It’s
Beyond Us
A
Sermon on John 16:12-15 and Psalm 8
By
Griff Martin
For
the First Sunday Following Pentecost (Trinity Sunday)
On
June 16, 2019
To
the Beloveds of First Austin: a baptist community of faith
Incarnate
and Resurrected God, we ask that you once again take the Word and transform it
into a living and breathing new reality we can all together experience. Make us
aware of your presence here in this space and in these words God, for if we are
present to you then nothing else will matter, but if we are not present to you
then nothing else will matter. In the name of the Creator, the Christ and the
Comforter. Amen.
The
New York Times
columnist and author David Brooks is one of my favorite thinkers. He writes with
a brilliance that I admire, and his moderation constantly calls me to rethink
my reactions and overreactions. He is someone who I think sees a bigger picture
than many of us tend to see. I watched him interviewed recently and he was
asked, “what is something you still want to learn in life?” And this incredibly
educated, well-written and well-spoken man uttered this: “I would love to know
God, but God is so weird.”
I
love it. It could be the tagline for this day; a day when we celebrate the
experience of the Trinity…the day we focus on one of the greatest of mysteries
in our faith, and the day your pastor feels like I need to be a contestant in a
theological beauty pageant, to walk the runway and wow you with my theological
mind and imagination, how I can help explain the Trinity to you.
At
the very least, I feel an obligation to try and answer some questions that are
far from easy about the Trinity. Questions like: How are God the creator and
Jesus the same? And then how are the Creator, the Christ and the Spirit the
same? How does three equal one and one equal three? Have all three parts of the
Trinity existed for all of eternity (and if not, then how do we know a 4th is
not coming)? How is one of the three not the most important of the three? Is
the concept of Trinity even found in Scripture? Neither the word Trinity or the
concept is ever mentioned, so what do we do with it?
So,
let’s begin…I don’t know.
I
have books and books and books that try to answer those questions. And then
next to those books, I have book and books explaining why the first books are
heretical. And then I have books about the history of this conversation and all
the drama it has sparked. We are at point that we are now writing books about
the history of this theological debate. There are lots of answers to our
Trinity questions. However, when approached with these Trinity questions, here
is my answer: let me tell you a little story about tangrams.
A
few years ago, I got a call at about 4:00 in the afternoon from Abby. I went
through the usual routine: Who’s bleeding? Who is misbehaving? Do I need to
grab something from the store? Once the usual suspects were crossed off, I knew
what was coming: the ultimate. This was a homework question.
Math;
it’s always a math question in the Martin household.
This
time the issue was a tangram. Blake had learned how to complete a tangram in
school that day, and her teacher had assigned the students to challenge their
parents to see how long it would take them to complete the tangram. By the time
Abby called me, the score at the Martin house was Tangram: 1, Parents: 0.
If
you don’t know what a tangram is, it is 7 shapes that can be used as a puzzle
to complete another shape. In our case, it was five differently sized
triangles, one square and one parallelogram. The puzzle was to use those 7
shapes to make a perfect square.
I
got to the near tears state at 22 minutes knowing it was going to be Tangram: 2,
Parents still at 0. Thirty minutes in I pulled out my iPhone, and even though
Blake informed me that was cheating (the first born is always such a rule
follower, which is why I now go straight to Jude when it comes to the homework
divide and conquer. The second born loves looking it up on the iPhone). Sadly,
the iPhone did not help.
However,
what the internet taught me was that tangrams are a big deal for some people.
There is an endless number of different tangram puzzles to complete out there. There
is an entire selection of tangram apps for your phone and there are online
communities dedicated solely to folks who just love tangrams.
I
don’t get this. To me, that is like people who love to do Sudoku puzzles or
people who don't like breakfast tacos or people who like cats or people who
understand K-pop or people who prefer math over poetry. I know these folks exist,
but I don’t get them.
There
are people out there who look at tangrams and they make sense to them. I am not
one of those people. And for me, as goes the tangram, so goes the trinity.
Which is to say, I can’t understand it. It’s beyond me.
