Trinity Sunday

It is "Trinity Sunday" today in the Episcopal church; otherwise known as the Sunday priests all across our nation try with all their might to explain to their congregations a concept that completely and totally baffles them (the priests, not the congregation)!

I'm never one to shrink from something I don't understand, or to be afraid to tackle the unexplainable. So here it comes: Trinity Sunday.

Genesis 1: "In the beginning when God created the heavens and the earth, the earth was a formless void and darkness covered the face of the deep, while a wind from God swept over the face of the waters."

A wind from God, what an amazing image. In the formless chaos before creation God creates wind from God's own self. God breathes. And then God speaks the first words: "Let there be light." God breathes, God acts, God speaks. But wait, this is Trinity Sunday. Shouldn't I be explaining about how the wind is the Holy Spirit; and the Word, that's Jesus; and well then God is, well, God...

Except the Jewish people who told this story didn't have our concept of the Trinity. This isn't a story about "The Trinity," this is a story about God. A God who speaks, and acts, and breathes. You notice, God doesn't even have a name here. All the god's around the Hebrews had names, like Baal, and Ra, and later still Zues. God though, their God and our God, is only God.

Our psalm today ends: "O LORD our Governor, how exalted is your Name in all the world!" and our canticle:

"Glory to you, Lord God of our fathers; *
you are worthy of praise; glory to you.
Glory to you for the radiance of your holy Name; *
we will praise you and highly exalt you for ever. "

All these mentions of God's Name, and yet do you notice, its missing. The Hebrews finally gave God a name that couldn't be pronounced. We don't even bother with that, we just say God. Not a name, but a title. There used to be thousands of little gods, every one of them with a name. We have God.

What does this have to do with Trinity Sunday? I think it has quite a lot. You see every year we try to explain the unexplainable. Every year we try to name the unnameable. I hope you'll forgive me if I quote the Tao te Ching. The opening words of that ancient sacred text begin:

The tao that can be told
is not the eternal Tao
The name that can be named
is not the eternal Name.

There is great truth here. I was in college when I first read those words and I remember vividly stopping in the middle of the University library and sitting down on the floor to read them again, very slowly. As I read I felt a flower of understanding opening in my heart and in my mind. My soul said yes!

I can't explain the Trinity to you today. Not if we had a hundred years to sit together and discuss nothing else. Not if all of humanity sat down together and pondered nothing else for a thousand years, because God cannot be named. The God who has no name, and a thousand names, and who is too great for any name, moves and acts and speaks and breathes.

God cannot be explained by any doctrine, or constrained by any name. I did a search while writing this for "names of God," and I found a website that listed all the "names" of God from Hebrew and Christian scripture. Now most of them would hardly sound like proper names to you or I, but the list numbered over a thousand and I'm sure we here could think of more. Our God is a God of a thousand names, and all togehter they are insufficient. Yahweh, Father, Son, Holy Spirit, Creator, Redeemer, Holy One, Lord, Mighty One, Savior, Deliverer, Shield, Righteous One, El-Olam, El-Berith, Abba.

If you want to understand God, then my friend, you are in the wrong place. The closest we've ever come were the words spoken to Moses: "I am that I am." or more literally and I think excitingly "I-shall-be that I-shall-be." We cannot name God. Neither can we divide or define God. That is why there are a great many preachers this morning sweating over sermons for Trinity Sunday.

That does not mean the Trinity is not important, or valid. Oh no, just the opposite. The uniquely Christian doctrine of the Triune nature of God is so very important because it is so impossible. If I could explain it to you in ten minutes, or in a lifetime it would be horribly and irrevocably flawed. It would be too small and too simple for the awesome impossibility that is God. God who moves, and speaks, and breathes, and acts. God who is, and was, and is to come. God who bears a thousand names, yet cannot be named.

If you are confused by the Trinity, you're in good company. And you have it exactly right. Because God is bigger than our names and yet God has chosen to reveal God's self through those names. God has chosen to draw God's awesome and infinite self down to fit infinity into a name. Holy One, Yahweh, Jesus, Spirit, Love. God who is the source of all things, and the destination of all things. God who is both Son, and Father, and Spirit. God who created time itself in its mind twisting infinity. And God who fits within each of our hearts, dwelling fully within us to comfort, to guide, to challenge, and to inspire.

Indeed God is Great, and Good, and Holy. God who cannot be named and yet to allows His essence to dwell within a name that we can grasp: Abba/God. God who cannot be named and yet dwelt fully within a human who bore an ordinary name: Jesus/God. God who cannot be named and yet dwells within you and I as She inspires and fires us: Spirit/God. And for that great mystery; thanks be to God. Amen.

Lectionary Meditation: As you live

A short meditation this week. I've been a little busy with things like seminary applications and the GRE.

John 14:15-21

15 "If you love me, you will keep my commandments.

16 And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Advocate, to be with you forever. 17 This is the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees him nor knows him. You know him, because he abides with you, and he will be in you.

