Transformed by God's Glory -- A Lectionary Meditation for Trinity Sunday
Transformed by God’s
Glory
For the third week in a row, the
church celebrates a historic festival of the faith. We began with the Day of Ascension, whence we
remember Jesus’ farewell commission and accompanying promise to send to the
disciples the Spirit of God, who would empower their mission into the
world. From there we moved on to
Pentecost, wherein we celebrated the coming of that promised gift of the
Spirit, who would be our companion along the way, empowering us and encouraging
us as we fulfill our calling to be witnesses of the in breaking of God’s reign
on earth as in heaven. Now, we observe
Trinity Sunday, the one festival of the church that is focused on a doctrine
rather than an event in the ongoing story of the revealing of God’s reign in
this world, which God loved enough to send a Son, that those who entrust their
lives to this reign might experience fullness of life.
The doctrine of the Trinity has defined the Christian
understanding of God for generations, and yet few truly understand it in a way
that would make a difference in their understanding of God, themselves, or the
world. The very fact that there are so many different
perspectives on the Trinity is reflective of this reality. So, whatever we say about the role of the
Trinity in defining who God is must be done with humility. We must make our statements about the nature
of God using analogy and metaphor, knowing that none of these devices truly
captures the reality that is God. And
yet, as enter this conversation and experience the complexity of God’s reality,
we can experience new life, new birth, new hopes and dreams.
As we come to observe and celebrate
Trinity Sunday, we are given the opportunity to reflect on our own
understanding of the nature of God. I’m
not a creedalist, so I don’t feel bound by the 4th century
definitions, though I find them useful.
What I do believe, very strongly, is that what we believe about God –
how we define or perceive God – makes a difference in the way we live in the
world. That is, the way in which we
envision God’s character and person influences the way we live and move and
have our being.
Being that Christianity is rooted in a monotheistic tradition
that affirms that there is but one God, and that we are to keep the name of
this one God holy, whatever we say about the nature and character of God must,
I would assume, respect that principle.
But what does it mean for God to be one?
What difference does it make? If
we complicate things by using Trinitarian language to define the nature of God,
what difference does that make? These
are the kinds of questions raised by Trinity Sunday, and that find their way
into our conversation about the lectionary texts for the day. What does Isaiah, Paul, or John have to say
about God that can contribute to our conversation about the Trinitarian nature
of God in the 21st Century?
Isaiah 6 is a powerful statement about the glory that is
God. Isaiah has a vision of God seated
on a throne in the Temple of God, high and lifted up with the edges of his robe
filling the Temple. The description has
many anthropomorphic aspects, but it stands as a reminder that there is
something different about God. It’s a
reminder that we’re not on the same plane as God. There is a difference, and this difference
brings out a sense of awe and amazement.
With the winged creatures, the Seraphim, we join in the singing of that
great hymn:
“Holy, Holy Holy is the Lord of Hosts!The whole Earth is full of his Glory.”
And as they
sing, the door frames of the Temple shake and the house of the Lord is filled
with smoke. In response to this display
of power and glory, Isaiah, becomes downcast.
He recognizes himself to be a person of unclean lips, who lives among
people of unclean lips. It’s not that he
is a worm, but that he recognizes that in himself, he cannot enter the presence
of God. But as he makes the confession,
a creature takes a coal from the altar and places it on his lips, cleansing him
with God’s refining fire, removing sin and freeing him to embrace the call of
God, which comes quickly. Who will go
and speak for me, says the Lord? And
Isaiah answers – he I am, send me.
What does Isaiah 6 say to us about
Trinity? We must be careful about
reading later ideas into an earlier text.
That said, Isaiah 6 is good starting point for our conversation about
the nature of God, and the glory that is God’s presence. Whatever we say about God must recognize the
holiness and the transcendence that is God.
It also stands as a reminder that God seeks to speak to us, even to a
world – as John 3 makes clear – that is experiencing darkness and is often
hostile to the things of God. But in the
end there is a life that is changed so that one can embrace one’s call.
If Isaiah calls on us to reflect on
the holiness of God, so that we might be transformed, in Romans 8 Paul follows
this up by speaking of our relationships with God and with one another. Again recognizing the context of the moment –
Trinity Sunday – we must ask ourselves how this passage reveals the Trinitarian
presence of God. Again, noting that
there is no fully developed Trinitarian theology in the New Testament, all that
we can truly find here are reflections and expressions of God’s presence that
reveal something of God’s Triune nature.
