Tag Archives: Holy Trinity

Sunday, May 22nd

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The Holy Trinity

Proverbs 8:1-4, 22-31
Psalm 8
Romans 5:1-5
John 16:12-15

Prayer of the Day:  Almighty Creator and ever-living God: we worship your glory, eternal Three-in-One, and we praise your power, majestic One-in-Three. Keep us steadfast in this faith, defend us in all adversity, and bring us at last into your presence, where you live in endless joy and love, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever.

“Does any of this stuff matter anymore?” That question was raised by a lay theology student in a class I was teaching on basic Christian Doctrine during a discussion of the Holy Trinity. This individual was not alone in her sentiments. More than a few of my congregants and even some of my colleagues question whether the assertions hammered out in the church councils and given expression in the Ecumenical Creeds still matter. “All that matters is that we follow Jesus.” This student went on to say.

In a way, I agree with her. Following Jesus is everything. Preaching, Bible Study and catechesis are not worth spit if they don’t lead us deeper into worship and discipleship. In a world threatened by war, famine, ecological destruction and gross injustice, how can we justify time spent obsessing over abstract doctrines of God? One colleague of mine jokes that you can question the Nicene Creed with impunity in my denomination, but God forbid you should be caught serving bottled water at a church event or using the wrong pronoun for the deity. We mainliners are not alone in this indifference to doctrinal precision. Christians who characterize themselves as “conservative evangelicals” seem far more interested these days in defining marriage, regulating sexuality, policing public lavatories and keeping “god” in the Pledge of Allegiance than defending central tenants of the faith set forth in the creeds. If John Shelby Spong and Franklin Graham seem to agree on anything, it is that doctrines like the Trinity are not particularly important to Christian faith and life.

Saint Augustine would take issue with us on that score. Augustine was no ivory tower theologian. He was about as immersed in his own contemporary culture as a person can be. He had lived his life under numerous doctrines about the nature of God and learned from bitter experience that it makes a huge difference what we say and believe about God. This is so precisely because the heart of the creator determines the shape of creation and dictates how we treat the earth and our fellow creatures both human and non-human. Christians confess that God created the world “ex nihilo,” that is, out of nothing. Strictly speaking, that is true, but in a larger sense we must say that God created the world out of love. The world exists not to meet some divine need. God was not lonely. It is because God is not a monad having only God’s single self to love that the world is not simply God’s ant farm. Because the love of God the Father has always had an object distinct yet within God’s self, namely, the Son, and because the love between Father and Son is a spiritual projection of God’s self, “the universe of space and time did not arise by chance, but the Three in love and hope, made room within their dance.” “Come Join the Dance of Trinity,” by Richard Leach, Evangelical Lutheran Worship, # 412.

Augustine’s Trinitarian arguments have often been criticized as mere word games. Yet I believe that there is a substantive basis for his insistence on the necessity of God’s being Triune. If God were merely one, could it still be said that God’s nature and character is love? Without an object, love can only be self directed-which is not genuine love at all. Consequently, if God were one and not Triune, love could not have preexisted creation as it would have had no object. The essence of God would then have to have been something other than love. Rather than God’s very being, love would be only an acquired divine attribute, a creature of God’s making rather than the essence of who God is.

Because God is Triune, love, faithfulness, obedience, friendship and community are eternal. They pre-existed creation in the being of the Triune God. That is why they require our witness, but never our defense. God’s will must be done and God’s kingdom must come because the forces resisting it are not within God and thus not eternal. Sin has no staying power. Evil cannot go the distance. Violence cannot silence the Word. Death cannot keep Jesus in the grave. Our hope for a new heaven and a new earth, says Augustine, is based on the conviction that the essence of the Triune God is love between the persons of the Trinity, love that God desires to share with all humankind. If God were less than Triune, God would be other than love and love would be less than eternal. If love matters to you, the Trinity should matter too.

Here’s a poem by Ariana Reines that speaks of love as a disruptive force that just “is.” I think Augustine would agree.

[Love]

Is an interruption or an aberration, a force in opposition to the ultimate inertia
of the universe,
 
Wrote Marguerite Duras.
 
Whether or not it is worth it it occurs. Whether or not it is to be believed it is.
 
The wind moves us without a frond being needed to be held by a slave girl.
 
The rudiments of sentences are ancient without a mouth needing to remember
what it is losing as it lets those words out, something eviller than what they
even mean right now, something too evil to be known right now
 
Or ever.
 
I feel sure that even the most culpable people have other qualities secreted
away
 
Adjusting their garments in light of fate
 
He turned his head upward, he looked up the white wall. The light from the
lamp could be light coming from a great distance, it could be a great distance
away, and the wall could be snow it is so beautiful, he said. His head looking
up the wall, his eyes looking up it, he said, that nail in the wall could also be
beautiful, for so far away.

Source: Mercury, (c. 2011 by Ariana Reines, pub. by Fence Books). Ariana Reines was born in Salem, Massachusetts. She is a poet, playwright and translator. She has taught at Columbia University and the European Graduate School. In 2009 Reines was the Roberta C. Holloway Lecturer in Poetry at the University of California-Berkeley, the youngest poet to ever to have held that distinctive position. She is deeply committed to humanitarian causes and has often traveled to Haiti to take part in relief efforts there. You can read more about Ariana Reines and sample more of her poetry at the Poetry Foundation Website.