18 "I will not leave you orphaned; I am coming to you. 19 In a little while the world will no longer see me, but you will see me; because I live, you also will live. 20 On that day you will know that I am in my Father, and you in me, and I in you. 21 They who have my commandments and keep them are those who love me; and those who love me will be loved by my Father, and I will love them and reveal myself to them."

I thought I was going to talk to you today about commandments.  When I first read the Gospel for this week that first line seemed a wonderful place to start.  It allows us to talk about love, and Christ's command that we love one another.  It seemed like a much needed message in a week when I read about bombings, shootings, thwarted bombings, and accidents.  But as I sat with the text preparing to write I heard another voice; and all because I misread a line.

'In a little while the world will no longer see me, but you will see me; because I live, you also will live.'

You see I sat reading the Gospel and I saw the words "because you live, I also will live."  It's an easy inversion for the eyes to make.  But it struck me deeply.  "because I live, you live.  because you live, I live."  And I thought, is this not truly Jesus' commandment for us?

Do our lives tell the Gospel story?  Do our lives give Christ flesh and blood today?  Does Christ live in us?  Those are big questions, they could be a frightening burden. They could be something we can never hope to live up to.

I have a story for you. It's a story about me, and it's not one I'm proud of.  A few weeks ago I got rear ended and my car spent a few days in the body shop.  The body shop was a few miles from my office so when the car was ready I headed across town after work eager to pick it up. Instead of taking the highway I decided to cut across on surface streets.  Between one light and the next the neighborhood changed from shiny new office buildings and streets filled with BMWs and Audis to old houses with winter shabby yards and cheaper, older cars.  There were people walking with shopping bags, and sitting on porches.  There were a couple boarded up houses, and bars on all the store windows.  My urban instincts told me this was an "iffy" neighborhood!

My heart rate went up a little and I suddenly wished I'd taken the express way.  I checked to make sure the doors were locked.  I wanted out of there!  I reacted with fear and distress to people because they looked different, dressed differently, had less.  I made snap judgements about my safety based on the neighborhood around me.  I'm not proud of it, and my heart was not Christ-like in those worried minutes. 

But then I saw up ahead a familiar sign, a blue and white and red shield.   You all know the one, there's one outside our church as well.  I immediately felt safer, more at home, my worry settled down and I was able to look around more clearly.  I was able to see my own reaction, and how unreasonable it was, and I was able to ask forgiveness and continue on my journey calmly.

Fear features often in the Gospel.   Jesus tells his disciples not to be afraid, angels tell Mary and the shepherds not to fear.  Fear features often because fear is something we all experience.  We all know what it is to feel alone, lost, foreign, and afraid.  Even church can cause fear.  Some of us grew up in churches that preached a pretty fearful message of damnation for many. Every evening when we turn on the news the fact that our world is not as God intended becomes painfully obvious, doesn't it?  And we sit perhaps, feeling small and helpless.  How can we be Christ to billions of people who are starving, suffering, and dying?  The fear of failure can stop us before we've even begun.

It would be one thing for Jesus to tell us yet again not to be afraid but it wouldn't help.  We'd still feel that fear.  So Jesus does more.  Knowing our fear and loneliness, Jesus gives us what I think may be the most reassuring words of scripture.  

Jesus promises that we are never alone.  The Spirit is with us as our guide, our protector, and our Advocate.  Jesus tells his disciples, and us, that we never need feel alone again because: 'he abides with you, and he will be in you.'  Does that mean we'll never feel afraid or unequal to the task before us?  Hardly!  Just as I felt overcome by irrational fear we will all find ourselves in places where we are afraid.

But in those places when we are afraid we can remember Jesus' promise.  God is with us, as our Advocate.  I looked up advocate in my dictionary because I often like to see where our words come from and what is their root.  Advocate is from the Latin word advocare which means "call (to one's aid)"  God is with us, dwelling among and within us, always.  And when fear overshadows us we need only to call.  This is Jesus' promise to us.  That God is always with us.  Without that promise, without that knowledge we could never hope to live as Christ commands.  We could never hope to live, so that he might live through us.  We could never hope to make even the smallest dent in the overwhelming need around us.

But we have that promise. As Christ lives, so we live.  And Christ does live in each of us, today, tomorrow, and for all time.  Amen.  Alleluia!

Lectionary Meditation: Stones

1 Peter 2:1-10
Rid yourselves, therefore, of all malice, and all guile, insincerity, envy, and all slander. 2 Like newborn infants, long for the pure, spiritual milk, so that by it you may grow into salvation— 3 if indeed you have tasted that the Lord is good.

4 Come to him, a living stone, though rejected by mortals yet chosen and precious in God’s sight, and 5 like living stones, let yourselves be built* into a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. 6 For it stands in scripture:
‘See, I am laying in Zion a stone,
a cornerstone chosen and precious;
and whoever believes in him* will not be put to shame.’
7 To you then who believe, he is precious; but for those who do not believe,
‘The stone that the builders rejected
has become the very head of the corner’,
8 and
‘A stone that makes them stumble,
and a rock that makes them fall.’
They stumble because they disobey the word, as they were destined to do.

