June 11 2006 Lectionary Reading

Reading: “ Whoever has seen me has seen the Father.” John 14.9 (GNB)

Today is Trinity Sunday. The Church set aside this day, this particular Sunday, over a thousand years ago, inviting us to make this a day in which we reflect on the living God, who He is, the One in Three and Three in One, as the ancient Celtic Church used to say - the Trinity. In some ways, the word is familiar enough to us – there is a part of Edinburgh called Trinity, and a school there called ‘Trinity Secondary School’. There is a Church called Holy Trinity, out at Wester Hailes. And each Sunday morning, at the end of our worship, the blessing comes: Go in peace, and may God the Father, Son and Holy Spirit bless, preserve and keep you today and forever………. a blessing which invokes the Trinity. So yes, in one way, the word ‘Trinity’ is familiar to us, and in our prayers we often speak of God the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. But what do we mean when we speak of the Trinity, of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit ?

Well, here we are speaking of the mystery, and glory and majesty of the living God – so we must come to this with deepest reverence, in adoring worship of who He is. When we try to raise our minds, our gaze, to speak, to think, of the living God who is Father, Son and Holy Spirit, John Keble, the hymnwriter once said, it is as if we are travellers who, on a winters day in the mountain forests, catch a glimpse through the trees of great mountains, great heights far off on the horizon. When we speak and think of God the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, we are looking towards great heights that are, in the end, beyond our grasp. Thinking about these things has occupied some of the greatest minds in the Christian Church, who have tried to explore something of the richness and depth of the mystery of the living God – the Trinity, three in One, Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

Now, these are high and great things for us to be thinking about, (some might say too high !) yet this is Trinity Sunday, and the Church down through the centuries has invited us on this day to pause for a while, to try to reflect for a while as a congregation on who God is, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, however weak our thoughts might be.

So where would we begin ?

We begin, as the Church has always done – by coming to this in deepest reverence. For here are the very depths of reality, depths beyond our capacity, here we are thinking and trying to speak of the living God, who is so great that the heavens cannot contain Him. This was Isaiah’s experience in meeting the Lord that day, long ago, in the Temple. That day, Isaiah heard the angels, the seraphim singing, heard that great hymn, Holy, Holy, Holy, the Lord Almighty is Holy, His glory fills the world ! and caught a glimpse of the glory of God - and he was overwhelmed by that glory, realising at the same time his own inadequacy and sinfulness…… so we too come to these great things in deepest reverence.

Deep reverence – the lack of that is one of the marks of the Church today isn’t it ? Lack of reverence in our worship, and in our speaking of God. How we need a renewed vision of His glory – like that of the prophet Isaiah long ago – a renewed vision of the glory of God, our worship lifted up by His glory. The glory that was revealed to Isaiah.

Yet, when we open the pages of the gospels we find something new here. As the gospel of Matthew opens, as God comes closer, we begin to see more clearly Who He is, and what He is like. It is there right at the beginning of the work that Jesus does. As Jesus comes into Galilee, to begin all that He has to do. What is it that we see more clearly ? Well, its this. We see in the opening pages of the Gospels, in the life of Jesus, the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit lovingly working together – as One. We see in Jesus the mystery of what God is like. At the baptism of Jesus, we read in Matthew’s gospel, suddenly the sky opened and the Spirit of God came down like a dove and rested upon Jesus. There we see the Spirit, resting upon, empowering Jesus. And we read that a voice from the heavens said, "This is my beloved Son, on whom my favour rests.” This is the Father speaking of His love for His beloved Son.

So already there, in the opening chapters of Matthew – it is clearly shown to us, that in all that Jesus does as the Son, the Father and the Spirit are working too. Or to put it another way. As we read of all that Jesus does right through the wonderful gospel, from His birth, through His life, teaching, healing, right up to the cross, and His rising again, Jesus is always in loving oneness with the Father in heaven, and always living in the power of the Spirit.