Proverbs 8:1-4, 22-31

I am not at all sure why this reading is included among the Holy Trinity lessons. It just happens to be one of the texts that the Arian heretics cited in support of their claim that the Son was a creature (albeit an exalted one) and in no sense true God. In this particular text, wisdom is not a pre-existent divine being distinct from God, but an aspect or characteristic of God who is poetically endowed with speech. Thus, it is largely irrelevant to the dispute between the Arians and the Orthodox Trinitarian believers. Still, it is a wonderful text testifying to the beauty and order of creation and the glory of its Creator.

The Book of Proverbs is a collection of poems and short sayings dating from as early as the tenth century B.C.E. to as late as the fourth century B.C.E. Unlike the Psalms which are for the most part expressions of prayer, praise, and lament within the context of worship, Proverbs is concerned with universal and pragmatic “wisdom” and the means by which it is acquired. Though clearly influenced by Egyptian and Mesopotamian wisdom literature, Israel’s understanding of wisdom has its own unique flavor. Though it shares with these foreign sources a humanistic focus on reasoned inquiry into the natural world, Israelite wisdom identifies the divine will and purpose as the ultimate human good wisdom reveals. Truth acquired through reason is open to the whole of humanity. Still, for Israel wisdom is subordinate to Israel’s God. It functions within the context of Israel’s covenants and the Torah.

In view of all this, it is not surprising that the particular poem in this week’s lesson affirms that wisdom, as wonderful as she is and though accessible to all willing to submit to her instruction, is nevertheless God’s creation. The human mind can do no more than appropriate what already exists by virtue of God’s creative activity at the dawn of time. Wisdom therefore necessarily takes the shape of Torah. It is not that Israel forsakes reasoned inquiry for blind adherence to law. Nor can it be said that Israel’s keen spirit of inquiry runs contrary to Torah obedience. Rather, Torah both shaped Israel’s questions of the natural world and informed her conclusions. Perhaps the clearest case of incorporation of wisdom into Torah is found in the very lengthy Psalm 119. Though the psalmist praises Torah as the source of all wisdom, it is obvious his/her own wisdom has been forged in the furnace of experience where Torah meets the challenges of everyday life.

Psalm 8

This psalm is one that biblical scholar Walter Brueggemann classifies a song of orientation. As such, it expresses “a confident, serene settlement of faith issues.” Brueggemann, Walter, The Message of the Psalms, Augsburg Publishing House (c. 1984) p. 25. It is further classified by the majority of Old Testament scholars as a “creation” psalm glorifying God for making and sustaining an orderly and reliable world in which season follows upon season, harvest upon harvest and the cycles of birth, maturation, old age and death are blessed with the gracious presence of the Lord.

The psalm points specifically to the place of human beings in the created order. Though the psalmist does not focus on human frailty and mortality, s/he is clearly aware of it when asking “what are human beings and their descendants that you care for them?” vs. 4. In comparison with God’s other works, the sun, the moon and the stars which are for all practical purposes immortal, human beings with their moribund existence and their short, fragile lives hardly seem to register. Yet the psalmist recognizes that God is uniquely concerned with human beings, that they are little lower than the angels in his estimation and that they have been appointed to rule over the earth and its creatures.

It is important to understand that “dominion” over the earth given human beings is to be exercised as an extension of God’s reign over creation. Thus, the words of last week’s psalm should be ringing in our ears: “All of [the creatures of the earth]look to you to give them their food in due season. You give it to them; they gather it; you open your hand, and they are filled with good things.” Psalm 104:27-29. Dominion is not given to human beings for exploitation of the earth and its resources. Human beings rule as stewards who must give account for the care they have exercised in managing God’s good earth. Ecology is very much a biblical value!

Stylistically, the psalm is carefully crafted to reflect in its composition the same good order manifest throughout God’s creation. It begins and ends with the same refrain: “O Lord, our Lord, how majestic is thy name in all the earth!” The psalm begins with people, even infants, glorifying God for the majesty of the heavens. Then the psalm turns to God’s glorification of human beings, small though they may be, in making them rulers over the earth and sea.

Romans 5:1-5

For Paul, the Holy Spirit is the animating force for the church which he regards as the Body of the resurrected Christ. As such, the Spirit’s primary concern is the health of that Body. Gifts of the Spirit given individually to members of the church are intended to “build up” the Body of Christ. Thus, it matters not at all which particular gift one has, but how one uses his or her gift. Whether one speaks in other tongues, prophesies, works miracles or exercises leadership, the net result must be that the church is strengthened. If leadership divides and alienates rather than unites or if miracles draw attention to the miracle worker rather than to the mercy of God in Christ, then these gifts become tools of Satan to break down the Body. Paul lays out all of this very succinctly inI Corinthians 12. Put differently, spiritual gifts must be exercised under the gentle reign of love. Of all the manifestations of the Spirit within the church, “the greatest of these is love” I Corinthians 13:13. That should help us understand what Paul is saying here in Romans.