9 But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s own people,* in order that you may proclaim the mighty acts of him who called you out of darkness into his marvellous light.
10 Once you were not a people,
but now you are God’s people;
once you had not received mercy,
but now you have received mercy.

The lectionary today is full of stones.  In Acts the first Christian martyr is stoned, in the Psalm God is called our fortress and 'strong rock.'  And here, in the first letter of Peter we hear about the cornerstone that is Christ.

We don't usually notice stones, but the world is full of them. They make up our foundations, our sidewalks, our roads.  They are a nuisance to be raked out of our gardens, fun to be skipped across a still lake, pain in our shoes, or if you're like me they're door stops and paper weights.  Stones are mightily useful things, how often we taken them for granted.

Stones don't usually get much notice.  They're dull.  Go out to any farm field and you will find piles of stones around the borders and in the hedgerows, why?  Because they've been discarded. 

‘The stone that the builders rejected

has become the very head of the corner’ 

We often hear these words and think of the crucifixion.  But that's missing the point.  Just as the farmer picked up the stone in his field and throw it away as useless or harmful, the establishment wanted nothing to do with an itinerant preacher from Nazareth.  Jesus was a nuisance.  He didn't toe the line, and like the rock in our shoe he made those in authority very uncomfortable.

But Peter calls Christ a "living" stone.  You see Jesus didn't just get in the way.  A regular stone in a field might break a plow blade and needs to be tossed out.  There are lots of stones in the bible: Barabas was one.  A revolutionary, a freedom fighter, today we'd call him a terrorist.  He made the authorities plenty uncomfortable but that was all he did.  Jesus did more than just make some folks uncomfortable.  He went beyond that to offer an alternative.   As our "living stone" he offered teachings that could be a foundation for a whole new way of being.

Jesus came to those that authority and power had rejected.  I hate to say it, but he didn't come to people like us.  He came to the destitute, the outcast, the despised.  Today what would those people he came to look like?  They might have been AIDS patients, transgender teens, single mothers or grandmothers on welfare, the homeless, the insane.  And what did he bring?  He brought hope.  He sat down and ate with them, and he gave them good news.  He told them that they were not useless.  He empowered them.  He lifted them up, and taught them to care for and one love another.  He told them that he loved them, and that GOD loved them.

That is the good news, no wonder it was rejected.  If those "others" are truly good and useful, truly beloved of God, the authorities would have to admit there was something fundamentally broken about their world.  The bad news is the world is still broken, and the good news is still being rejected.   The temple authorities rejected Jesus and his Way; we do too.  Every time we condemn or reject someone who makes us uncomfortable, every time we allow the world to tell us that we are useless, every time we give up, or give in.  

Come to him, a living stone, though rejected by mortals yet chosen and precious in God’s sight, and 5 like living stones, let yourselves be built* into a spiritual house

God is calling us to become living stones ourselves.  God is offering us the chance to be like Christ.  That isn't an easy thing I'm afraid.  It means rejection.  It means that the world will not understand us.  It means we will be called to speak out against repression and violence wherever it finds root.  Doing so won't make us popular.  Like Stephen and Jesus and thousands of others it will mean our rejection by many.

Most of us are probably pretty comfortable.  But our world is still full of the same repression and violence and inequality that held sway when Jesus walked the hills of Palestine.  It might make us unpopular but we are called to speak out when our government tramples on the poor, or oppressed (and it does).  We are called to speak out when big business does harm to workers or citizens or creation itself.  We are called to speak out when our churches cause pain or harm through their teaching or actions.  We are called to be like Christ, to be living stones.  

We can become the foundation of the Kingdom of God.  No, we must become the foundation of the Kingdom of God.

"you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s own people,* in order that you may proclaim the mighty acts of him who called you out of darkness into his marvellous light."

God had a purpose for us when we were called.  Not to just come and sit here on Sunday morning and then go back to living in the world.  No, we were called out of darkness and it is our obligation to call others as well:

10 Once you were not a people,
but now you are God’s people;
once you had not received mercy,
but now you have received mercy."

God has made us Her people!  God has chosen us.  That is a frightening thing.  Because with it comes the responsibility to be Christ to the world.  When we were baptized into Christ's death, and His eternal life we were made living stones indeed.  Let us then not reject Him, nor our call from God.  Rather, let us become light, and mercy, and hope for those who live in darkness and despair.  Let us become food and drink for those who hunger and thirst.  Let us become a thorn in the side and a rock in the shoe of those who are too comfortable.  Let us become stones, breaking the plow blades that would turn under the weak and powerless of this world.

Let us be living stones!  Because God is good, and God has given us life and light and joy.  That we might bring all the discarded stones of the world to God who discards nothing!  Amen.   Alleluia.