Holy Trinity Sunday
Genesis 1:1-2:4
Psalm 8
2 Corinthians 13:11-13
Matthew 28:16-20

Dear fellow ministers of the gospel of Jesus Christ, 
grace and peace to you from the community of God. Amen
 
Today is Holy Trinity Sunday, 
it’s an odd little festival
 that is crammed in between Pentecost 
and the long stretch of ordinary time 
that takes us to the end of the Church year
 
 it’s odd because it is the only festival 
that is dedicated to a doctrine or teaching of the church,
 you see, the doctrine of the trinity,
 the idea that God is one in three, three in one
 doesn’t appear explicitly in the Bible.
 
 We do hear the trinitarian formula
 at the end of the gospel of Matthew, 
we heard that just a moment ago, 
but as a description rather than a teaching. 
 
because while the math doesn’t work 
and the concept is confusing, 
how can God be one and three at the same time? 
In the end we have found that the trinity 
is the best description we can come up with
 for our experience of God. 
 
We have experienced and believe in God the creator, 
the one who, as we heard in our first reading 
created the heavens and the earth, 
 
and we have experienced Jesus 
who in the beginning was the Word
 and the Word was with God and the word was God.
 Jesus who told his disciples 
that in seeing him they had seen the one who sent him, 
who rose from the dead 
 
and we have experienced the Holy Spirit, 
the wind that swept over the waters at creation, 
who descended upon Jesus at his baptism in the form of a dove,
 the advocate who Jesus promised to send 
who with a rush of wind 
blew the disciples out into the streets
 with tongues of fire above their head
 and all the languages of the world 
coming from their mouths, 
 
We have experienced all three 
and yet we believe that to experience each of these members of the trinity
 is to fully experience one God, 
the God of Abraham and Jacob, 
the God of Moses who led the people out of slavery in Egypt to freedom in the promised land, the God who sent his son to once and for all redeem the world, 
who promises to be with us to the end of the age.
 
Our one God is a community within Godself. 
The various experiences of God 
working together to become the full expression of God.
 and yes how exactly that happens is a holy mystery, 
when we try to explain every single aspect 
we invariably get into trouble 
because our explanations fall short of reality
 but we know what we have experienced, 
our God is communal. 
 
Last week we talked about the beginning of the church
 and how it is like a body, one body many members, 
and the one body needs a diversity of parts to create the whole. 
This week we discover that in a way 
the same thing is true for God, 
that even God needs diversity within unity to be whole.
 
 So what does this mean?
(Remember our Pentecost question?) 
 
What the trinity means for us
 is that diversity is essential to existence, 
even the existence of God. 
 
The way God created the world 
means that we need a diversity of people
 to be whole as humanity. 
We need people that look different 
and think and move and communicate differently, 
variety is a strength 
and we will never be whole
while some differences are valued higher than others,
 while some differences hold more power than others. 
 
Until that is acknowledged
 there will always be something missing in the experience of humanity. 
That’s the march toward justice that we have seen break out, 
the acknowledgment of pain of division and the desire to be whole.
 
What the trinity means
 is that the lie of individuality is exposed, 
our wellbeing is inextricably linked to the wellbeing of all 
and when one person or group is hurting, we hurt too. 
 
The same applies to our faith, 
our faith is communal, 
it grows and flourishes when in relationship with God and others,
 and this is so because our God is a communal God.
 
What the trinity means
 is that we are to set aside our own advantages and privileges 
In our quest for the wellbeing of all
because we have a God who set aside the privileges of being God,
 but took on flesh, and in the words of the Christ hymn from Philippians:
6who, though he was in the form of God,
 did not regard equality with God
 as something to be exploited,
 7but emptied himself,
 taking the form of a slave,
 being born in human likeness.
 And being found in human form,
 8he humbled himself
 and became obedient to the point of death --
 even death on a cross.
 9Therefore God also highly exalted him
 and gave him the name
 that is above every name,
 10so that at the name of Jesus
 every knee should bend,
 in heaven and on earth and under the earth,
 11and every tongue should confess
 that Jesus Christ is Lord,
 to the glory of God the Father.
 
What the trinity means
 is that we have a God who works in the world through us. 
We heard in our gospel Jesus’ last words to the disciples his last command:
 
“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, and teaching them to obey everything that I have commanded you.”
 