“God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit which has been given to us.” Vs. 5. Recall Augustine’s assertion that the Trinitarian character of God is revealed in the love between the Father and the Son which is the Holy Spirit. Genuine love, however, is not exclusive. It “overflows” the bounds of the relationships that give rise to it. Perhaps that is what we mean when we confess in the Nicene Creed that the Holy Spirit “proceeds” from the Father and the Son. Love is ever seeking new objects. It is precisely because the one God is also three and because the relationship between the three is characterized by their mutual love and because love by its very nature makes room for the other, the Spirit of God, which is love, broods over the waters at the dawn of time seeking that other. The Word beckons the other into being and the Father blesses what comes to be. Again, this is not to say that the universe was the work of a committee. Rather, creation is a singular act of the Triune God which bears the stamp of that God’s innermost Trinitarian being.

It is perhaps clearer now why Jesus could say that the two greatest commandments are first to love God with all the heart, mind, soul and strength, and next to love one’s neighbor as oneself. Such love is grounded in the innermost being of God.

John 16:12-15

In this tightly packed paragraph from John, Jesus speaks of the interaction between the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. The Spirit of truth will be given to the disciples and will lead them into “all the truth.” Yet the Spirit speaks not on its own authority, but on the authority of the Father. However, the Spirit imparts “truth” to the disciples by “taking what is mine [Jesus’) and declaring it to you.” The disciples are recipients of the Spirit who comes from the Father and whose sole job is to impart Jesus to them. Once again, the sending of the Spirit is a unitary act of the one Triune God by which the disciples are drawn into the heart of God’s Trinitarian life of mutual love. Not surprisingly, this section of John was a favorite of our friend Augustine (on whom I have perhaps gone a little heavier than I should have!).

 

Sunday, January 10th

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THE BAPTISM OF OUR LORD

Isaiah 43:1-7
Psalm 29
Acts 8:14-17
Luke 3:15-17, 21-22

Prayer of the Day: Almighty God, you anointed Jesus at his baptism with the Holy Spirit and revealed him as your beloved Son. Keep all who are born of water and the Spirit faithful in your service, that we may rejoice to be called children of God, through Jesus Christ, our Savior and Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever.

“This is my son.” I have used those words more than a few times over the last two and one half decades, always with a deep sense of pride and joy. But now I cannot speak or hear them without feeling also an undertow of sadness. That is because I remember so well my own son’s deeply felt pride and joy in introducing to me to his son, my grandson, Parker. Twenty-four hours later my wife and I were holding my son as together we grieved Parker’s untimely death in the neonatal ICU. In so short a time, one life brought such outbursts of joy and such a tidal wave of grief. Two fathers, one mourning the loss of a son, the other powerless to comfort a son experiencing the most horrible thing that can happen to a parent. This is my son.

I cannot help but wonder if there is not a similar underlying sadness in the declaration of God the Father: “Thou art my beloved Son.” John tells us that God desires to share with us the same love that has existed eternally between the Father and the Son. How else can God love us other than to become human flesh? How else can the Word of God embrace and comfort us when all spoken words fail? And what shape other then the cross can such love possibly take in a world driven by unbelief, fear and hatred? The cross is the terrible cost of the Incarnation; the cost of Trinitarian Love born into a sinful world. This is my Son.

“A child is something else again,” as poet Yehuda Amichai tells us. We have no idea of all we let ourselves in for when we decide to have children. Still less can we predict the ripple effect that child’s life will have on the rest of the world. “A child is a missile into the coming generations,” Amichai says. She or he is our contribution to the ongoing saga of creation. We cannot foresee the joy or sorrow our children will bring with them into the world or experience themselves. Yet we know this much: our children will one day know death-that of their loved ones and their own. Their hearts will be broken, their bodies grow fail and their minds will become dim.

Into just such an existence God births the Son. And because the Son is God’s Son-the One whose innermost being is love, the Lamb of God incapable of violence, cruelty or cunning-he is particularly vulnerable to those most vicious characteristics of our world. The only question is whether the Son will continue to be the Son despite all that the world is about to inflict on him. The New Testament answers that question with a resounding “yes.” Jesus is God’s arrow of love shot into the world. That Trinitarian love proves stronger than the powers of evil even as they employ their heaviest weapons against it. Jesus lived, suffered and died cruelly in this world, but went on loving. He would not be sucked into the vortex of retribution that imprisons us. That is the “weakness of God” Paul recognizes as God’s greatest strength. It costs God dearly to hold all things together in Christ against the divisive forces threatening to rip creation apart. Our assurance is that God will never lose God’s grip. If the crucifixion of God’s beloved Son cannot cool the heat of God’s passionate, Trinitarian love for us, nothing can. Still today God the Father raises up to us his bloodied and wounded child saying to us, “This is my Son.”

Here is the poem by Yehuda Amichai I cited above.

A Child is Something Else Again

A child is something else again. Wakes up
in the afternoon and in an instant he’s full of words,
in an instant he’s humming, in an instant warm,
instant light, instant darkness.

A child is Job. They’ve already placed their bets on him
but he doesn’t know it. He scratches his body
for pleasure. Nothing hurts yet.
They’re training him to be a polite Job,
to say “Thank you” when the Lord has given,
to say “You’re welcome” when the Lord has taken away.

