Holy Trinity Sunday

Holy Trinity Sunday 2010

Good Shepherd Lutheran Church, Plover, WI

An audio version will be available at www.eflock.org/sermons

Grace and Peace to you in the name of our Lord, Jesus Christ.

From Advent and Christmas, to Lent, Easter, and Pentecost – the life of the community of faith moves along quickly. The high festival days come all together as we walk through the life of Christ from birth to death to life. Here we are at the end, post-Easter, post-Pentecost. After all these great stories of God’s movement in the life of the church, we come today to Holy Trinity Sunday.

Holy Trinity Sunday is the only Sunday of the church year that is dedicated to a doctrine of the church. All the rest are focused on seasons, events in the life of Christ, and festivals. There are no iconic stories today. The word Trinity is never used in the bible. It wasn’t until the year 325 that the doctrine of the Trinity was finally agreed upon. The early church was trying to comprehend the incomprehensible. To put into words what is beyond words. They were attempting to explain their experience of God in Scripture and in life. And so rather than try to tell you something about God as Trinity today, we’re going to tell each other something about who God is – our God sightings. So – turn to a neighbor and share with them a time you have experienced God.
When and where in your life have you most clearly seen God?

Psalm 8-creation – glory and splendor – I behold the work of your fingers
Romans 5- falling to our knees at the foot of the cross on Good Friday
-experiencing the peace that falls upon us on Christmas Eve while singing Silent Night – through the not so silent nights of turmoil – There Christ meets us in our suffering and sorrow.
John 15-the love of community in times of sorrow and joy – the spirit will intercede for you with sighs too deep for words – The Spirit will speak – will declare -

Rachel and I have been taking some free salsa dancing lessons the past couple months. The first couple nights were enjoyable, but a disaster. In salsa dancing, as far as I can tell, there are no set moves. There are twists and turns to learn, but in the end you do whatever you want when the music moves you. It’s more about being in tune with each other and the music than knowing a choreographed routine. As the guy, I get to lead. So there are gentle nudges and twists of arms that I’m suppose to do in order to communicate to Rachel what’s going to happen next. The disaster of those first few weeks happened when I would either not tell Rachel what was going to happen next and we’d run into each other or I twisted her arm to hard and hurt her. We were a hot mess. I just assumed she knew what I was thinking or that I had to force her to move in a certain direction. Both ways left us unfulfilled – knowing there was a better way. But after a few weeks of practice – we’re getting better. We’re still not very good, but instead of each of us dancing by ourselves next to each other, we’re dancing together. Because we’re open to the each other we are beginning to recognize the nuances of the moves and can now we can listen to the music, and let it move us.

This dancing analogy has long been used to describe the relationship of the Trinity. The Holy Trinity communicates with itself in perfect love and with gentle nudges where to go next and what to do. The Trinity shows us that God’s identity is not isolated. God is in its very essence is a community of persons sharing love – sharing experience – sharing grace. And in all these ways that we have shared now, we see how the Trinity has opened up itself to us. Making room for even us.

The question for us is not do we affirm the doctrine of the Holy Trinity and reject the theological heresies that contradict it. Doctrine is important, don’t get me wrong, but only as an ordered reflection on our experiences of God and the biblical witness(thank you Working Preacher). The question that is before us is do we believe that the God who created all things – whose name is majestic in all the earth – is truly mindful of us, humans, of you and the short lives that we live in the grand scheme of creation. God is mindful of you. Do we believe that the God whose glory is magnificent and completely incomprehensible, shares it with us through our faith in Christ? That Christ would lower himself to human form and to the point of death – God dying so that we would have life to the fullest and be brought into communion with God? God is mindful of you. Do we believe that now, 2000 years after the person of Jesus died and rose, 2000 years after these stories of faith occurred that the Spirit of God is still speaking to us. Still declaring to us. You are children of God. You are not forsaken or forgotten. There is room here for you in the dance of Trinity.

When I was in middle school I went to Confirmation Camp in at Camp Mowana in Ohio. And they had a dance on Wednesday night. I was shy. I was timid. I wasn’t confident – like every other middle school boy. But they would dance. I sat on the side watching. And even when a girl would come over and invite me to get up and join them, I was politely refuse. I didn’t think they really cared. I think I thrived on my self-pity. So sat there all evening and missed out. And regretted it. We all do that sometimes, don’t we? Ignoring the hand of God that’s hand is stretched out before us.

Even on our best days, it can be difficult to trust and believe that God is mindful of us. That Christ is inviting us to dance – to be so in tune with the music of creation and the movements of the Spirit that we move in perfect harmony together. Our life of faith is not so much about knowing the steps that will come next, but rather about trusting God to guide us through the next turn, twist, or dip. Sometimes our life of faith is finding the courage to dance.

That courage comes from God’s simple touches of grace that lead us into the way of peace. The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you. I baptize you in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Do this for the remembrance of me. And all the ways the Holy Spirit is speaking to you each day.

We’re going to have some more participation now. Where in your life now, is God inviting you to join the dance of Trinity? Where are God’s subtle touches of grace leading you?

God whose glory is manifest in all of creation, God who glory is revealed in his suffering on the cross, God whose glory is spoken to us in tongues of fire, in a still small voice, or in sighs too deep for words. That is Trinity. God working in distinct ways in every aspect of our lives. Sometimes, like the window above us – subtly in the background, but ever present. Urging and encouraging us to dance. Turning our mourning into dancing. Dancing with joy like David and Miriam, like the prodigal son and his father’s household, or like a guest at the wedding feast. You don’t have to be a good dancer. You don’t have to know the entire routine ahead of time. The key is to follow our partner’s lead.