God comes into our lives and claims us 
through the community of God, 
the parents that bring the child to the font, 
the sponsors and Sunday school teachers and classmates,
 the people who gather together linked by their own baptisms.
 
What the trinity means 
is that joined to God in baptism 
we are never done learning, 
the baptismal journey
 is one whose whole length 
is spent learning to obey the commands of God, 
all summed up in the greatest commandment,
 love the lord your god with all your heart and soul and strength and your neighbor as yourself. 
 
And yes because we are always learning and growing 
we will make mistakes along the way,
 and when we do, 
when we acknowledge our sins and repent,
 we are forgiven and freed to continue to learn and grow
 
What the trinity means 
is that in community with one another and God 
we are never alone, 
Jesus’ last words before he ascended were a promise: 
“And remember, I am with you always to the end of the age.”  
 
God the creator is with us always 
in the diversity of creation that God made and called good. 
 
Jesus the Son is with us always
 in the Church, the body of Christ on earth, 
 
The Holy Spirit is with us always, 
blowing through our lives, 
calling, gathering, enlightening and sending us in the world. 
 
Three experiences, 
one God, 
with us forever. Amen.
 

Pentecost
Acts 2:1-21
Psalm 104:24-35b
1 Corinthians 12:3-13
John 20:19-23

Dear fellow ministers of the gospel of Jesus Christ, 
grace and peace to you 
from the one who blows new life into our lives. Amen
 
It’s pentecost! The festival fifty days after Easter 
when we celebrate the gift of the Holy Spirit 
and the start of the church. 
 
Each year I’m reminded of a song from my children’s choir days
- Mom you know exactly which one I’m talking about, 
and yes my mom watches the worship videos online- 
this pandemic has created avid youtubers out of moms of pastors all across the nation- 
anyway the song went a little something like this:
 
Pentecost is happy birthday
Happy birthday to the church
When every single doubting Thomas
Comes alive with Jesus’ promise
That he would not leave them
In the lurch.
 
Now with the exception of the fact
that the song continues to smear the disciple Thomas’ character 
for the sake of a rhyme 
it’s a pretty good basic interpretation of the day. 
 
We heard last week
 how Jesus promised the disciples 
the gift of the holy spirit 
and commanded them to take his message to the ends of the earth 
before ascending to the right hand of the father 
 
and we just heard in our reading from acts, 
how the spirit blew the disciples out into the streets, 
each speaking in a different language 
so that the people assembled from the ends of the earth
 could understand their message 
 
and later though it wasn’t part of our reading,
 we are told about 3,000 people are baptized and join the disciples 
and it is exciting and a great celebration 
but it’s one that comes as the culmination of a long time of waiting and uncertainty.

We’re intimately familiar with those dual feelings aren’t we?
 uncertainty coupled with waiting
 and even if we are trusting in the promise of God to bring new life 
 it can be really hard to wait,
 we get impatient,
 
 or we imagine what the future will look like 
which invariably ends up being unrealistic, 
because we always imagine ourselves in the role of the hero,
 we anticipate and hope that when our wait is over 
and the spirit is on the move 
that we will be like the disciples stepping forward to face the crowds
 but the reality is that often when the Holy Spirit blows in new life,
 it looks nothing like what we imagined 
and in turn we are act more like the crowds than the disciples
 
Act tells us that the crowds
 gathered by the commotion the disciples are making
 are first astonished to hear the disciples 
whose accents betray them as Galileans, 
speaking in their own languages 
and then they have one of two reactions
 
some in the crowd react with curiosity,
 asking “What does this mean? But others sneered and said, "They are filled with new wine." Their response is to immediately dismiss what is happening 
using the least generous possibility as an explanation,
 
 and while it is amusing to hear Peter protest 
that the disciples are not drunk because it is only 9am
 think about how the disciples felt, 
here they are receiving the long awaited gift from God, 
and some immediately dismiss them because they are disturbed.
 
That’s the thing about the Holy Spirit, 
as new and exciting as it is, the new life it brings
 is coupled with the potential for destruction,
the potential exists even in the way the arrival of the spirit is described, 
with a sound like the rush of a violent wind,
 and as tongues of fire, 
out here we know the power of wind 
and what it can do to trees and structures that seem strong in one moment 
and in the next are torn apart. 
Fire, used for cooking and heating,
 is always only one spark away from destruction.
We also know that giving birth
Even in the best of circumstances,
 is painful and dangerous and full of uncertainty
Until the first breath is taken and even after.
 