A child is vengeance.
A child is a missile into the coming generations.
I launched him: I’m still trembling.

A child is something else again: on a rainy spring day
glimpsing the Garden of Eden through the fence,
kissing him in his sleep,
hearing footsteps in the wet pine needles.
A child delivers you from death.
Child, Garden, Rain, Fate.

Yehuda Amichai, “A Child Is Something Else Again” from The Poetry of Yehuda Amichai. (c. 2015 by Yehuda Amichai, Translated By Chana Bloch and published by Farrar, Strauss & Giroux). Yehuda Amichai is one of Israel’s most prominent poets. He was born in Germany in 1924 but left with his family for Palestine in 1935. He fought in the 1948 Arab/Israeli war. His poems have been translated into English, French, German and Swedish. You can read more about Amichai and his poetry on the Poetry Foundation Website.

Isaiah 43:1-7

For a more thorough discussion of the Book of the Prophet Isaiah and the place of this reading within it, I refer you back to my post for the Epiphany of Our Lord, Sunday, January 3, 2016. Suffice to say that this Sunday’s lesson comes from Chapters 40-56 of Isaiah, which are attributed to a prophet who preached toward the end of the Babylonian exile of the Jews around 537 B.C.E., declaring to them God’s forgiveness and God’s promise to lead them back from exile in Babylon to their homeland in Palestine.

The cry “fear not” (Vs. 1) is a refrain heard throughout this section of Isaiah as it is also sounded throughout the Gospel of Luke. In contrast to the prophets of the 8th and 9th Centuries whose prophesies were more often than not declarations of judgment evoking fear, the glad tidings of release from exile and return to the land of promise banish fear and inspire hope. The term “redeemed” (Vs. 1) is a technical/legal term pertaining to ancient family law. It refers to the payment made to a third party releasing a relative from slavery or imprisonment for debt. Westermann, Claus, Isaiah 40-66, The Old Testament Library (c. 1969 SCM Press, Ltd.) p. 116. The promise to deliver Israel through waters and through rivers unmistakably evokes the Exodus miracle at the Red Sea and the crossing of the Jordan into Canaan under Joshua. Vs. 2.

“Because you are precious in my eyes, and honored, and I love you, I give men for you, peoples in exchange for your life.” Vs. 4. Of this verse Westermann goes on to say, “here we also have one of the most beautiful and profound statements of what the Bible means by ‘election.’ A tiny, miserable and insignificant band of uprooted men and women are assured that they-precisely they-are the people to whom God has turned in love; they, just as they are, are dear and precious in his sight.” Ibid. 118. The distinction here is not between Israelites and members of other nations as people, but rather between the glorious status of the reigning empires to whom this God prefers a band of exiles. This is, of course, consistent with the prophets’ and the psalmists’ insistence that God is particularly concerned with the widow, the orphan and the poor.

I have a fondness for these verses. As a matter of fact, this lesson was one of the readings for Sesle’s and my marriage service. I cannot remember what my thought process was in making this choice. In retrospect, however, I can attest that God has indeed been with us through some pretty rough waters and has gotten us out of some fiery predicaments over the years. Perhaps I was thinking that a marriage is a very fragile thing. It needs a lot of help to become strong, to remain healthy and to survive. I expect that the Babylonian exiles were probably feeling pretty fragile also.  Having lost the land they called home, the temple that was the symbol of God’s presence in their midst and the line of David that gave them a national identity, they were now living in the land of their conquerors as a community of foreigners. I expect that they were struggling to pass on their identity to a new generation of Jews who knew nothing first hand of Israel’s past glory and saw only the social and economic benefits of blending into the surrounding culture. Little by little their language was becoming a relic used only in worship. The prophet’s call for these defeated and demoralized exiles to make the long and dangerous journey back to a ruined land was a daunting challenge laden with risks and uncertainties. The odds against the returning exiles were even more formidable than those facing a marriage.

But the people of God do not make their decisions on the basis of statistical probabilities. They live their lives in the light of God’s promises. That is why we enter into marriage with promises to remain faithful until death parts us-knowing full well the statistics on divorce and separation. That is why I baptize infants of parents who promise to bring their children to the house of God, teach them the Lord’s Prayer and the Ten Commandments-even when I am fairly confident that they intend to do no such thing. It is God’s faithfulness to God’s promises that make the difference-not our own faithfulness which is fickle at best. So with each baptism I pray that the infant will pass through the baptismal flood to a new creation; be purified, but not consumed by the fire of God’s Spirit and be brought at last into the Sabbath rest of all people called by God’s name.  I continue to stay in touch with these families-sometimes to the extent of making a pest of myself-in order to keep alive their tenuous connection to the family of God. I do that because I believe that when God adopts someone and says to them, “You are my beloved,” God means it. So I strive to keep the door open as far as possible.

