Trinity Sunday Sermon

Today is Trinity Sunday, the day each year when we explore the complex theology of Trinity, of God as one and God as three. But this is no mere riddle; nor is it simply a confusion of words meant to perplex. It is, perhaps, the church’s most sublime insight into the nature of God: that there is only one God, and that one God is an intimate community within Gods’ self.

And, although it took centuries for the church to arrive at this understanding of God, our lectionary reading for Trinity Sunday looks all the way back to the first chapter of the first book of the Bible – to the creation story – to find its first word on such an understanding of God.

But before we start, let me clarify something: The author of Genesis was not writing a science book. It is not a treatise on the physical development of creation. We do violence to the text and the author’s intention when we force that kind of reading on it.

The story of creation is a theological text. It is an ancient form of writing that explores the nature and the character of God, using the form of a narrative. Don’t press this story to prove how God made the world; look to it to understand who God is, and what God intends for creation, and then you will find in it the starting place for every major theme and doctrine in scripture…including the Trinity.

But, to be clear, when the author of Genesis penned this opening chapter of scripture I don’t believe he had any formulated understanding of the Trinitarian nature of God. But from our vantage point, we can look back to the story of creation and perceive in it the seeds of that truth.

And it is those seeds that I want to explore this morning.

So we start with God the Father. How is the father portrayed in this story?

Principally, God is portrayed as the one who creates order and goodness and life out of chaos and danger. Isn’t it fascinating that, whereas the “formless void” envisions an absolute nothingness, “the deep” implies water, a deep ocean, a place of danger and disorder.

And then God speaks. God simply speaks and effortlessly begins to order that which had no order. “Let there be light” and there was light. There is an ease with which God’s authority is revealed.

One thing that scholars of Genesis are quick to point out is how similar this story is to other creation stories that existed in the Ancient Near East. The assumption often made is that the story can’t be “true” if, in fact, it’s just a compilation of plagiarism from other sources. But remember: this is a theological text. The author is deliberately taking the stories from other cultures and turning them on their heads, to create a theological statement about the true nature of God.

For example, all the other creation narratives depict an epic battle between cosmic forces of Good and Evil. But what makes this story so distinctive is the ease of God’s creating. “Let there be light…Let there be dome in the midst of the waters…Let the earth put forth vegetation…” God speaks and makes it so, with nothing more than words. The God we encounter in this story is a God of absolute and unassailable authority. Nothing is threatening to this God.

And how does God choose to demonstrate that authority? By putting in order what has no order, making safe what was dangerous. God gives life to that which could not live. The most elemental thing about God in this is how the “bad” is turned to “good.”

And this remains the foundational truth about God that we continue to depend on in our lives. Our lives are filled with disorder and chaos and fear. Where does the suffering come from? What is the origin of evil? I don’t know. And the Bible doesn’t tell us. But to that elemental question the Bible’s principal image of God is of creating order. God is the one who redeems, who makes good where there was no good. When we find ourselves in our “formless void” – when marriages fail, when loved ones die or nations divide – we turn to God. And when we do, we encounter the God who says, “Let there be light.” And there is light. And the light is good.  And this opening image of God is developed and reinforced throughout the entire Bible. On this you can depend. God the Father.

Next: God the Holy Spirit.

Before God even began the ordering of creation, we read, “darkness covered the face of the deep, while a wind from God swept over the face of the waters.” It’s a picture of a stormy sea with thrashing waves. But the wind blowing over that sea is God’s own self, intimately present, as close as the wind upon our face, even upon the face of chaos. In the original Hebrew, “wind” and “breath” and “spirit” are all the same word. So here we see that, from the beginning, even in the worst circumstances, God is there, hovering over the face of the deep.

I remember when my friend Steve was diagnosed with terminal cancer. No sooner had he been diagnosed, than his lungs began to fill with fluid. I remember during those pain-filled days, reading the Genesis story and watching Steve’s story, and seeing them merge into one: The waters weren’t only some metaphorical, primordial sea – the waters had become the fluid filling Steve’s lungs. The disordered waters of death were stalking him, bursting their banks and flowing where they did not belong. Yet, even in the midst of this chaos, the Spirit was there in Steve, and so intimately that his own breathing became as the breath – the Spirit – of God.

And so remains our hope: God’s home is in us. We cannot, we will not, be abandoned, regardless of what waters overtake us. God the Holy Spirit.

And finally: God the Son.

The story of creation keeps building. Day after day, God puts this creation in order – increasingly making it full and fruitful and teaming with life. And at each step of the way, God affirms its essential goodness. Then we reach the sixth day – this monumental day when God creates humanity. And the fundamental characteristic of humanity is that they are made in the “image and likeness of God.”

In the Ancient Near East, this phrase “image of God” was used to describe a statue placed by a king in a territory he’d conquered – a sign that the king himself was there, claiming sovereignty. The term also described idols, carved images of gods that were placed in the temples – not just as symbols, but actual manifestations of the gods.

But in this telling of the creation story, God’s sovereignty and presence in the earth was through humans. We are the image of God, living representations of our creator God. No other creation story made such an audacious claim. The only person in the Ancient Near East who would ever be given such dignity might be a king. But here: all people, male and female, without exception, are image bearers of God.

And what task are they given? “Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth and subdue it; and have dominion”. In short, as representations of God on earth, they are given the task of behaving like God. The commandment they are given mimics what we’ve seen God doing throughout the creation story up to this point: creating and ordering, making the world safe and habitable, fruitful and productive.

Make no mistake, “subduing the earth” has nothing to do with exploiting the earth and its resources. To the contrary, our engagement with all created things is to be godlike: to make whole what is broken, to make safe what is violent, to make good what is evil. This is the principal way God is described in this story. So this becomes the principal call for us who are given as God’s stewards of earth.

This is our human calling. But it is hard for us. And we fail often. Human history is a story of division and enmity and exploitation. But as the scriptures unfold, there is one human – one image and likeness of God – who did not fail. I am speaking of course of the Incarnation – of Jesus: fully human and fully divine, whose life and mission perfectly fulfilled the divine mandate. When he cured the sick and cast out the demons, when he dignified women and the poor, when he instituted the sacraments, and – ultimately – when he conquered death itself: at every point he was bringing order out of chaos. He was the full and complete likeness of God, making manifest the reign of God on earth. So we see: God the Son.

The author of Genesis had no idea that he was planting seeds within this story that would grow and prove themselves the starting place of God’s revelation as Holy Trinity. But, looking back, it’s all there. Like creation itself, our understanding of God is a growing and dynamic thing; order is still being formed out of confusion.

And, as God’s image bearers in an ever-changing world, so faith requires of us: keep watching; keep thinking, keep asking, “In this time, in this place, how do we live into our divine mandate to be God’s stewards sharing in God’s work, and sharing in the nature of God’s very being?”

We are made to be individuals, each with our particular identity. And we are made to be one harmonious whole, without division between us. Our souls yearn for this kind of harmony and wholeness, to be fully known and loved, to be one with each other. And in God we see the origin and destination of all our seeking. We were formed in the image of God, and we are restored to the image of God, that we would be like God, living and participating in the life of the Holy Trinity

So let us lift our heads and assume the dignity that is ours. Let our words and actions be godlike, bringing healing and love, forgiveness and justice. Let us be transformed into a unity of love befitting the image of God. And may God say of our lives the words spoken that first day: “Let there be light.” And we shall be light to this broken world. And may God see us, God’s children and likeness, and affirm again, “It is very good.”