For
instance, while reading commentary on our lectionary passage for today I came
across this line from a wonderful scholar: “(This passage) plainly addresses
the relationship between the Father who is said to have all that belongs to the
Son, and the Son who is said to have all that belongs to the Father, and the
Spirit who takes what belongs to the Son and declares it to the disciples.”
Clears
things right up, doesn’t it?
For
some people this is helpful, and there are people out there who love to debate
the Trinity and how it works and the theology behind it. I actually love a good
theological conversation; however, I also know this: When it comes to matters
of the faith, the really important mysteries of our faith, I would rather
experience them than understand them.
And
maybe that is actually what a day like Trinity Sunday is really about; not
trying to understand something but trying to experience something. A day that
calls forth how we experience God.
The
most basic truth is that this day is about how we talk about God, and that is
no small thing. How we talk about God is important. A recent study from the
University of Miami found that among HIV patients, better immune system
functioning is found among those who held to an image of God that is more
compassionate and loving than for those patients who held to images of God as
judgmental and punishing. The way we talk about God and think about God affects
our very basic biology. Our God talk needs to be well thought out.
However,
the tension to that is this: our God talk is always limited. First, we simply
don’t do it. In a recent Barna study of millions of religious Americans
(and “religious” is a key word there), 1/5 admitted they had not had a
spiritual conversation in the last year, and half admitted they had maybe had 4
spiritual conversations in the last year. Only 7% said they talk about
spiritual matters once a week.
Second,
we can’t talk about God fully because God is beyond us; God is a mystery that
we can never fully grasp. God is too big for our minds. Barbara Brown Taylor
says it best: as creatures, “we can’t paint a true portrait of God because
creatures can’t capture their creator any better than a bed of oysters can
dance Swan Lake.”
And
God as Trinity…God as three persons, yet one person…God as Creator, Christ and
Comforter, and still just God…The Formless, Form and the energy between them…God
as Trinity…God as Creator, Word Made Flesh and Spirit… It’s confusing, and yet
I do believe this is the central image of God in our theology. An image that is
central to my own theology, but I also know that it’s far from being the only
image in our faith (which is to say, I don’t think a True/False Trinity
Question is going to be on the Final Final Exam. I still think that is going to
be a blue book with one essay question: How did you love?).
Look
at Scripture, which is full of different people experiencing God and explaining
God in different ways. For Adam and Eve, God is creator, and then God is a tailor
making new clothes for them. For Abraham, God is painter of the stars. For
Solomon, God is a lover. For Esther, God is a hidden delight. For the Psalmist,
God is a nursing mother and a beekeeper. For Jesus, God is a mother hen. And
that is just the beginning. Scripture tells us that God is like a cypress tree
and like fire and wind and like a whisper and also like thunder. Throughout
Scripture, God is bread. And that is just the start.
And
yet God is still ever so much more.
I
emailed a few of you to ask what God is like for you, and I have cornered a few
of you over the last two weeks to try and get you to tell me a bit about how
you experience God. And let me tell you, I have been overwhelmed with responses
– so many I can’t use them all today. And I have had some of the most
fascinating and life giving conversations I have ever had in this church, and
reading your words and hearing your experiences of God have strengthened my
faith.
In
fact, more than ever I believe this is what we need to be talking about – these
types of questions and sharing our stories and our testimonies with one another
because this is what matters so much more than bylaws and numbers and committee
and process. Let’s talk about who God is to us.
And
here is what I have learned: for the community of First Austin over the last
few weeks, God is…
God
is roots and wings to me.
God
is music: a gospel choir, Handel’s Messiah, an acoustic guitar,
Beyoncé’s Homecoming, an opera, Rent, The Indigo Girls, a
children’s choir, madrigals, a street performer, Hamilton, Bob Dylan,
Pavarotti, Adele, Whitney Houston singing anything. It brings the kingdom
of heaven here to earth.
God
is the thing I cannot grasp. The moment I think I’ve wrapped my brain around
it, I’ve made God too small.
God
is a loving father who does not expect me to be spiritual all the time, so I
can be happy when I am shopping with my sister or when Texas wins a football
game.
God
is like the multitudes of music: folk songs, camp songs, symphonies, sonatas,
that keep rolling around in my head and heart day after day, year after year.
Always striking a chord of courage, hope, reflection and joy. That music abides
with me and I with it, as I journey through life.