Psalm 29

Many commentators suggest that this psalm is an Israelite poet’s adaptation of an ancient Phoenician hymn praising Baal-Hadad, the Canaanite storm god. Weiser, Artur, The Psalms, The Old Testament Library (c. 1962 by SCM Press, Ltd.) p. 261; Brueggemann, Walter, The Message of the Psalm, Augsburg Old Testament Studies (c. 1984 by Augsburg Publishing House) p. 143. Other commentators have maintained that the psalm is a liturgical recital of God’s appearance to Israel on Mt. Sinai. Both views might be correct. Israel frequently borrowed liturgical and literary material from its neighbors in shaping its own worship traditions. Thus, a hymn originally praising the storm god in the wake of a particularly fierce weather event might have served as a template for this psalm memorializing God’s stormy appearance on Sinai. Nothing wrong with that. After all, Luther is said to have composed hymns from common songs.

The psalmist unashamedly attributes to Israel’s God the awe inspiring and often destructive effects of a storm. That is a little unnerving for us moderns who are squeamish about attributing anything to God that isn’t “nice.” Indeed, this psalm is particularly embarrassing in the shadow of hurricanes, floods and earthquakes that damage homes and take lives. Are such events God’s doing? Does God send storms or just allow them to occur? Does it make any difference either way? Is it anymore comforting to believe that God just fell asleep at the wheel and allowed a hurricane to happen rather than to believe that God deliberately sent one? Has the universe gotten so far out of God’s hands that God is no longer able to prevent hurricanes, earthquakes and tsunamis?

I don’t pretend to have neat answers to all these questions. But perhaps part of our problem is our homocentric view of things. Indeed, I would go further and suggest that the problem may be with our “me” centered approach to faith. It seems to me that a lot of our prayers are exceedingly self-centered. We pray for good weather on our vacations-even in times when our farms are desperate for rain. We pray for an economic recovery without any thought to the economic, ecological and social havoc our economy wreaks upon the world. Even our prayers for others often have a strong streak of selfishness in them. As the father of a child with a chronic medical condition, a day does not go by that I don’t pray for her healing. Yet lately I have been wondering about my motives. Am I looking for a special miracle? By what right do I get to push to the head of the line of parents with sick children to receive such special treatment? Thanks to the benefits of medical treatment afforded by her insurance plan, my daughter is able to live a relatively normal and healthy life despite her condition. So shouldn’t any miracle go to a child without these benefits?  I find that too often my prayers do not venture beyond my own needs, concerns and the small circle of people in my small world.

Perhaps this psalm gives us some perspective. The psalmist does not begin his or her prayer with a request that God stop the storm or steer it in some other direction. The psalm begins with praise, awe and reverence for God. As Jesus taught his disciples, that is where all prayer needs to begin. Recall that in both of the creation stories from Genesis, the world was created first. In the first chapter of Genesis, the earth and all its creatures were created and declared good. Then human beings were created to rule over and care for the earth. Likewise in the second chapter of Genesis: the earth was created and God planted a garden in the earth. Then God created human beings to tend and care for the garden. The message is clear. It’s not all about us. The world was not designed to be a twenty-first century playground that is so well padded and equipped with safety features that no kid could ever possibly get hurt-or have any fun either.  No, the world is far more like the way playgrounds used to be-a place where you can really play. It pains me to no end that my grandchildren will probably never know the ecstasy of rocketing half way to the sky on a real swing set. Nor will they ever experience the dizzying high you could get from one of those merry-go-rounds that we used to crank up to warp speed. Our public parks have been cleansed of all such unacceptable risks. The attorneys and insurance underwriters who have taken over our lives have determined that fun is just too dangerous for kids.

But don’t get me started on that. We were talking about the psalm and the fact that we are not the center of God’s universe. As C.S. Lewis once pointed out, God is not a tame lion. God is not “safe” and neither is the world God made. There is no room in the Bible or in real life for a wimpy, weak kneed religion that longs for a “nice” god. You can get hurt on this planet and tragically so. But for all that, the earth is a good place to be. It’s a place where you can have real fun. Beauty the likes of which you see in the ocean, in the storm and on the top of Sinai necessarily has an element of terror.  The psalmist doesn’t hide in the storm shelter and plead with God not to be so scary. The psalmist praises God for this awesome display of power and rejoices in the beauty, wonder and terror of creation. This is the glorious world God made and the stage on which God acts. The psalmist doesn’t complain about its dangers. S/he prays instead that Israel will find the courage to live boldly and faithfully in this grand universe. Anybody who whines about bad weather and wishes that God had made a safer planet has never been on a real swing!

Acts 8:14-17

I must admit that I don’t know what to make of this brief snippet from Acts. I don’t know how a person can receive the Word of God without the aid of the Spirit, nor do I understand how one receives the Spirit apart from the Word. But one of those things or both seem to have occurred here. Rather than trying to make theological sense out of this, I prefer simply to take this passage as a warning against becoming too dogmatic about how faith and the Holy Spirit work. As I said before, I have performed more than a few baptisms where there appeared to be little in the way of proper motivation or even openness to faith. I don’t know what the outcome will be, but that is really out of my hands. When you invoke the Holy Spirit, you are by definition placing matters in hands beyond your own. In a sense, I suppose I am hoping that what happened in this text will eventually occur for these families, namely, that the Holy Spirit will fall upon them-however belatedly.