When we are faced with the arrival of the Holy Spirit,
 New life and all the comes with it to bring it into the world
we are faced with two options:
 to dismiss the strange things before us 
with pat explanations that demean those through whom the spirit is working, 
 
or we can approach with curiosity,
 to ask the question: What does this mean? 
To take the time to listen to the ones who like Peter 
stand up and offer an explanation,
 to explore what others have experienced leading up to this moment 
That makes new life necessary
 to seek out those who have visions and dreams for the future, 
those who can help us imagine ourselves in that future, 
those whose faith remains unshaken even as we are unsure.
 
In short, faced with the work of the holy spirit 
we need the help of the gifts of the spirit
 that Paul describes in our reading from 1 Corinthians, 
gifts that the spirit has distributed as she sees fit 
and never all in one person, 
 
when we need the gifts of the spirit
 we need the community. 
We need the people who are wise,
 and the ones that are knowledgeable, 
we need the ones that get things done, 
and the ones who are good at figuring out what we need to do,
 
 we need those who prophesy 
and those who translate that prophesy into a vision for the future. 
“All these are activated by one and the same Spirit, who allots to each one individually just as the Spirit chooses. For just as the body is one and has many members, and all the members of the body, though many, are one body, so it is with Christ. For in the one Spirit we were all baptized into one body- Jews or Greeks, slaves or free- and we were all made to drink of one spirit.”
 
We are united in the spirit 
but Unity in the spirit doesn’t erase our individual identities,
 in fact we need people to be different 
so that we all can be whole
 
 Paul continuing with his body analogy later says “If the whole body were an eye, where would the hearing be? If the whole body were hearing, where would the sense of smell be? But as it is, God arranged the members in the body, each one of them, as he chose. If all were a single member, where would the body be? As it is, there are many members, yet one body.” 
and what keeps a whole body alive?
 Breath, the spirit.
 
The common theme running through the major upheavals in our world right now 
is lack of breath, 
COVID19 is a sickness of the lungs,
 the people who die are those whose lungs are so compromised 
that they are no longer able to breathe. 
 
George Floyd could not breathe,
 his airway cut off by another person
 and he is not the first to have uttered those words 
in a similar circumstance. 
 
Those seeking new life for other
Have their breath taken from them
By those who want things to stay the same.
 
Our world needs breath, 
needs the spirit,
 even as we are made aware
 that we are members of a community,
 that our health and wellbeing 
are tied up in the health and well being of our neighbors, 
the ones next door, 
across the country, 
and around the world.
 
The world needs the spirit, 
and I believe that the spirit is at work, 
bringing new life, 
even, especially if it is life like we haven’t imagined,
 
 and the work of the spirit, 
like a strong wind,
 will be unsettling, 
even for those of us who long for the new life that the spirit brings. 
And when faced with the work of the Holy Spirit, 
we have two options: curiosity or dismissiveness.
 
We can dismiss the need 
for finding new ways for common life 
that enable the health of all, 
we can dismiss the protests 
using whatever pat explanation comes to mind.
 
Or we can ask:
 What does this mean? 
And listen with an open heart and an open mind
 to those, who like Peter, 
have the gifts of the spirit 
that allow them to explain the long history leading up to this point, 
who show us why this is a moment 
that should not be dismissed but paid attention to. 
 
And it may be hard to hear
 what the Peters in our midst have to say, 
and at each point when we feel discomfort, 
a sign that the spirit is working by the way, 
we once again have two options: 
we can dismiss it 
or we can ask what does this mean? 
And move further down the path toward new life 
 
and as we go down this path,
 we will never be alone 
 
because we have been given the gift of the spirit 
who is as close to us as the breath in our lungs, 
who is there to unsettle us when we need to be unsettled 
and to comfort us when we need to be comforted 
 who activates in each of us gifts, 
who works in our lives through the gifts others share 
who gathers us together in community to wonder together: what does this mean? 
If you are feeling the moving of the spirit, 
If you ever want someone to wonder with 
and ask the hard questions,
 know that I am available to wonder and question with you, 
because this is something that we don’t do alone 
and if we can’t ask the hard questions in the church, 
where can we ask them?
 
Pentecost is happy birthday
Happy birthday to the church.
 
What does this mean?
 It means the start of something new, 
something unsettling and comforting at the same time, 
it means God is with us 
and God is sending us. 
It means Jesus keeps his promises. Amen