Sermon for the First Sunday after Pentecost: TRINITY SUNDAY
Lectionary
Isaiah 6:1-8;
Psalm 29;
Revelation 4:1-11;
John 16:5-15
Evagrius of Pontus, a Greek monk of the 4th century who came from what is now Turkey in Asia and later lived out his vocation in Egypt, said: "God cannot be grasped by the mind. If God could be grasped, God would not be God."
Evagrius's words seem to me to be a fitting way to begin a sermon on the feast of the Most Holy Trinity. It is a warning to keep before us as we talk about the innermost reality of God. Our faith teaches that God is One God, in Trinity of Persons in Unity of Being: Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Do you grasp that?
For many people, the inability to understand God, to grasp God, leads them to reject the whole notion of God. What they are doing is rejecting anything greater than themselves. Others take a different direction, and because they can't understand God, can't grasp God, they believe that there is something wrong with themselves. They believe that they don't have enough faith or aren't good enough or smart enough to get it.
Thank you Evagrius, for admitting that God is beyond us and cannot be grasped, controlled, defined by us-for if God could be so limited to fit into the human mind, then God is not God who is transcendent and beyond, who called creation into being out of chaos.
This Almighty and transcendent God is whom we meet in two of our lessons. In both the lessons from Isaiah and the Revelation we have visions of -melek ha-olom, the king of the universe, seated upon a throne. Humans quiver before his majesty and the host of heaven, cries out "Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord God of hosts." We ourselves will echo this vision as we give voice to the heavenly host and all creation later today as we approach that throne in the eucharistic sacrifice of bread and wine. This is the transcendent God that we cannot grasp.
But there is another aspect to God. It is called immanence, the nearness of God to us, the intimacy that God shares with us. And this intimacy is at the core of what we celebrate in the feast of the Most Holy Trinity.
There is another text that serves us well today. It has been very important in the development of Trinitarian theology and worship, yet we don't read it on the feast day in any of the three years of our lectionary cycle. It is found in Genesis 18:1-15. You might want to read it this afternoon.
Our parents, Abraham and Sarah, are old and it is long past childbearing time for Sarah. Yet, God had reiterated time and again that Sarah and Abraham would bear a child and would be the parents of a great nation. But how could this be? Or could God not be trusted to keep his promises to his faithful ones?
They were camped at the oak tree of Mamre when three strangers appeared. In typical middle-eastern hospitality, Abraham and Sarah brought water to wash their feet and prepared a feast to welcome the strangers. As the three sat under the spreading tree eating, Abraham stood by.
They spoke to him and said where is Sarah? She, a modest nomadic woman, was hidden still in the tent. She'd prepared a meal for the visitors but custom decreed that she not mix with them. She might not sit down with them, but she listened. And when one of the strangers said that when he would return, Sarah would have a son, she laughed to herself (not out loud), and said, "After I've grown old, and am married to an old man, shall I have pleasure?" The stranger then said to Abraham: "Why did she laugh? Is anything too wonderful for the Lord?" Sarah, afraid, denied it and said, "I did not laugh". But he said, "Oh yes, you did laugh." Then the men set out from there.
What has this story got to do with the Trinity? The text of the story is curious. It says that the Lord appeared to Abraham at Mamre-when Abraham looked up and saw three strangers. Mostly they speak with one voice. But later on the one who questions Sarah's silent laughter is also referred to as the Lord. Clearly, this is not a reference to the fully developed doctrine of the Trinity, but the early church saw in it a hint at what we had come to believe as the truth and began very early to represent the Trinity by this scene. In particular, it consisted of three figures, usually painted as angels, sitting around a table under the oak tree. Originally, the picture included Abraham and Sarah serving them, but over time they dropped out as more and more the focus has placed on the strangers at table.
And what the painting is focusing on is the relationship among the three. Unlike most religious paintings, the figures do not look out at us. Rather, the three are looking at each other. They are in a relationship of equality that is bound together by love. At the core then of God's nature is this never-ending circle of love. It is God's nature to love in relationship: the relationship we call, Father, Son and Holy Spirit.
The picture originally called the Hospitality of Abraham became known simply as the Holy Trinity. It stands in the place of honor today in this temple of the Lord. What is unique about this icon is that rather than facing us as most icons do and coming out to meet us, confronting us, rather it pulls us into itself so that we are located on the table in the center of the circle, surrounded by hospitality and love. In fact, what the picture says is that the creation exists within the intimate arms of the Trinity. Creation is held together and held up by the love of God in God's own self. God supports and sustains the creation, God stands under-understands-the creation, not the other way around. God has creation within the grasp of the Divine Love, which holds the creation in the center of that love. God grasps creation….We cannot grasp God. We can only make pictures of what we see partially.
But, when the Lord met Abraham and Sarah at their campsite under the shade of the oak tree at Mamre, they gave the two old ones a promise, the promise of new life, represented by the birth of a child. And Sarah laughed because it was so silly. Yet, God keeps promises no matter how silly they sound, for nothing is too wonderful for God. Within in a year, a boy was born to Sarah. They named him Isaac-the name means: he made us laugh. Even you and I can grasp that-a newborn baby as the sign of God's closeness and love and faithfulness.
And it came to pass that in the fullness of time, God again gave us a little newborn as the sign of God's love for us. God himself came to us as a graspable baby, as the fulfillment of all his promises and the sign of our salvation. And we can grasp that, because we can hold a newborn little baby in our arms and cuddle her. And besides little babies make us all laugh.
Amen. Come, Lord Jesus.
Br. William, n/OHC
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