Luke 3:15-17, 21-22

A couple of things are worth noting here. First off, the Holy Spirit falls upon Jesus well after he is baptized by John and while he is praying. The voice from heaven addresses Jesus specifically in the second person. It is not even clear that John is still present when this occurs. In verses 15-17, where John disavows any messianic role, he also downplays the significance of his baptizing ministry. “I baptize you with water; but he who is mightier than I is coming, the thong of whose sandals I am unworthy to untie; he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and with fire.” Vs. 16. Thus, John’s baptism, whatever it might have accomplished, did not confer upon those baptized God’s Holy Spirit. According to Luke, Jesus’ receipt of the Holy Spirit seems to have occurred separately from his baptism by John.

The other significant aspect of this text is its location. In both Mark and Matthew, Jesus is led by the Holy Spirit still sopping wet from his baptism out into the wilderness to face temptation by Satan. In Luke’s gospel, Jesus’ receipt of the Holy Spirit is followed by a lengthy genealogy tracing Jesus’ ancestry all the way back to Adam. One cannot help but see in this the foreshadowing of what will occur in the second chapter of Acts where the Spirit falls upon the disciples who then preach the gospel in tongues understandable to a multitude of people from all corners of the known world. Jesus will be the conduit through which the Spirit of God will reach all peoples. Just as Jesus begins his ministry “full of the Holy Spirit” (Luke 4:1), so the church at Pentecost will begin its ministry filled with the Holy Spirit. If we would read Luke rightly, we need to keep the Book of Acts on the horizon. The same Spirit that animates Jesus’ ministry in Luke’s gospel will likewise animate the mission of the church in his Book of Acts.

“The heaven was opened,” is a term used frequently in apocalyptic literature. Vs. 21. The Greek word used by Luke translated “to open” here is milder than the term “ripped open” used in Mark’s gospel to describe the descent of the Holy Spirit upon Jesus. Mark 1:10. In both cases, however, the rending of the heavens is a literary device used to announce the radical intervention of God. In the 64th chapter of Isaiah, the prophet prays, “O that thou wouldst rend the heavens and come down…” Isaiah 64:1. That is precisely what is happening here as Jesus prays. The heavens are rent and the Spirit of God descends upon Jesus through whom God will now act.

What do all these texts have to say about baptism? The take away for me is that, when all is said and done, this is God’s act. We have no idea what we are unleashing when we stir the waters of the baptismal font over which the Spirit hovers and take the creative Word of God upon our lips. We can no more channel the power of God’s Spirit than we can control the raw energy of a storm. At most, our worship makes room for the Holy Spirit to enter in. But the Spirit blows where it wills.

Sunday, May 31st

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THE HOLY TRINITY

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

PRAYER OF THE DAY: Almighty Creator and ever-living God: we worship your glory, eternal Three-in-One, and we praise your power, majestic One-in-Three. Keep us steadfast in this faith, defend us in all adversity, and bring us at last into your presence, where you live in endless joy and love, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever.

Sometimes I think the biggest challenge I face as a witness for Jesus comes not from the secular world, but from other preachers, churches and organizations operating under the Christian franchise. Take, for example, the crowd self identifying as Christian howling with approval as Lynyrd Skynyrd sings:

But there aint nobody safe no more
So you say your prayers and you thank the Lord
For that peacemaker In your dresser drawer

God and guns Keep us strong
That’s what this country Lord Was founded on
Well we might as well Give up and run
If we let them take our God and guns.

This month Westboro Baptist Church sent out a news release thanking God for the death of nine more American soldiers killed in action by the hand of God in retaliation for our country’s growing toleration of gay and lesbian people. (I know. I don’t get the connection either). Another Christian website I ran into is warning us about a war against Christianity in this country waged by (among others) the government, socialists, Democrats, liberal Christians, atheists, Jews and intellectuals. I guess that war must be taking place in some other part of the country because I have yet to hear about antichristian groups burning down churches (as happened in Egypt) or the beheading any disciples of Jesus (as occurred in Libya) or the government forcing Christians to leave the country (as is happening in Syria and Iraq). As the pastor of a Christian church in the United States, I am not only free to preach the gospel, but I get free parking at hospitals, preferential permission to ignore laws against discrimination that other organizations must observe and enjoy tax benefits that embarrass me. Is that what a war on Christianity looks like? Do these folks even know what a war is?

Most troubling is the picture of God that emerges from these degenerate types of Christianity. What we see here is an angry god; a god who cares more about his precious rules than about the people he made; a god who will resort to torments greater than we humans in all our depravity can devise to punish the slightest moral infraction. Not surprisingly, the disciples of this mean spirited deity reflect the same heartless intolerance, rage and violence against their perceived enemies. I often wonder, what is the draw for this depraved kind of faith? Do people believe in an angry and fearsome god because they are angry and fearful themselves? Or do they become angry and fearful because they have been raised to believe in an angry and fearsome god? Either way, it is sad and sadder still that it all takes place under the banner of Jesus Christ.

Unfortunately, I don’t foresee this warped Christianity going away anytime soon. In fact, as more young people and people in general continue to reject their religious claims, I expect that the proponents of this religion of hate and fear will become even more angry, abrasive and vocal. I have learned that arguing directly with these folks is pointless. As a colleague of mine puts it, “Don’t mud wrestle with a pig. You just get yourself dirty and the pig likes it.” I also don’t see much point in trying to refute this kind of faith in public forums, particularly through preaching. That only gives these false notions of our faith more exposure. Worse than that, I tend to become infected with the same anger I find so distressing in what I am refuting.

