Rev. Susan Gilbert Zencka
Frame Memorial Presbyterian Church

Texts: Psalm 8; Genesis 1:1-2:4a

Today is Trinity Sunday – it is the Sunday that the Church decides to grapple with the doctrine of the Trinity, as we do each year on the Sunday after Pentecost. It is appropriate to focus on Christian Education on such a Sunday, because one of the goals of Christian Education is to prepare people for the kind of theological reflection that is involved in thinking about trinity.

Trinity is the theological understanding of God as three-in-one. In traditional language, we describe these as the three persons of God: Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Sometimes, to get away from that traditional language, we say things like Creator, Redeemer, Sustainer. And the theology around the Trinity sometimes bothers us, and often confuses us – but today I’d like to look at how it could actually impact us – I’d like to look at how our theology could connect with our faith and practice.

Despite all of the sermons, and children’s sermons, that try to simplify and explain the Trinity using one analogy or another: water/steam/ice, apple tree as trunk/leaf/apple, etc. etc., most people still find explaining the Trinity somewhat complex. During the Confirmation class, when we discussed it, the model that seemed the most helpful to the kids in the class was Augustine’s description of God as the One who Loves, Jesus as the Beloved, and the Holy Spirit as the Love that flows between them. Lover-Beloved-Love. I think my understanding is probably best simplified as: God is the Transcendent Being who creates and who is both beyond and within all creation; Jesus is fully God and fully human, revealing God to us in the way we can most easily understand; the Holy Spirit is the way we experience God ourselves – the nudges, ideas, feelings that reveal God to us now. And for me, the most important theological dimension of Trinity is the understanding that God-in-Godself is a community, a relationality, and so being relational is not only an integral dimension of God, but also of humanity. People have sometimes said, “You can’t be a Christian on your own”, underscoring the importance of relationships to the practice of Christianity – but I think that understanding God as Trinity teaches us that you can’t even be human on your own. Being human in the image of God means that relationships are integral to humanity.

So that’s the short version of Trinitarian theology for me, with the caveat that like God in general, our understanding is limited, and must include the dimension of mystery – we can’t dissect and fully analyze God: understanding, like God, lies both within and beyond us.

But I found it fascinating, as I approached preaching this week, that the lectionary provided such creation-oriented readings for Trinity Sunday. We normally associate “Creator” with “God the Father” but using these readings for Trinity Sunday suggests that Creator is a role associated with both Jesus and the Holy Spirit as well. And I am reminded of the opening verses of the Gospel of John, where Jesus is called “the Word” and we hear:  “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.  He was in the beginning with God.  All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being. What has come into being in him was life, and the life was the light of all people.”

And I am also reminded that one of the objections among theologians to describing the trinity as “Creator, Redeemer, Sustainer” is that these roles are not person-specific: that the God who creates also redeems and sustains, and that Jesus who redeems also creates and sustains, and that the Spirit who sustains is also creative and redemptive. Each of the persons of God has all of the attributes of God. So how do we understand Jesus and the Spirit as creative?

Or, more pertinent, perhaps, to our own practice of faith: if we use Augustine’s formulation of Lover, Beloved, and Love, and adapt it for ourselves as Giving, Receiving, and the Love that flows is given and received, how can we bring these attributes into our own faith practice AND how can we do so creatively?

Because there are a couple of reminders from the story of Creation that should be important for us – and one is that creativity is not only a dimension each of Father-Son-Spirit, but is also part of who we are as creatures-made-in-the-image-of-the-Creator. We are created to share in the ongoing task of creation.

And that creation is ongoing is another important reminder. An alternate translation of the opening verse of Genesis is When God began creating the heavens and the earth…. Or as the faith statement shared at last week’s Presbytery meeting by a minister opened: I believe that God is creating the Universe, and everything in it, including humanity. Is creating. Creation is an ongoing activity of God.

And when we understand (1) that we-in-God’s-image are creative, (2) that creation is ongoing, and (3) that we are stewards within God’s creation, charged with the responsibility of caring for creation – we begin to see that discipleship isn’t some kind of rote rule-following, but is instead the creative, ongoing, challenge of entering into God’s love for creation, as creatures who are both Beloved, and Lovers ourselves. How is our own discipleship an exercise in creativity?

