June 12, 2022 – Trinity Sunday Text: John 8:48-59
Dear Friends in Christ,
Science fiction is a genre that is quite popular. It has been pointed out by Orson Scott Card, a science fiction writer himself, that most of the heroes in the books and movies are mostly individuals, out doing their thing by themselves. They seldom have family or friends. There is no spouse or children, parent or childhood buddy.
Something we knew before the pandemic has know become a mini-crisis in our world. Men and women are not meant to be alone and isolated. It has especially affected the older and younger generations. The science fiction hero is to be the rugged individual but what is seen on the big screen only goes so far.
This Trinity Sunday morning let’s look in on the dialogue between Jesus and the unbelieving Jews. It will help us see . . .
“THE TRINITY OF GOD MAKES US ‘WE’ NOT ‘ME’ WITH HIM”
We love the me generation and being our own person. Believe me, we all talk like this quite often. Look at marriage today. Sixty years ago, half of 21-year-olds were married. Three years ago that percentage was down to 8%. Today even lower.
Or take the words we use like sheeple. We blend people and sheep for the definition of a docile person just going with the flow. The Washington Post wrote, “The cancel culture is often stoked by sheeples with no interest in drilling down to the truths.” How true. Look at the mob mentality in our age. People follow blindly without knowing what they are following.
We is better than Me. English writer John Donne wrote the famous poem with these lines: “No man is an island…every man is a piece of the continent…Any man’s death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind, and therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee.” When one man dies, is reminds all of us that mankind is dying. “The wages of sin is death.” (Rom. 6:23)
God is not a Me. Our Holy Lord is not about sinful individualism. He is not disconnected from us even though we speak of God as Him, He, The One. We think this way and then we get to Trinity Sunday and like a three-leaf clover we squish our one God into Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. What did our Lord do in the Garden of Eden? He created humanity male and female. One, yet two. He did the same in marriage, the two become one. (Gen. 2:24) God knew that it was not good for man to be alone. He had to have someone to fight with over the remote!
God is a We. The Father begets a Son through whom comes the Spirit. The Jews could not grasp this concept because they couldn’t let go of their ideas about God. How could Jesus know the Father? It didn’t make sense to them. They heard blasphemy when Jesus said, “I am.” In a mysterious wonder, our Lord is in fact three persons in one divine substance. In Jesus, we see God for who He is, just as Abraham got to witness during his time.
Abraham believed, because he believed in what God saying. Think of the things in his life where he had to trust God. Being a father as a senior citizen. Rescuing Lot. Having to watch the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah. Asking to sacrifice his son Isaac. The promise God made him about his descendants. Abraham was no island. He was a We with God. The Lord led his life and Abraham followed.
The devil would like us disconnected, kept apart. He wants us to be believe that to be alone is to be like God. He whispers to us that we can do what we want, it is not affecting anyone else. We have personal choice and freedom, and you can’t tell me any different.
Jesus wants us together as He and the Father and Holy Spirit are together. Verse 55, “But you have not known him. I know him. If I were to say that I do not know him, I would be a liar like you, but I do know him and keep his word.” God sent Jesus into the world to forgive us. He takes our “I am an island” and “my choice” and “you can’t tell what to do” and He lays it on a cross so that you and I can be free. The Holy Spirit breathes out into us the Christian life that we lead. By the power of the Spirit, we keep the Father’s Word, Jesus, in us. This is what it means to have everlasting life and “if anyone keeps my word, he will never taste death.” We may try to live our aloneness but the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit pierce our hearts, enliven our faith and make us One with them.
Here is how it works. I like my alone time. More and more as the world gets rougher and rougher to live in. But the Lord says, “Lueck, I need your witness.” So I go out in public to a ball game, a public trolley in Savannah, the grocery store. I am placed into situations where God’s name is used in vain or other profanities used. I am compelled to speak up. The reaction is usually not positive. Here is the interesting part. Over the years not one other person has said anything. I feel like an island, but I’m not because I am doing what my Lord and Savior wants me to do. The Lord uses me to help change a corner of the world. I don’t speak for myself, I speak for We, my kids and grandkids. I speak for our faith. I speak for Jesus.
What about you? Is it going to be Me or We. The Lord must change the hearts and the behavior. The Trinity of God is a unity. They do not stand alone. We honor them by keeping their Word. Abraham knew God not as a ‘He’ but as a ‘We.’ Now we do as well, through the Word of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Amen.