Sermon Holy Trinity Sunday 2012

Text: John 3:1-17

Grace and Peace to you from God our Father, our Lord Jesus Christ, and the Holy Spirit our Three in One God who fills our every moment allowing us to trust.

            I think Nicodemus is one of the most interesting people in the New Testament. He is not one of the disciples, or apostles, but he has his own story line, and seems to be one of the few people outside of those disciples or apostles who actually seems to change from when we first meet them. Our story before us today is the first time we meet Nicodemus. Nicodemus is a Pharisee, a group who are the main opponents of Jesus and the ones most set on Jesus’ death. Here he comes to Jesus at night, whether it’s to hide that he is coming to Jesus perhaps or showing confusion, night is a place of confusion and doubt in John, or whether it’s some combination of the two, we don’t really know. The two of them talk and discuss and Nicodemus goes on his way.

            Nicodemus’ story does not stop here though, he shows up two more times, one time defending some troops who the chief priests had wanted to arrest Jesus for no reason. When they responded that they could not with no reason the chief priests were upset, to this Nicodemus asks, “Our law does not judge people without first giving them a hearing to find out what they are doing, does it?” And finally he appears at the very end of John’s Gospel alongside Joseph of Arimathea. At this point after Jesus’ death it is Joseph and Nicodemus that together take Jesus down from the cross, anoint him with oil and spices, wrap him and place him in the tomb.

            Nicodemus starts as this figure who cannot be seen with Jesus out in the open, only showing up by night, and changes to one who is present at the most intimate of moments caring for Jesus’ body after death. Nicodemus seems to have made a complete shift. He has truly understood what it means to trust God. The theme of our VBS this last week was No Matter What… Trust God!!!!!  Can I get the kids to help their parents do that a little better?  No matter who you are…  Trust God!!!!!

            Nicodemus has understood what that truly means. No matter how you feel, trust God! No matter what people do, Trust God! No matter where you are, trust God!

            But why?  It’s a question that sort of ran in the back of my head the whole week. Why do we trust God? I wonder if that’s part of why Nicodemus showed up at night, he was unsure of why he should trust this teacher who has done so much.

            The answer is found looking at the feast day we celebrate today. We find ourselves on Holy Trinity Sunday, the first Sunday in the Season after Pentecost, often called the time of the church.

            Holy Trinity Sunday focuses on God as three in one. The Triune God: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, all distinct, but the same. We try to use metaphor to describe it, I’ve heard water, where water can be Solid, Liquid, and Vapor but all three are still water. I’ve seen the use of a three legged stool, where you need all three legs to make the stool, two metaphors that I really like that go all the way back to the first centuries and the early Church writers Gregory, Basil, and Augustine. God as light, God the father as the light source, God the Son as the actual light that illumines, and God the Spirit as the warmth you feel from the light, or God as love, The Father the Lover, the Son the Beloved, and the Spirit the love shared between the two.

            But, to get to the answer to our question of why do we trust God we need to move away from the academic work of trying to figure out how the Trinity works, to looking at what the Trinity means, and why the Trinity matters.

            Three in one means that God is by nature relational, and we are drawn into that relationship by the God who loves us, the God who came to us, the God who continues to blow and swirl among us. It’s the reason we are leaving our Pentecost flame up, to remind us of the Spirit’s presence, God’s presence.

David Lose, Professor at Luther Seminary says - Perhaps the best way to approach the Trinity is to think of it backwards. It is through the power of the Spirit that we can receive Jesus as God’s surprising and unexpected messiah who reveals to us the gracious and loving nature of the Father.

We trust God because the Spirit allows us to understand that the Son came into the world for us, showing how much the Father loves this broken, confused world.

John 3:14-17: And just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, ¹⁵that whoever believes in him may have eternal life. ¹⁶“For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life. ¹⁷“Indeed, God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.

The season after Pentecost is often called the Time of the Church. And it’s tempting to say that means we are out on our own, and we don’t need to trust God, but to trust our own work and effort, that it’s time for us to go our own way. It’s that attitude and understanding that makes me really glad that we start the time of the church with Holy Trinity Sunday that focuses so much on our relational God.

Because I’m terrified to be out and about in the world on my own. I know who I am, I screw things up, I condemn people, I put them down, I label others, I hurt others by mistake and on purpose. We think wrong thoughts about people, we try to make God in my image. We make God to be who we want God to be. We do this; on our own we head straight for problems and concerns.

That’s why I love Nicodemus because he tells me to put aside my fears and trepidations and trust God. Despite who he was and what sorts of trouble he could have gotten in, he till comes to Jesus, and to his fears, to our fears, and Christ speaks his and our answer to Nicodemus. “For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son.”

The Father sent the Son to the world, and the Son sent the Spirit to the world, a world that even though we love darkness, and even though on our own we rebel against God, God still loves.

A world that seems to fear that it is on it’s own, afraid to take a step, but we are completely surrounded by the love of the Triune God. Loved by the Father, joined by the Son, supported and filled by the Spirit. The Time of the Church is not a time on our own, but one where we walk in relationship, surrounded each step of our journey by the love and grace of our Three in One God. That’s why we trust.

Let us pray,

Triune Relational God, help us to be in relationship like you are in relationship. Help us to know your love and grace. Help us to know that we don’t walk alone, but that you surround us and walk with our every step.

Amen.