Remembering that in our own being we are givers, receivers, and the love that flows in the world…how can we be creative givers? I think we are challenged somehow be creative in how we give – thinking outside the box, and giving not only our money but ourselves, as God gives to us. After all, God gives us all of creation – God’s stuff – and God also gives us God’s self: coming among us as Jesus, and continuing to be among us as the Holy Spirit. So how can we give our stuff creatively? First of all, our giving should be life-giving…as it generally is. We give food, we give the means to grow food, and so we give hope. We give on several levels – as Presbyterians, some of our most important giving comes through One Great Hour of Sharing, which is divided among disaster relief, hunger programs, and self-development of people giving. The latter programs are programs that give people the means to care for themselves, so that they are not in a continuing relationship of dependence, but are empowered to care for themselves and others. This concept of giving is why so many of us like programs such as the Heifer Project, where the recipients of animals also are required to pass along some of the animals’ offspring to others, passing along the gift. This is exactly how we should receive from God – we receive love and care from God, and we become givers also, loving and caring for others.

It seems obvious, then, that giving as a creative, life-affirming act means we will give plowshares instead of swords. We give gifts that give life. When we reflect on how our faith can shape our involvement and thinking about national policy issues, I would challenge us all to think about whether we really believe God could support the policies that we support. Are there weapons systems that we really, sincerely, believe that God would want us to use the good gifts of God’s creation to build and ship? Do we really believe that God is disinterested in these matters? When we say that providing health care to all people is too complex, isn’t it a way of walking away from embracing our call to help heal the sick? Yes, all of these issues are complex, but that’s why God gave us such capable minds – to help solve hard problems. Let’s take seriously the challenge to be creative as we are givers.

And we need to remember to give ourselves, too. It is easy for some of us to write a check, but can we take an hour to listen to someone? In our busy days, as we check items off our to-do lists, can we take the time to notice the people around us? And can we give ourselves time, too? One of my challenges in trying to use sustainable travel is to give myself enough time to bike and walk instead of driving. I have to remember that taking the time to bike is really the gift that keeps on giving – I am a better, kinder, healthier, more attentive person when I am not in a hurry.

And how to we receive? For we are not only made in the image of God the Lover, God the doer, but in the image of Jesus the Beloved, the Christ who took time in the presence of God, and who received the love of those around him. How are we able to allow ourselves to receive?

This is not just about my usual mantra of taking time in contemplative prayer. This is also about allowing ourselves to receive from others in very ordinary ways – ways that many of us find difficult. Can we let someone help us? Can we accept a gift from someone? Can we even accept a compliment from someone? If we can only give, and not receive, we may have some inner power issues that we should resolve as persons of faith – for Jesus, the very Son of God, fully divine and fully human, revealed to us that being able to receive is also part of how we were created to be. I think this is part of what Jesus meant when saying, “Those who can receive the Kingdom as a little child….” Children happily receive gifts, and soak up love. If we want to live faithfully, we need to learn how to receive….and I’m not sure what it would mean to receive creatively. Would that be a mode of receiving that affirms and honors the giver? A way of receiving that is life-giving to the receiver? So to receive creatively may mean to develop that dimension of ourselves that can receive as part of our wholeness? Let’s all continue to think about this, and if you have insights as to how we can receive creatively, let me know!

And perhaps most challenging is how to image the Holy Spirit in our own living – except this may be the simplest of all. If we remember the understanding of the Holy Spirit as our own experience of God, or God’s presence in our own experience, then perhaps for us to live as the Holy Spirit, is to be truly present. Being present to another means being attentive to them, listening to them, regarding them. I think of the gaze of an infant: which holds another, or holds the world, in full attention. Being present to another is sometimes the simplest, and most challenging thing we can do.

As an adult diagnosed with Attention Deficit Disorder, I have enjoyed the occasional descriptions of our culture as being ADHD – we struggle with being present in the moment. It’s hard for us to be truly present to another, without being distracted by our own inner need to be problem-solver or wise-word-sayer. It’s hard to just be with someone, attentive to the other, learning about them, listening to them, being present to them. And yet it is one of the most powerful gifts we can give.

Can we be present to God’s creation? Take a walk along the river, and just notice it. Notice the sound of the water, the feeling of the air on your skin, the color of the sky and the grass, the firmness of the path.

Can we be present to ourselves? Franciscan priest Richard Rohr has said that the reason more people don’t do contemplative prayer is that it requires solitude…and most of us don’t want to spend time with people we don’t like.

Being present where we are is a huge challenge in our busy, busy world, and to our fragmented selves, but learning to be present is the first step to wholeness. I challenge you to find time, each day, to be present: spend some time being present to another, spend some time being present to your surroundings, and spend some time being present to yourself….practice presence.

The modern version of the Bible called The Message which the confirmation class and its mentors received translates one verse: Live creatively, friends! As it happens, this verse is in a section on giving and receiving forgiveness, which is a great reminder that a creative approach to relationships is one where reconciliation is a value. And of course, forgiveness is at the heart of the Christian message… but that’s a sermon for another day. For today, it is enough to remind ourselves that the Christian life is indeed a creative life, in all its dimensions and that we are called to give creatively, to receive creatively, and to be present creatively. Live creatively, friends! Amen.