I remember being taught as a child that love was the reason God moved in creative action. The narrative of the creation of humans in Genesis 1 saws that we were created in the queer, non-binary, plural identity of God. We were created in the diverse likeness of God. We all carry God’s inherent diversity and propensity to be in relationship. The inherent diversity and propensity to relationship of the divine is the best way for Christians to explain our very strange understanding of God.
As Christians, our proclamation of God is that God is one, and that this single God is the only true God. That places us among religious traditions that profess a monotheistic proclamation of God. Judaism and Islam are sister monotheistic traditions with whom we also share the historical and scriptural witness of Abraham as proto-parent of our faith traditions. Theologically, this shared parental origin also connects us to a shared affirmation of God’s identity – God is all-powerful, all-knowing, and present everywhere.
The God issue gets complicated when we introduce a mystery. When speaking about faith and theology, a mystery is something we have accepted to be so without having a rational explanation. And as one that has had the privilege and opportunity to, both, lead the practice of the faith and study the theology behind our witness, I can say without hesitation and in good conscious that our understanding of God as one in three persons is, both, an essential tenant of our faith and one of our deepest mysteries. God is distinctly and at once Creator, Redeemer, and Sustainer. God is distinctly and at once Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. There are two millennia’ worth of pastoral and theological reflection about this way in which we understand God’s reality, its relationship to itself, and its relationship to the created order. And it remains a mystery that is core to our faith.
The gospel lesson of John 16:12-15 provides us with a rare scriptural occasion of the presence of the three divine persons. And in the unique tongue-twisting way in which John writes his gospel, the evangelist places in Jesus words of encouragement and admonishment something that was essential - to the congregation John was writing to in the latter part of the 1st century, and for us in the 21st century as we continue to figure out how to be better and effective witness of the complex and profoundly relational good news of Jesus:
“I still have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now. When the Spirit of truth comes, it will guide you into all the truth; for the Spirit will not speak on its own, but will speak whatever it hears, and the Spirit will declare to you the things that are to come. The Spirit will glorify me, because it will take what is mine and declare it to you. All that the Father has is mine. For this reason I said that the Spirit will take what is mine and declare it to you.”
The challenge we have before us is, I believe, two-fold and interrelated. The first is what it will take to make the daily decision to embrace this mystery as core to our faith, and how we prepare daily for our witnessing of the faith. You see, even when we cannot explain the mystery of the Holy Trinity in a rational way – and we have been trying to for the good part of 2,000 years – this mystery is central to our understanding of community, diversity, and belonging.
Think about it, if God from the beginning of everything has been one in three persons – coexisting, sharing one being, cocreating, co-redeeming, and co-sustaining even when we speak of each divine person individually when speaking of these divine actions – then God has always been community in its diversity, and have belonged with, of and for each other from the beginning. One of the persons of that God came to be among us to build community with us and among ourselves. That is what we call redemption and reconciliation. Community, diversity, and belonging are core to who God is, how God engages with us, and how God expects we will embrace our belief and witness of God.
The human impetus is to explain, to rationalize, to articulate deeply and broadly that which we cannot understand. Theology and science are about the pursuit of understanding. Yet, seeking understanding for its own sake is futile. God’s creative intentions are not about knowledge alone. God is first and foremost about love.
In a commentary about John 16:12-15, Dr. Carlos Cardoza Orlandi, professor of world Christianity at Baylor University, says that,
“for a long time we have associated truth of the gospel with rational discourse, with an unquestionable argument, with absolute persuasion. This is the old, modern formula of equating faith, truth, and knowledge. Not a few people think that understanding the how of the mystery is the same as living the mystery... It is a mystery to explain how the substance makes the three persons one. It is not a mystery, though challenging, to live in the unity that the Trinity has. However, to live continually seeking the unity of the people of God with the Triune God is to discover the truth of the Spirit.”
How do we do this, you may ask. We will do this by committing to continually seek that unity of the people of God with the Triune God. And know that we will be able to pursue this commitment because we are empowered by God. Wisdom is a divine gift. Joy is a divine gift. Kindness is a divine gift. Faithfulness is a divine gift. Love is a divine gift. We have been created in the image and likeness of God. We got this because God calls us continually to be in community with the divine and with each other.
Amen.