I can think of no better response to deviant Christianity than simply to offer the world the real thing. To a world that has heard too much of the god who delights in stockpiling weapons, killing soldiers and torturing people for breaking the rules, we are called to speak of the Triune God whose essence is love: love of the Father for the Son; love for the world to which the Son is sent-not to condemn but to save it; Triune love poured out through God’s Spirit upon all flesh. More than ever before, it matters that we take care to speak rightly and well about God: Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

Isaiah 6:1-8

King Uzziah’s forty year reign over Judah (783 B.C.E.-742 B.C.E.) was generally one of peace and prosperity. Under the king’s leadership, Judah rose up from a state of near collapse to economic expansion, military might and international prestige. But, as always, there was a price to be paid. Greater national security required the expansion of royal power. Entrance into international commercial commerce bred a new merchant class and an economy hostile to subsistence farmers. Land that had for centuries been passed down from generation to generation within tribal clans was now being bought up at fire sale prices leaving the traditional owners destitute. This injustice did not escape the prophet’s notice:

“Woe to those who join house to house, who add field to field, until there is no more room, and you are mad to dwell alone in the midst of the land.” Isaiah 5:8.

As might be expected, the death of Uzziah unleased a great deal of sorrow and anxiety. That was normal, of course, for near eastern monarchies where the passing of the king frequently led to fierce struggles for power within the royal family for succession to the throne, sometimes resulting in civil war. But there was more at stake than political stability. The age of petty kingdoms such as Judah was coming to an end. The age of empires was dawning. Already the ascendant Assyrian Empire was beginning to cast its shadow over the region. Uzziah’s son and successor, Jotham, followed the path of neutrality and isolationism in order to spare his country from war. His grandson, Ahaz, would not have the luxury of this option. Isaiah saw perhaps more clearly than any of his contemporaries the change that was coming over the world. Yet in his vision, he is reminded that the true throne is the one occupied by the Lord of Hosts. So the real issue is not who will sit upon the throne of Judah now that Uzziah has died, but who occupies the throne in heaven and whose glory truly fills the earth. The God of Israel, the Lord of Hosts is the only true king. Vs. 5.

This passage is the only scriptural reference to “seraphim.” They are described as six-winged creatures who attend the Lord of Hosts and intone his praises. It is interesting to note that the fiery serpents sent to punish Israel’s faithless complaining in the wilderness are called “seraphs.” Numbers 21:4-9. This has led some scholars to identify them with a six winged demonic figure holding a serpent in either hand portrayed at an archeological site at Tell Halaf. Gaster, T.H., Angel, The Interpreter’s Dictionary of the Bible, Vol. 1 (c. 1962 by Abingdon Press) p. 132. The fiery bite of the serpents in the Numbers account leads to death unless resort is made to the bonze replica of these creatures fashioned by Moses. Here, too, the seraphim touch the prophet’s mouth with a burning coal from the altar which by all rights should inflict severe pain and injury, but instead cleanses him of sin and emboldens him to speak. Vs. 8.

The prophet’s response to his vision reflects the very heart of his calling: “Woe is me! For I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; and my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of Hosts.” Vs. 5. The prophet does not stand above his/her people hurling righteous condemnation. To the contrary, s/he stands with his/her people, knowing that s/he shares their sin. The judgment s/he proclaims will be on his/her own head also and so is uttered with tears. The prophet can speak only because his/her “unclean lips” have been cleansed. Vs. 7.

Although this vision unfolds in the temple, it is much too big for any such architectural setting. The Lord of hosts is “high and lifted up.” His train alone fills the entire temple. Vs. 1. When the Lord speaks, “the foundations of the thresholds shook.” Vs. 4. The fragileness of the temple and, by extension, the kingdom of Judah and the rest of the world in the presence of such a Being is hard to miss. While God might honor the temple with God’s self-revelation, there can be no containing God there!

I cannot see any reason for including this wonderful text in the lectionary for Trinity Sunday other than the seraphims’ cry of “Holy, Holy, Holy” which evidently inspired the Trinity Sunday hymn by that name. Nonetheless, as is evident throughout the prophetic books, the word of God is sent to God’s people through the mouth of the prophet, a word that is as much action as speech and thus an extension of God’s self. The word sent to Israel by the prophets is, according to the New Testament witness, the Word made flesh and the Son who is sent into the world for the life of the world by the Father. Thus, it is quite possible to move from this text to a discussion of the Trinity.

Psalm 29

I have commented on this psalm before, most recently in my post of post of Sunday, January 11, 2015. For my thoughts on textual, formal and interpretive issues, you might want to revisit it.

As I read this psalm through the lens of Trinity Sunday, I am struck by the attribution of so much activity to the “voice” of the Lord. Again, ours is a God who speaks. Yet much of what God has to say through natural phenomenon like storms is unintelligible unless proclaimed through the lips of human witnesses. What, for example, do we glean from witnessing a hurricane? Power, to be sure. But raw power is an attribute shared by every tyrant, bully and thug. That God has more of it than anyone else is hardly comforting if that is all we know. The psalm must therefore be read in the context of the canonical narrative. This God of the storm is the God who used the might of his arm to liberate a people from slavery and bring them up into freedom. This thundering God is the God who made a covenant with the earth promising never to use divine might to annihilate it. This psalm testifies not only that God is powerful, but that God can be trusted to use power to redeem, sanctify and heal.