Just to take the first of those. The oneness of Jesus with His Father in heaven. When Philip asks Jesus - “Lord show us the Father; that is all we need” Jesus answers – whoever has seen me has seen the Father… I am in the Father and the Father is in me.” All that Jesus has done for us, is in His Father’s loving purpose for us. It was the Father’s loving plan and purpose before the world began, before we were born, that we should come to Him and know Him, that we should not die but have life through Jesus Christ. To trust, and rely on Jesus, to live with and in Jesus is to come to the living God, the Lord of life. Because, as Jesus says “I am in the Father and the Father is in me”. Jesus - always in loving oneness with the Father in heaven, has invited us to come, opened the way for us, and brought us, even us, into that same oneness that He has with His Father in heaven.

Jesus - always in loving oneness with the Father in heaven, and always living in the power of the Spirit.

Now, at the very beginning of all that He did, we see in the gospel the Spirit of God coming down to rest upon Jesus, in fullness and power. So that in every touch of Jesus of every blind man, lame beggar, sick woman, epileptic child, there is the power of the Holy Spirit and healing. The deaf hear. The dumb speak. The fearful are given courage. The dead are brought to life. Through the power of the Holy Spirit resting upon Jesus.

The miracle, the wonder is this. As we have heard over these past weeks – Jesus has returned to the presence of God. But from there He has sent, poured out that same Holy Spirit upon us. So that, as Paul says in Romans, the Spirit is life for us… the Spirit comes to help us, weak as we are…. the Spirit draws us into such closeness with our Father in heaven, that we become His children, sons and daughters. In knowing the love of Jesus, we know the love of our Father in heaven, and the life that the Holy Spirit brings to us.

When we look across the whole great landscape of the New Testament, then, we find revealed there that the living God, is Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

These are great and high things, I am sure you will agree. And the Church has always continued to think in deepest reverence on the wonders of the living God.

It was a lovely day yesterday, as you will know, and like a lot of people we went down to the beach, the beach at Longniddry. I found myself with my daughter Evie, down on the sea shore, digging a hole, and then waiting for the waves to fill it.

One beautiful afternoon long ago, Augustine, that great saint and thinker, bishop and leader of the Church did the same. He walked along a sea shore, not here, of course, but in Northern Africa. He was in the middle of writing a book about the Trinity, God the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, and as he walked he was thinking about these deep things, trying to understand these mysteries, trying to unravel their complexities. He came across a little boy on the beach who had dug a hole and was waiting for the waves to fill it. The little boy asked Augustine where he was going and what he was doing, and he replied – I am walking along the shoreline, and I am thinking about God as I walk.

What are you doing ? Augustine asked the boy. Oh – I am digging a hole here – and I am going to empty the sea into it. Augustine laughed, and said – Oh I don’t think that’s possible – you cannot contain the whole sea in such a small hole ?

And the little boy is supposed to have said to Augustine – Well, it’s the same for you …. you cannot contain God in such small thoughts.

That is true and always will be. And while we have tried to think about these things this morning - the majesty, and the mystery of the living God is far beyond our grasp. Yet, in His loving goodness, the living God has shown us in Jesus, as we have heard, something of who He is – one living God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

And, despite what the little boy said at the seashore, Augustine, that great thinker, continued to think on these things, and he and other great saints over the centuries. What did they discover ? What deep things do the saints of old have to teach us ? Well, those old saints speak to us of the love between the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, shared from before the world began, in all eternity. That out of this love between the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, the creation of all that is took place, and that God created us to share that same life and love with Him.

And even when the sin of human beings, brought about all the conflicts, quarrels, disharmony and wars that we know, and men and women turned away from the living God - the gospel of John says; “God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that every one who believes in him might not perish but might have eternal life.” Here is the love of God, as the New Testament says, the Father who gives His own Son - Jesus, and Jesus who lovingly gives Himself for the world.

What the saints of old were saying, is that the origin of life, and the meaning of life, and the source of life, is in the living God, in the love shared between the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. And in His wonderful love for us, God shares that same life and love with us through Jesus, and, invites us to lead a life of love and sharing too, in the power of the Spirit.

AMEN.