May 18, 2008; Trinity Sunday Readings: Genesis 1:1-2:4a; Psalm 8; 2 Corinthians 13:11-13; Matthew 28:16-20.   The Rev. Dr. Hilary B. Smith Knowing the Trinity We have celebrated Easter; we have celebrated Pentecost; and today we are bringing it all together - the church's experience of God, our experience of God, as Trinity. The Book of Common Prayer states that the Trinity is one God: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. To believe in the Trinity is to believe in one God in three Persons. The Bible tells us about God and how the writers experienced God. The creation account from Genesis makes the point strongly that one's understanding of God as creator is essential. This deep faith in the one God was what Jesus' friends brought to their experience of Him. Then in Christ, they knew God; then after Jesus ascended, they experienced God among them as Spirit. Long before the theologians had worked out and agreed upon their understanding and explanation of the Trinity, the followers of Jesus were experiencing God as Trinity. They believed in One God, who they experienced in three distinct ways. How do we experience the Trinity? Have we even considered that question? In the Christian scriptures we hear the idea of the Trinity being used. "The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Spirit be with all of you (2 Corinthians 13:11-13)." "Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit (Matthew 28:16-20)." An understanding of the Trinity is essential for understanding Christian belief. And yet, there are many, who have no idea what we mean with we talk about the Trinity. To understand what the Trinity is, it might helpful to understand what it is not. There have been a number of ways of understanding God that were shown to be in error by the early church and thus these understandings were called heresies. To name a few: modalism held that God basically acted as either the Father or the Son, or the Holy Spirit at different times. Rather than always being God: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, there were times when God was just the Son or just the Spirit or just the Father. The doctrine of the Trinity holds that they coexist simultaneously-always have and always will. So when we go through the Nicene Creed, and say that we believe in God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit, we are not saying that we believe that God is one or the other at any given time. Adoptionism holds that the Father is uniquely God and of greater rank than the Son or the Spirit. In this heresy, Jesus was believe to be a special man to whom God bestowed special status. So Jesus is elevated to God but is not actually God. Again, this is heresy because God is one, in three persons-each one of the three being fully and co-equally divine. Arianism holds that the Son was created by God the Father at a point in time-that there was a time when Christ did not exist. For one holding this belief, Christ is not fully God but inferior to God, which was deemed to be heresy. So when we as Christians talk about God, we are talking about God in three persons, Father, Son and Holy Spirit. I remember having an interview with a committee when I was going through the ordination process. It was at the very beginning of the process so I was a bit nervous. I was asked by a person on the committee, "Who do you pray to." She was very intense in her questioning. I said, "I pray to God and Jesus." Apparently this was not good enough, because she asked me again: "Who do you pray to?" I said again, "God and Jesus." Still, not what she was looking for, and she asked me the same question a third time. I gave the same reply. I think that she must have been trying to get me to say something about the Trinity? I'm still not sure. The priest from my home parish who was with me at the interview, moved us along by saying that he thought we had covered the question. So, when I say "God" as a Christian, it always includes the Son and the Spirit. We believe not in three God's but in one God, experienced in different ways at different times but always the Trinity. To be a Christian is to believe in the Trinity. But what does that mean and how important is it really? I have had many people tell me over the years that they struggle with the concept of the Trinity - those who are active in the church and those who are not. My guess is that most church goers do not think much about the Trinity as an intellectual concept. We come to church we worship God, we live a life of faith, and we accept the core teachings of the church as true or at least not worth worrying about. Does that sound about right? People have many different reactions to the concept of Trinity. The topic of the Trinity is one that confuses, confronts, and comforts. Many people I have known need to settle the "God question" in some way. Often they will say to me that they believe that Jesus was a great person and an important teacher. They say that they have a sense of the spiritual - the Spirit - and God as creator. They say that they sense everything to be divine. All this is good stuff for conversation about God - but these ways of describing God do not convey an orthodox Christian understanding of God. Who is God? Who do we say God is for us? To say that God is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit is to claim the belief that God is our creator, our savior, always with us, and active in our lives. How would you express your experience of God? Many, for example, are much more comfortable thinking of God as Creator or Mother rather than as Father. How is God your creator; how is God one who is with you; how is God experienced as a force in your life? What are the words you would use - disrupter, comforter, sustainer, redeemer, or friend? The Churches words have always been Father, Son, and Holy Spirit in answer to such questions. Sometimes it helps us to understand the historic language better when we use other words that express our deepest experience of God. To understand the core beliefs of our faith is not only necessary for general knowledge, but it also has great implications for the way we act as Christians. I mentioned last week that the creative love of God has been reaching out to embrace humanity and all creation throughout the ages. That is a serious amount of grace, of which we are the beneficiaries. So many things in life challenge us and confuse us. We must always remember that God has acted throughout history to be with us, to support us, to challenge, and to lead. Nothing in our life is beyond the reach of God. We are in communion, in community with God, whose life is one of community - One God in Three Persons. The story of the Trinity is really a love story. When you understand and experience God as Trinity, you are experiencing and knowing the love of God that has reached out to us and to the world in dramatic fashion. May we all know the love of God that reaches out to us, bringing us into communion with God and into community with each other. Amen.