That probably does not answer all of the questions we might have about God’s will and purpose in the wake of a devastating hurricane, tornado or earthquake. But it assures us that God is at work in such horrific events turning them to God’s own redemptive purposes. The word that goes out from God is always the Word made flesh, the Son sent into the world for the life of the world.

Romans 8:12-17

For my take on Paul’s letter to the Romans generally, see my post for Sunday, June 22, 2014. Here Paul is contrasting the life of faith in Jesus Christ with the life of bondage under “law.” It is critical to understand here that Paul is not speaking of law as “Torah,” or the totality of God’s covenant relationship with Israel. It cannot be overemphasized that Israel’s covenant with God was emphatically based upon God’s mercy, compassion and grace. Paul is using the term “law” to characterize the quality of one’s relationship with God apart from grace. If the Torah is understood not as God’s gift, but rather a tool by which to win God’s approval or a source for boasting of one’s special status before God, it leads only to death and condemnation. For both Jewish and Gentile believers, adoption as God’s people is based on God’s election and God’s mercy alone.

In sum, “law” as Paul uses it here represents an attitude of entitlement before God based on one’s lineage or accomplishments. Even the good news of Jesus Christ can become “law” if it is preached as a demand, requirement or condition of God’s mercy, i.e., “You have to believe in Jesus to be saved.” Such preaching makes faith a condition that we must satisfy to placate God rather than a gift of the Holy Spirit that sets us free from the need for such placation. Faith is not a condition of salvation, but the thankful response of a forgiven heart to the good news about what Jesus has done for it. For Paul, faith comes through the preaching of the good news about Jesus and is inseparable from that preaching. Romans 10:5-17. Life in the Spirit of God is the very antithesis of life in bondage to “law,” however conceived. The requirement to “measure up,” is gone. The struggle is no longer to become worthy of adoption as God’s children, but rather to conform our lives to the ways of the holy people God has already declared us to be.

Paul contrasts “slavery” with “sonship” to distinguish these two ways of living. A slave has no legal standing in the household. S/he is merely property of his/her master that may be sold at any time. Thus, if a slave desires to remain in the household, s/he must constantly be demonstrating his/her worth and value to the master. The life of a slave is one of fear, anxiety and uncertainty. A son, however, belongs to the household and can address the father fearlessly with the intimate term “Abba.” Vs. 15. Of course, the son or daughter owes his/her father obedience and respect. But that is far different than the servile need of a slave to please his/her master to remain in his/her good graces. The son or daughter is already in the father’s good graces and has no need to earn his love.

The “Spirit” of which Paul speaks is the source of that confidence a believer has to address God as “Abba.” Just as Augustine would say that the Holy Spirit is the love binding the Father and the Son, Paul I think would say that the Spirit is the love binding the believer to God in Christ Jesus. It is the desire of God to share with us the Trinitarian life of love experienced between Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

John 3:1-17

Again, my formal, textual and interpretive comments on this text can be found in my post of Sunday, March 16, 2014. You might want to revisit these.

Focusing on this passage from the standpoint of Trinity Sunday, I am drawn to verses 16-17. Our God is the God who speaks. God is known because God makes God’s self known to us. The sending of the Son is but the intensification of God’s speaking God’s word, so much so that this “Word” became flesh in order to dwell or sojourn among us. John 1:14. God is not merely as good as God’s word. God is God’s Word.

Jesus’ words about the Spirit are elusive for Nicodemus, but that is precisely because his words are unintelligible apart from the Spirit. As last week’s reading informed us, it is the role of the Spirit to lead us into all the truth. John 16:13. It is the Spirit that takes what belongs to Jesus-which is “all” that the Father has-and imparts it to the disciples. John 16:13-14. Although Nicodemus says he knows that Jesus is a “teacher” come from God, he is light years away from knowing or understanding that Jesus is the Son sent from the Father. To obtain such understanding, Nicodemus must be born from above, that is, born of God. Vs. 3. Nicodemus misunderstands Jesus, thinking that he is speaking of some sort of human rebirth. Naturally, then, when Jesus begins speaking to him about the Spirit, he cannot follow. Nicodemus is literally chasing after wind.

We never discover whether Nicodemus ever understood Jesus’ final word to him, namely, that God so loved the world that God sent his Son into the world to save it. Indeed, until we reach the Farewell Discourses it will not become clear to us as readers that the sending of the Son is the outpouring of the Father’s love for him (the Spirit) upon the world. John 17. God desires to draw us into the very love that is the life of the Trinity:  “Righteous Father, the world does not know you, but I know you; and these know that you have sent me. I made your name known to them, and I will make it known, so that the love with which you have loved me may be in them, and I in them.” John 17:25-26. That Nicodemus felt the pull of that love is evidenced by his defense of Jesus before the council of religious leaders in Jerusalem and his participation in the burial of Jesus. John 7:50-52; John 19:38-42.