I did not mention it, but the scenario described at the beginning of the sermon was one that has been relived too many times in the my twenty-six years or ordained ministry: the Sunday after 9/11; all the Sundays after school shootings; even Sundays after calamitous weather events evoke emotions in the gathered congregation as they (we) struggle to articulate our faith in God in the face of, maybe in spite of, what we see in our world. I might also note that the power of the psalmist, at least for me, is their willingness to dig deep and search for, demand of, ask about, question, and give in to the God they have known but the name: "I will be who I will be."
“Trinity Sunday” SAPC, Denton; June 16, 2019; Exodus 3: 1-6; 13-16
Exodus 3: 1-6: Moses was keeping the flock of his father-in-law Jethro, the priest of Midian; he led his flock beyond the wilderness, and came to Horeb, the mountain of God. 2 There the angel of the Lord appeared to him in a flame of fire out of a bush; he looked, and the bush was blazing, yet it was not consumed. 3 Then Moses said, “I must turn aside and look at this great sight, and see why the bush is not burned up.” 4 When the Lord saw that he had turned aside to see, God called to him out of the bush, “Moses, Moses!” And he said, “Here I am.” 5 Then he said, “Come no closer! Remove the sandals from your feet, for the place on which you are standing is holy ground.” 6 He said further, “I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.” And Moses hid his face, for he was afraid to look at God.
13 But Moses said to God, “If I come to the Israelites and say to them, ‘The God of your ancestors has sent me to you,’ and they ask me, ‘What is his name?’ what shall I say to them?” 14 God said to Moses, “I am who I am.”[a] He said further, “Thus you shall say to the Israelites, ‘I am has sent me to you.’” 15 God also said to Moses, “Thus you shall say to the Israelites, ‘The Lord,[b] the God of your ancestors, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, has sent me to you’:
This is my name forever, and this my title for all generations.
16 Go and assemble the elders of Israel, and say to them, ‘The Lord, the God of your ancestors, the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob, has appeared to me, saying: I have given heed to you and to what has been done to you in Egypt.
Introduction: Each year as Trinity Sunday arrives, I am transported back to the first Trinity Sunday in my first call in First Presbyterian Church, Mt. Sterling, KY.
I had my sermon rolling early in the week. I’d been waiting all my life to preach Trinity sunday, not really, but I had been hitting each liturgical day in the calendar with the zeal and gusto only a newly minted preacher could summon. Looking back, I marvel at how that congregation put up with me!
I could not wait to preach on the Trinity. The sermon was mostly done by Wednesday or so (another thing I can hardly imagine these days).
then, an horrific event took place. the nephew of one of the members, who was also the grandson of the member’s mother, who attend frequently - this young man woke up, took a gun and killed his mother, his father, his two younger sisters, then went to his high school and held a classroom hostage until an assistant principal talked him into giving himself up to the authorities.
Although it took place in a community a couple of hours away, the shock wave reverberated throughout our community.
the funeral was going to be Trinity Sunday afternoon at a Methodist church a couple of hours away with the graveside taking place back over at the family burial plot a few miles from the church i served.
I knew the tragedy would hang over the worship service that Sunday morning. I also knew that several of us would be leaving immediately following worship to drive over to the funeral before returning for the graveside. I would be driving over and back with some of their extended family.
I revamped the service with all the emotions and questions in mind.
What to do about the sermon? I decided a sermon on a theological concept like the Trinity would seem out of touch and inaccessible to a congregation hurting and questioning in the face of this tragedy.
so off I went to redo the sermon - take out theology, put in pastoral care; take out three-in-one, put in the some word of comfort.
As I read through the sermon on the Trinity, I realized that if I thought the concept of Trinity was only a theological concept, then I did not understand the point of a trinitarian God.
The Trinitarian God we discover in the three persons of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, is exactly the God we need to know when tragedy confronts us, or uncertainty overwhelms us, or we struggle to make sense of your lives.
Reflect on how our Trinitarian God meets us.
move 1: First, a comment on how God comes to us as a mystery
a. We join Moses at the burning bush.
1. Moses wants to know God’s name in case when he tells everyone what God wants them to do someone asks, “Who is this god anyway? What’s this God’s name?”
Maybe Moses is also stalling a bit to avoid doing what God is asking him to do.
2. We want to know God’s name because we are rational people who deal with facts. We want to be able to say “1+1+1=3,” not “1+1+1=1”
Maybe we also get sidetracked by defining God and understanding God as a way to avoid accepting who we discover God is.
b. God answers Moses from the burning bush: “i am who I am,” or “I will be who I will be.”