A simple accounting of references to Father (Abba), to Christ, and to
Spirit, will demonstrate that all three are present, without defining in an
unambiguous way the nature of their relationship. But, if we understand that the triune nature
of God is reflective of a community of persons, a social Trinity, where the
unity is the community, we find that there is a clear witness to relationships
and community. Most specifically, there
is reference to familial relationships.
By the Spirit’s empowerment, we can cry out to God “abba Father.” First we hear the
Aramaic and then the Greek, signaling the importance of this familial
relationship that we are invited to share in through the Spirit. Thus, we become children of God – not by
blood of course – but we are children nonetheless, and therefore heirs with
Christ of God’s glory, though our opportunity to share in this glory requires
that we suffer with him.
But what is the
nature of this relationship? What is its
outcome? Is it not a transformed view of
our relationships with each other? As children
of God who cry out “abba father” we are no longer slaves to fear. There is abundance in our status as heirs
with Christ of God’s glory. As there is
no fear, and recognizing this abundance that is God’s we can let go of our need
to hoard and to control. There is, therefore,
no need to live our lives according to the principle of selfishness. This is an important word for our day,
especially for those who live in the United States, where in recent years the
message is one of selfishness. Indeed,
according to Ayn Rand, whose writings are all the rage, selfishness is a
virtue. But such is not the case for
those who, like Paul, are followers of Christ.
Selfishness leads only to death, not life in its abundance. But
the choice is ours? Will we share in the
bounty that is God’s or will we follow Ayn Rand into the death producing
principles of selfishness?
We now come to the Gospel of John, where we encounter
Nicodemus, the religious leader who comes to Jesus in the night, seeking
wisdom, but also living in great confusion and doubt. Nicodemus recognizes Jesus to be a teacher of
truth, but this truth does not fit well with received tradition. Nicodemus can make this claim because he has
seen the miracles – signs that Jesus has come from God, but he’s not sure how
this all works – how does Jesus reveal to humanity the reality that is
God? Yes, there is confusion and doubt –
a state of being that is underlined by his coming to Jesus in the night, which
symbolizes just such a state. We stumble
around in the dark, unable to find our way, but there is light that can be shed
on our path through the power of the Spirit.
Again, the Trinity is present in the text, though more
implicitly than explicitly. We must
connect the dots from the God who sends the Son as a sign of divine love and
who transforms those who respond to this love through the Spirit, for we must
be born not only physically (through water) but also in the Spirit, which blows
wherever it wishes.
To Nicodemus, Jesus offers an opportunity to see the world
from a different perspective, but that requires a complete transformation of
his identity and being. He has to be “born
again” or perhaps better “born from above.”
Then, Nicodemus would understand.
Unfortunately, at this point at least, Nicodemus, like so many of us,
gets caught up in the literal – how can a person return to one’s mother’s womb –
and misses the point. To catch the vision, Nicodemus has to move
beyond such a narrow view, to start seeing things from a spiritual vantage
point. Nicodemus’s basic problem is that
he’s confused about the nature of God.
David Lose suggests that Nicodemus failed to understand two
basic premises about God. First, he
failed understand the freedom of God, who like the wind blows wherever God
desires. Nicodemus, like many, wishes to
keep God in a box, but “God is dynamic and God’s activity is therefore not
always as predictable as we might like to imagine.” Nicodemus also fails to understand the
nature of God’s love. As Jesus declares
here, God loves the kosmos (world),
and as Lose notes -- elsewhere in John, the kosmos
is described as being hostile to God. Yes,
God loves a hostile world and does so through Jesus and through the ongoing
presence of the Spirit – the wind of God – and as a result the world is
transformed by the glory of God.
The desire of God is not judgment – though that which is
hostile to the purposes of God will face judgment – but rather the salvation of
that world, a renewing of the covenant so that the love God might reign over
all.
As we observe this Trinity Sunday, may we be aware of this
reality, that the God, who comes to us as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, is a
God who is both free and loving. We
encounter this God in and through God’s works, which we experience in the
Spirit, in whom we are reborn so that we might live without fear and carry the message of God’s glory
to the ends of the earth.
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