Life with the Triune God
Trinity Sunday May 30, 2010
Text: John 16:12-15 The Rev. Dr. Ross M. Wright
On this Trinity Sunday, we celebrate the life of God as a triune life. You have probably noticed by now that all of the hymns and Scriptures in this morning’s liturgy support this central theme. God is our Father, the creator of heaven and earth. God is the Son, Jesus, who has become one of us and is therefore one with us. God is the Holy Spirit, the continuing presence of Jesus on earth, so that Jesus is not just a figure of history “then and there” but a present reality, here and now. We are as close to the risen Christ as the disciples who first met him on Easter Day.
Think about all the references to the life of the Trinity in Christian worship. We began this service with the acclamation: “Blessed be God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.” In a few minutes, we will say the creed, which has a Trinitarian in structure: “I believe in God the Father. . . I believe in God the Son. . . I believe in God the Holy Spirit.” You were baptized in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. You will be buried with this commendation:
Depart, O Christian soul, out of this world;
In the Name of God the Father almighty who created you;
In the Name of Jesus Christ who redeemed you;
In the Name of the Holy Spirit who sanctifies you.
May your rest be this day in peace,
and your dwelling place in the Paradise of God.[1]
So from beginning to end, the Christian life is encompassed by the reality of God’s triune existence.
The words, “Trinity,” and “the doctrine of the Trinity” may sound abstract and impersonal. But when you hear “Trinity” I would like you think not about a concept but about a relationship, or a series of relationships existing among the three members of the Godhead. Think of the one God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit as persons in communion with one another. God is not a static monad but “a dynamic, pulsating activity,” as the Father, Son and Spirit coexist in a joyful, cosmic dance. Think about a square dance, say – the Virginia Reel. The dancers are in constant motion, as they swing from one partner to the next, a living dynamic of interrelatedness. When we have contact with any one of the persons of the Trinity, we encounter all three.
There are two activities in which we experience the Trinitarian life of God most concretely: prayer and the Holy Eucharist. C. S. Lewis, with characteristic clarity, puts it like this:
An ordinary simple Christian kneels down to say his prayer. He is trying to get in touch with God. But if he is a Christian he knows that what is prompting him to pray is also God: God, so to speak, inside him. But he also knows that all his real knowledge of God comes through Christ, the man who was God – that Christ is standing beside him, s helping him to pray, praying for him. You see what is happening. God is the thing to which he is praying [I would prefer to say “the reality”] – the goal he is trying ot reach. God is also [the reality] inside him which is pushing him on – the motive power. God is also the road or bride along which he is being pushed to that goal. So that the whole three-fold life of the three-personal Being is actually going on n that ordinary little bedroom where an ordinary man is saying his prayers.[2]
Second, we experience God’s Trinitarian life in corporate worship. What is worship? Most people would answer that question by describing a series of actions which we do: we come to church; we sing the hymns; we listen to scripture and the sermon; we offer our money, time and talents to serve God; we pray for the needs of the world. We would certainly admit that we need God’s help or grace to do these things, but in the end, the emphasis is on human action.[3]
The Scottish theologian, James Torrance calls this a Unitarian view of worship. Why? Because it conceives of worship as something we do in the presence of God: a “do-it-yourself-with-the-help-of-the-minister worship.” In this view of things, worship is like a spigot: if you know how to turn the right knobs, grace flows out. God’s action is somehow conditioned by what we do.
But think of how the picture of worship changes if we think of worship as Trinitarian. Here, the emphasis is on our participation in the life of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Jesus is our high priest, who, as the writer of the Hebrews says, “lives to make intercession” to the Father for us. Our prayers and worship are a participation in his prayers. Perhaps you have had the experience of praying with someone who knows God deeply; you sense that to pray with such a person is to be in the presence of God. Or to use a musical analogy, perhaps you have had the experience of signing next to someone with a big voice. When you sing with them, you sound better, so that you’re not sure how much of what you are hearing is your voice and how much is the other’s.
There is only one true Priest through whom and with whom we draw near to God our Father. There is only one Mediator between God and humanity. There is only one offering which is truly acceptable to God, and it is not ours. It is the offering by which [Jesus, our great high priest] has sanctified for all time those who come to God by him. There is only one who can lead us into the presence of the Father by his sacrifice on the cross.
Is not the bread which we break, our sharing in the body of Christ and the cup which we bless, our sharing in the blood of Christ? Our sonship and communion with the Father, are they not our sharing by the Spirit of adoption in his Sonship and communion with the Father? Our intercessions and mission the world are they not the gift of participating in the intercession and mission of the “apostle and high priest whom we confess” (Heb. 3:1)? Our baptism, is it not the gift of participating through water and the Spirit in the One Baptism, Christ’s baptism for us in the waters of Jordan and in the blood upon the cross, which alone washes away our sins?[4]
There is a world of difference between Unitarian worship and Trinitarian worship. The first puts the emphasis on what we do, the second on our participation in what God does. The first is wearying – always looking for some new way to prop up the worship; the second is energizing, liberating, and joyful.
So, the Trinitarian life of God is a life of dynamic relationship. We are being invited to join in that dance. Of course, it is possible to sit on the sidelines and simply observe the dance. Have you ever had the experience of watching people dance and wanting to join them but feeling inhibited or self-conscious? Maybe you don’t know how to dance. And then, someone walks up to you and says: Do you want to dance? Every day, we stand in the presence of God’s dynamic, Trinitarian life. Every day we are confronted with the question: Will we sit on the sidelines and watch, or will we join the dance?
When we do enter into the life of God, we discover that we are drawn into the mission of God. God is by nature a sending God. The Father sends the Son into the world to love, serve, and wash the feet. The Son sends the Spirit to the church. Jesus said: “It is to your advantage that I go away, for if I do not go away, the Counselor will not come to you; but if I go, I will send him to you” (John 16:7).
And the Spirit sends us into the world to serve. On the night of the resurrection, Jesus breathed on the disciples and said: “Receive the Holy Spirit. As the Father has sent me, so I send you.” Likewise, the Spirit sends us into the world on a mission. The Christian life is not a cozy, insulated life with likeminded people or a safe harbor for people who want to escape from the stress and demands of life in the world. On the contrary, the Spirit of God sends us on mission. God has a mission. And the moment we risk associating ourselves with him, we become part of that mission.
This is what I have to offer you on this Trinity Sunday. I hope that these words and meditations will serve to draw us more deeply into the life of the Triune God who invites us to worship with him this morning and sends us into the world on assignment with him.
