SERMON
PREACHED AT St PAUL’S, ARROWTOWN
and
St PETER’S QUEENSTOWN
TRINITY
SUNDAY (27h May) 2018
READINGS:
Isaiah
6.1-8
Ps
29
Romans
8.12-17
John
3.1-17
When we speak of the Trinity we enter the
language of love. Not the language of dissection, or of structural analysis,
nor even of explanation, but of love. That said, even love language falls
short, rings hollow, if it is nor grounded in experience. The difficulty for
those who design the lectionary is that of choosing which language to use to
showcase the love that is demanded of us by and for our creator, our redeeming,
life-giving Triune God.
The readings give us hints as to how we
might praise God by serving God, or even serve God by praising God. The
Westminster Confession (more beloved of Presbyterians admittedly, than
Anglicans) proclaims boldly that the “chief end” or “primary purpose” of human
beings is to praise our God, to pour out the language of love. We might get put
in a loony bin if that were our sole activity, but the powerful imagery
remains: are there times when we pour our souls out in crazy praise to our
invisible Creator?
There is a very real sense that we are
invited to find our place in the stories that we read, inserting ourselves into
the text. Not least we might in passing note the seraphim in Isaiah’s vision of
calling. Their sole, or at worst primary role is to sing the praises of God. We
might notice, too, Isaiah’s deep sense of fallibility, of not being good enough
to serve God. Who is he to speak with the authority of God?
Who is anyone to do so, you or I included?
Despite feel good pop-psychologies, it doesn’t do any harm to be reminded of
our inadequacy. This is at least in part the reason why the Anglican version of
Christianity incorporates so many checks and balances; our service of God must
not become a monument to our own egos, wills and preferences, but is tested
against the waters of wider traditions and opinions, a partnership between us
and the wider Body of Christ.
The basic language of Trinitarian love is
simple. For the Hebrews the Ruarch/Spirit
was a sort of creative word, creative command of the Creator God, by which
God’s actions became reality in the world. The Christians finessed this
understanding. Their experience of God in the life and teachings – and the absolute
identification of the two – in Jesus was so powerful, and so inexpressibly ratified
in the Resurrection, that they began to speak of him, too, as Lord and God.
So far so good. Yet physically as we know
from the ascension story, he had, after being physically present to them for a
while, disappeared, dissipated perhaps, from the followers’ sight. Disappeared,
yet he remained powerfully, tangibly present in their experience of worship,
fellowship, and exploration of the scriptures. And the language of Trinitarian
faith was slowly, and I would argue irreversibly born.
The believers’ response was love language.
Well … Paul’s language is not only the
language of love, but sometimes the language of correction, for he was a
prophet and a pastor. A people that claim to love and serve God but whose lives
do not emanate Christlike love are skating on thin ice. Paul highlights a few
failings of what we might call ersatz
or faux Christ-followers.
One or two are of a sexual nature, though
his emphasis is more on exploitation and predation. Most are references to
behaviours that tear at and tear down the body of Christ: factionalism,
back-stabbing, a catena of behaviours that he calls the works of the flesh (and
that his contemporary James attributes to undisciplined tongues).
The temptation of course is always to
point the finger at others: the responsibility is to note the three fingers
pointing back at ourselves. Paul will always contrast flesh and spirit: the
latter is the result of, the state of, the joy and love of immersion in the
Triune God. Words to describe that God of Jesus Christ so far evade human
description that in Paul’s time words had not even been invented to express the
love God emanates, imparts, exudes. But where that love is, the Spirit of the
Triune God is at work indeed.
So we are left with the (at this stage)
rather obtuse Nicodemus, who John depicts stumbling his way through the gospel
story, through three appearances. Nicodemus staggers awkwardly from
incomprehension to adoration, to the moment when he eventually has no words but
only ointment to pour on the body of the friend he first visited secretly by
night.
While occasionally we might and do need
Paul’s strong words of correction we could do worse than Nicodemus, whose love
for Jesus overcomes intellectual confusion, and who eventually sacrifices so
much to anoint the body. But Nicodemus was pouring out his love for Jesus
between Good Friday and Easter, weighed down not only by his fifty kilo or so
load of spices, but by grief and perhaps a sense of failure.
We live in a different time. Blessed says
John are those who believe but have not seen.
We are called to something else: we are
called to join the post-resurrection witnesses of Jesus, pouring out our hearts
to the sometimes stern, never wussy or chummy Creator. We are called to experience
not the dead Jesus, but the risen Jesus, made known to us by the eternal
Spirit. Jesus, made known to us despite being beyond our sight or understanding.
Jesus, made known to us in scripture and in fellowship and in the elements of
bread and wine. Jesus made known to us in love and hope and justice, peace and
reconciliation (“Peace to those who are far off, peace to those who are
near”). Jesus, made known to us in the one another that we are called to love
within the Body of Christ.
We are called to be a trinitarian,
resurrection people, dancing beyond the capabilities of the mind, dancing where
the God who flings universes across the heavens meets us in a Palestinian
peasant, meets us in suffering, leads us through death to life, and embraces us
and those we love, eternally.
Alleluia, Amen.