1. A mysterious answer, yes, but an answer that points us to the far-reaching, hard to imagine ways in which God will find us.
2. We think we want concrete answers to fully know everything about God.
3. But the truth is any god who can be fully known by us in our finite humanity is not god enough to handle the next great tragedy we encounter, or to cry with us, or to help us reach for those dreams that begin as endless possibilities.
4. We need the God who spoke to Moses in the burning bush because our complex lives and world need the God who is ever ready to meet us in new ways we have yet to imagine.
c. To describe our Trinitarian God as a mystery we cannot fully understand, however, does not mean we do not know God’s desire to love us, to find us, to join with us, to save us, to transform us.
how we discover God’s desire forms the basis for what we know as our Trinitarian God.
Move 2: God’s desire to love is first seen in God the Father.
a. On Father’s Day, this image has some focus for us.
1. Think of all the good things about fathers, and you begin to see a glimpse of how we view God the father.
2. Think about the intimate relationship a father might have with his children, and you see the intimacy of the relationship God desires to have with us.
b. But do not stop at that first glance - look deeper to be reminded of God the Father who is more than father.
1. God, the creator, who acted out of love to create.
2. dial up the image of God who breathes the breath (the Hebrew word for breath can also be translated as spirit) of life into us thereby calling us into being.
3. All that we are, we owe to God.
4. when we do not know what to do or where to go, like a child who turns to his mother or father for guidance, we turn back to the one who created us, the one who has invested God’s try own breath into us.
Move 2: We also meet God the the Son, the one we know as Jesus Christ.
a. In Christ, we discover that when God answers Moses’ question with “i will be who I will be,” it means that God will take on human flesh and move among the world with compassion to heal the sick, with love to reach out to the children, the outcasts, the hopeless, the scared, the poor, and the wealthy with no regard for their position in life.
1. Like a mother who puts her arm around us as we walk to car after a game, comforting us if we lost and celebrating with us in the win…
Like a father, who joins with us as we shed a tear and share the fear we feel as we look to the future….
So God chooses to live among us, to join us, to walk alongside us in our human endeavors.
2. We often speak of Jesus in terms of his saving act on the cross, but do not ignore that Jesus is the embodiment of God’s desire to walk with us through our triumphs and trials.
b. In Jesus, we discover the one who willingly submits to a sinless death on the cross and is raised from the dead to free us from sin and death.
1. the pain we bear in life life’s struggles is not a pain unknown to God, but a pain embraced by Christ.
2. We have to look no farther than the cross to see the power and humility of God’s embrace.
3. An embrace so broad and so grand it envelops all of us.
c. Christ also is the one who calls us to follow him.
1. to follow him into the world to join him in ministering to the world.
2. To follow him into the waters of baptism, where we are united with him in both his death and resurrection, thereby giving us our greatest hope in life and in death.
c. Perhaps there is not greater image of how God accompanies us in Christ Jesus than in the story Jesus himself tells about the shepherd who has lost one sheep.
1. Most of us would be satisfied with a 99% save rate.
2. But not the shepherd Jesus describes. That shepherd leaves the 99 and goes out to find the one lost sheep.
3. That shepherd is Jesus. God in flesh who comes to find and save all of us.
move 4: The God whom we meet as the Holy Spirit.
a. Who among does not want to leave she security for our kids and grandkids - maybe a trust fund; some kind of gift that could ensure our children no matter what the future might bring.
1. Jesus promises the Holy Spirit, the Comforter, the interpreter of Scripture, and lots of other things.
2. In the holy Spirit we discover God’s desire to be with us in new ways.
3. God’s creative sprit that pulls us, pushes us, supports us to grow into the new person God calls us to be.
b. God’s answer “i will be who I will be” is not a riddle, but a promise - a promise of steadfast faithfulness; a promise to never forsake us.
1. A promise lived out by the Holy Spirit.
2. The world changes; the demands on God’s people change.
3. So the Holy Spirit moves among us, providing us the gifts needs to meet those demands, to minister in new ways in our ever-changing world.
4. God’s desire to love and save remains the same, but by the power of the Holy Spirit we discover new expressions of that desire.
Conclusion: David Lose, former Biblical Preaching Chair at Luther Seminary, puts it bluntly:“Here's my rule-of-thumb regarding the Trinity: People who say they understand it aren't to be trusted.”
I promise you can trust me because I do not fully understand God in three persons as a rational argument.
But I can tell you about the God who so desires to love you, who so desires to save you, who so desires to be with you no matter where you are or what challenge you might have, that this God meets you as three persons: God the father, who created you; God the Son, who redeems and saves you; and God, the Holy Spirit who is present with you even now. Amen.
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