, or concept of the Trinity came out of a very human attempt to reconcile the seemingly incompatible aspects of God. God who is invisible but visible, everywhere and here, in control but not controlling, Jesus dead but living, and the Holy Spirit as a “ghost” and living in us. The Christian doctrine of the Trinity has been argued about and defined since the church's inception and has been the cause of many of the divergent tangents of Christianity. It is a result of people trying to describe their experience of God making God's self known. It is appropriate then to use scriptural references that tell us a little about our experience with and the role of this most ancient concept.
This third person of the Trinity, the Spirit is not a new creation. Jesus' promise of the Advocate, Companion, Holy Spirit did not call forth a new spirit for us, but called forth The Spirit of God to live in us. We are baptized in one spirit. It is the indwelling of the Spirit that was promised at Pentecost. That indwelling in us will lead to the glory of God being visible in the world through us.
Rather than get myself into deeper trouble trying to define the entirety of the Trinity, we will focus on just the third person, the Holy Spirit, Holy Ghost, Sustainer. From different traditions we have learned phrases like “Father, Son, and the Holy Ghost,” or “Creator, Redeemer, Sustainer,” or “Abba, Christ, and Holy Spirit,” or “Father, Son and Holy Spirit.” The language of this third person of the trinity has been modified at times to reflect the function of the holy spirit. The holy spirit as a relationship to us; a function within us; a guider of our steps; the deepest helpmate for discernment; the tool we use for reason.
Reading about Wisdom in proverbs 8, and her call, her closeness with God and her delight give us new insight into the width and depth and eternal place of the Spirit within the life of God's creation.
Wisdom calls, raises her voice, everywhere so all can hear; on the heights, beside the way, at the crossroads, beside the gates and in the entrances to the portals. She cries out “To you, O people, I call, and my cry is to all that live.”
In verse 22 Lady Wisdom says “The Lord created me at the beginning of his work, the first of his acts of long ago.” “Before the beginning of the earth.” Before the depths, the mountains, the soil, the heavens, the skies, the sea – Wisdom was there “rejoicing before him always, rejoicing in his inhabited world and delighting in the human race.”
We see this same wisdom in Luke 2:40 when Luke writes about the boy Jesus “And the child grew became strong, filled with wisdom; and the favor of God was upon him” (Luk 2:40) When Jesus teaches in synagogue in Mark 6 those present as “Where did this man get all this? What is the wisdom given to him?” (Mar 6:1). And Paul states emphatically, “But unto them which are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the Wisdom of God” (1 Cor 1:24).1
The cry of wisdom is to all that live. Wisdom of God exists in Christian, and Jewish traditions as well as Qur'anic and Islamic traditions. And of course philosophy and literature and science have been discussing wisdom since their earliest days as well. “Simone Weil, described wisdom as a love of truth that led one from thought to action.” And, “The notion of wisdom flourishes in later Islamic religious thought, for example from one Islamic scholar, who sees all of the prophets offering distinct sorts of wisdom that lead towards saintliness and union with God.”1
In our own context, combining this text from the book of Proverbs with the church's celebration of Pentecost, we see that the concept of Wisdom is of a spirit that is eternal. When we talk about having wisdom we are usually talking about intuition, the sum of our experiences, perspectives and insights that we understand to the core of our being. It is this form of wisdom that can be seen as God's presence in our lives. We in our wisdom are innately connected with God.2
Wisdom has given us her presence and her voice, her beauty, her integrity, her fresh perspective. Trinity Sunday helps us remember our own wisdom. We have that wisdom in our souls and it's the thing we can pay attention to.
One commentator said that Trinity Sunday was like Pentecost Part II. We are invited to ask ourselves just what is the outcome of this unifying force of God's ongoing presence in us? What does it mean for us today? We are reminded that we don't worship God in Christ, who then died and we worship the things that are long gone. We are reminded that we worship God who is alive with us now and is continually revealing Jesus to us.
Of those who came to the Burlingame March for our Lives yesterday, how many of us saw Jesus somewhere in that crowd? Personally I saw Christ in a little girl, maybe 4 or 5 years old, who had a sign just her size, clearly drawn by herself, that said in very messy handwriting “no more guns” and a pointy thing with a circle around it, crossed off. We adults, worked so hard on our signs on Friday trying to figure out which phrase to use, in my case how to even paint letters!, and think our way to a proper presentation of our feelings. It's always a child, isn't it? No guns. It seems like a no brainer. We saw and heard it in the three 14 year olds (maybe 15) who will hopefully run for office someday – they were so articulate, so passionate and so creative, including a young man's poem called “Did you hear that?” And then I think of the great loss to us that those 19 lives in Uvalde are no longer going to be among their generations beautiful people that the world needs that was God's intention for them. God is continually revealing Jesus to us. God is still working for change and pushing us to new horizons, as individuals and as the Church.
How else is God revealing Jesus to us? How is God asking us to be that face of Christ to others where they are and in a way that is needed? Marching in a walk related to gun control is a new personal spirit-led walk for me, so I made it known casually that I would be doing it and we did. It's not the only thing in my heart and I know there are so many things in your hearts too. I'm happy to help organize Bethany sponsored group social justice activities that you bring forward too. Or just anything casual that anyone wants some company with. It turned out that those of us who went yesterday each wanted to go but didn't want to go on our own. The idea might have been spirit-led for me, but for us as a group, getting us all together was the spirit at work too.
Another topic close to the hearts of folks here at Bethany is the care of the planet. How timely that Psalm 8 is also in the lectionary today, where we read our mandate to care for God's earth and creatures! God's glory described in psalm 8 will not continue to be divine if we destroy it. In nature, even after the land is destroyed life does eventually begin again. Maybe God will create another earth-like place in the millennia after we destroy this one, but God might not decide to make us so central. We'd be better off trying to keep the one we have. Every sunny day, every lake, every powerful storm, every snow covered peak shows us the planet entrusted to our care. It would be a shame if our grandchildren didn't have the opportunity to experience those things.
When we acknowledge that the Spirit is a force of God made available for us, our choices open up. What is available for our future, our children's futures, is so much more than we can imagine. The Spirit, an eternal presence with God will not leave us alone to create a better world without help.
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1 Wisdom across religious traditions
2 Douglas M. Donley, Feasting on the Word series, Year C. Vol. 3, p.26-30
Not referred to here anywhere, I just like it, as it relates to deciding how to behave:
“Behave so the aroma of your actions may enhance the general sweetness of the atmosphere.”
--Henry David Thoreau