God
is “behind” all of the many moments in life that make me smile and with me in
the hard times.
God
is the mother I always wanted.
God
is like my oldest and dearest friend because she does not always tell me what I
want to hear but what I need to hear.
God
is the sunshine after the rain.
God
is the article on the front page of the paper about how poorly our city treats
our homeless neighbors; God is the justice called forth in those words.
God
is like a book and some books are tough reads, some anger you, some
confuse
you
and some disappoint you and God has done all those things…. However, God is a
book I always come back to, wanting more.
God
is a poet using an economy of words to say simple, beautiful, lifechanging
truths in my soul.
God
is the girl who can’t say no.
God
is the peace I find when I am anxious.
God
is like a rainbow. This past week I was flying from just around sundown. It was
dark on earth. Above the clouds there were distinct bands of color. It was
astonishing to see clearly laid out a bottom band of red, then on top of
it, orange, and after this a very thin layer of genuine yellow, and
then a true beautiful deeper green, a thicker layer, and then a stretch of
lighter blue, and, finally, up above everything, the
famous "indigo", that dark and deep blue, soaring all
the way up over our heads. I wanted nothing so much as to draw all of this
within me, to drink and drink it all in.
God
is like a giant sequoia tree! Majestic, mind-boggling, like no other,
ever-present, beautiful, stretching arms out to give protection, sharing comfort,
giving to all who take time to be present to it.
Mother
God is nurture and nature, reaching for me from everywhere and enveloping me
like a warm hug to let me know I am accepted and that my presence matters. When
we separate, she excitedly waits close by, ready to pick up where we left
off.
To
me, God is like the sun, moon, and stars to me. He is my everything. God hears
my every cry and shares my every joy.
God
is the pride flag we fought so hard to wave this month…. Love despite
everything that tried to conquer it.
God
is everything.
God
is my dad’s hand holding me on my wedding day.
God
truly is love.
Right
now, to me, God is like a warm hug when you need it the most. The hug when you
need reassurance, telling you with its embrace and warmth that you will be
okay, all will be okay, even though it seems like it just really won't. The hug
when you need comfort, sharing your grief and sadness but assuring you that
you're not alone. The hug when you need and receive forgiveness and you've been
given it. That sense of relief and release that comes with acceptance of who
you are no matter what. The hug that welcomes you home and sends you off with
the knowledge of a warm, welcoming place to return to.
God
is the song I can’t get out of my head.
God
is like water which exists in many forms – vapor, solid, gas, liquid – all
different yet all necessary for life to be able begin, evolve, and
continue. Water has both tremendous force like a flooding river yet is as
gentle as a snowflake.
All
those stories. All those different ways of experiencing God. God is so many
things to all of us and yet God is still one.
And
maybe that is the real gift of the Trinity – many experiences and yet one love.
Because the Trinity gives us three very different ways of experiencing God: God
as Creator as the powerful force and artist behind all that is, God as Jesus
Christ showing us a better way of living and giving us life, and God as the
Holy Spirit blowing wherever the Spirit wishes. Those are three pretty
different roles that are a bit hard to for us to try and make work together and
maybe that is the point; the point is, it’s beyond us and it’s not ours to make
sense of, but to experience.
Maybe
Trinity Sunday is nothing more than an invitation to experience God and to be
reminded that we are lost in a divine game of hide and seek and we are playing
with our God who hides in the most obvious of places, and the most obscure of
places. Our God, who is constantly wanting to surprise us and to be found by
us. A God who is everywhere in order to show us how badly God wants to be part
of our life…and that is something to be celebrated.
Perhaps
Trinity Sunday is nothing more than once again an invitation to dance with God
and an invitation that reminds us, “Come dance with me and I will be found in
every song, every step and every partner you dance with.”
And
actually, one of the most classic explanations of the Trinity deals with this
very dancing. Several Greek scholars translate the Greek word for trinity as
“to dance around.” The Trinity is God dancing with God… the divine dance… and
the good news for us is it’s a dance we are all invited to experience this
day.
Amen
and Amen.
*artwork: Celtic Trinity Knot, Stephen Killeen, fineartamerica.com/profiles/stephen-killeen.html
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