Today is Trinity Sunday, which is a thing that is hard to get excited about, I have to admit. It just feels very abstract. The doctrine of the trinity is hard. In fact, the first thing you need to say about it is that it is not a thing we can really comprehend, so we shouldn’t even try.
But we do try. We are continually making all kinds of creative analogies in order to make sense of it. The Trinity is like water, we say, which can take three forms: ice, liquid, and steam. Or the Trinity is like a man, who can be at the same time father, son, and uncle. St. Patrick said the Trinity is like a shamrock, one object with three distinct leaves. And none of these analogies work. Because there is nothing that is like the Trinity.
But we continue to try. And so we pull apart the three persons and analyze them each individually, hoping this approach will work. We try to assign them roles, saying this is the Father’s job and this is the Son’s job, and so on. We seem to want to line them up like a 3-person team, standing on the field of life, ready to play the positions they’ve been assigned. The Father tosses the ball to the Son, the Spirit runs interference for the Son – each one plays their part. But the persons of the Trinity don’t want to be lined up in that way. The Father, the Son, and the Spirit all resist this effort to keep them in their unique places.
In part this is because the most important quality of the Trinity is the relational quality. The Trinity is a relationship between the three persons – Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. And it is from this relationship that all the energy comes. The relationship is so crucial that we cannot really separate the persons from one another. They are three, and still they are one.
Perhaps for today a helpful way to approach the Holy Trinity is to look at how this blessed relationship can bless our relationships; our sometimes fraught, often frail, human relationships. And so I want to share with you a story about a young woman, whose story may in some ways be similar to yours.
She was going through a very difficult time in her life. Karen was about to graduate college. She was faced with some hard choices, particularly about marriage. And she felt very alone. She had lost her father, with whom she was close, just a few years earlier. Her mother did not have the strength to give her much support. Karen had always leaned on her sister, someone who had always been there for her. But now, for the first time ever, she and her sister were going through a very hard patch.
She felt alone and knew that she would have to make some very important decisions all by herself. It all felt very unfair to her.
But then something happened that changed everything. She was lying on her bed thinking about all the uncertainties and dilemmas of her life, and she was overcome by a mysterious sense of peace. And a message like, “It will all be well. Everything will be well.” From this point on she was able to move forward and make the decisions she needed to make. And, most importantly, she was able to heal the broken relationships.
What was this? It felt like divine guidance to Karen. Somehow, God had spoken to her, filled her with what she needed at that moment, and continued to help her navigate the relationships of her life.
Was it the Holy Spirit who helped her? Yes. Was it Jesus? Yes. Was it God the Father? Again, yes. They work together and they are never at odds with one another, which raises another important point about the Trinity.
You cannot pit God the Father against the Son, although we sometimes do. We act as though Jesus had to come down to correct God’s mistakes; we assume that the God of the Old Testament has been superseded by some newer, nicer God wearing the face of Jesus. But that gets it all wrong.
As the Apostle Paul wrote, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have been justified. Forgiven. This is the same God that always was. But the relationship between the Father and the Son makes it possible for us to enjoy this relationship, too. We become adopted into this very large and always growing family.
With God the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit – the Spirit who intercedes just when we need her. As Jesus says to his disciples: I know that you have as much as you can take on your plate right now. But the time will come when you are ready and then I will send the Spirit who will guide you into all truth.
Father, Son, and Holy Spirit – they are all in this work together, this work of drawing us into the relationship they enjoy, and into relationship with each other.
More than anything, the Trinity should help us see the importance, the sacredness, of relationship. When we meditate on the Trinity we see glimpses of a bond made of perfect love, love that enjoys, love that serves, love that is willing to sacrifice for the other; love that recognizes how much we need one another.
We say that God is love, and can we really know love in any way other than in relationship? There is abundant love that flows between the persons of the Trinity – Father, Son, and Holy Spirit – and this love pours out over us as the Holy, Blessed Trinity draws us into themselves.
I know the language is weird. I know this is all confusing. But, as someone once said to me after the funeral for her father, “I got lost while you were talking about Paul, but I got unlost when you talked about my dad.”
When we look at the Trinity, maybe we should simply look at how much they love one another, and us, and just let that love be a blessing to us. Let the love of the Trinity be a model for us to follow.
The mystery of the Trinity is one we will not ever comprehend fully. But, thankfully, the blessings of the Trinity may be known completely.
All thanks be to God – Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
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