18 Then Jesus came to them and said, “All authority
in heaven and on earth has been given to me. 19 Therefore go and make disciples
of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and
of the Holy Spirit, 20 and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded
you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”
- Matthew 28:18-20, The New International Version, (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan
Publishing House) 1984.
Dear Friends in Christ,
One of the fundamental teachings of the Bible and the Christian faith drawn from it is the doctrine of the Trinity. Every Sunday we confess our belief that God is "triune," meaning one God yet three distinct persons. This doctrine is so important that from early on the Christian Church reserved a special Sunday to pause and reflect on it. That day is today: Trinity Sunday.
Although this teaching transcends our understanding, that it is clearly taught in Scripture cannot be disputed. One of the clearest examples can be found in our text for today, which we will consider shortly.
We might also add that the doctrine of the Trinity is not just some dusty old Bible truth that has no bearing on our lives. Just the opposite is true. The fact that God is triune and all that this means has an unparalleled impact on our lives. Consequently, this is indeed a relevant topic for us to consider...
Therefore, on the basis of the passage before us as well as other portions of Scripture, let us turn our worshipful attention to, in the words of the hymn we just sang,
GOD IN THREE PERSONS! BLESSED TRINITY
1. The mystery of the Trinity
2. The comfort of the Trinity
One preliminary remark before we proceed any farther. We should know that neither the word "trinity" nor "triune" can be found in the Bible – a fact that Jehovah’s Witnesses, who don’t believe this teaching, will quickly point out to you if ever you enter into a conversation with them.
Although the words themselves are not found in the Bible, the teaching, or idea, certainly is. To describe the fact that there is one God yet three distinct persons, Christians have coined the words "trinity" and "triune," both of which mean "three in one."
Having said that, let’s turn to our text and first consider THE MYSTERY OF THE TRINITY. Then Jesus came to them and said, "All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore, go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit."
These words are familiar to us as the "Great Commission." Jesus spoke them to His disciples sometime between His resurrection and ascension. These words are most often used to emphasize evangelism, and rightly so, for here Christ gives the Church its marching orders. Today, however, we simply want to note the clear expression of the Trinity found in them...
Note that Jesus commands His disciples to baptize in the name of (not names of) God, who is the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. In other words, three persons. Other Scriptural examples could be cited, such as the baptism of Jesus recorded in the Gospels (God the Father spoke from heaven while God the Son was being baptized; God the Holy Spirit came down from heaven in the form of a dove).
Another example would be the two blessings, or benedictions, with which we close our worship services. One, called the Aaronic benediction, was our first Scripture reading for today. Did you notice how the name of the "Lord" was purposely used three times? That is a reference to the Trinity.
The other, called the Pauline benediction, asks that the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God (the Father) and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with us all. Again, Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Yet, the Bible always asserts that there is but one God. That there are three distinct persons and yet one God is the MYSTERY OF THE TRINITY.
Throughout the years Christians have tried to come up with different ways to grasp this truth. Legend has it that St. Patrick, early Christian missionary to Ireland, used the shamrock (three separate leaves, one plant); Martin Luther talked about water, ice and steam (three forms, one element); and Christian symbolism from early on used the triangle (three sides, one figure). But the bottom line is that this doctrine is beyond our comprehension. So how do we deal with it?
We take it on faith. We believe it even if we can’t understand it. Perhaps an illustration from the life of the great church father Augustine will put this, as well as everything else we can’t understand about God, in perspective...
Augustine was a brilliant man, and the story is told of how he was having trouble understanding the idea that God is triune. Deep in thought, he began walking along the North African seashore where he came upon a little boy going back and forth from the ocean to a ditch he had made in the sand carrying water cupped in his hands. When Augustine asked the little boy what he was doing, he received this reply: "I’m emptying the ocean into my ditch."
At that point Augustine realized he was trying to do the exact same thing by emptying the vastness and the mystery and the wisdom of God into the "ditch" of his limited mind. And, as the story goes, from that time on Augustine didn’t have any problems with the Trinity anymore.
However, far more important than contemplating the MYSTERY OF THE TRINITY is reflecting on the COMFORT OF THE TRINITY. We might say that while the teaching of the Trinity is not meant to be understood, it is meant to be enjoyed. Recognizing that we will always have difficulty in neatly dividing up the work of Trinity, Scripture does reveal to us that each person of the Godhead has a certain primary work or "area of responsibility" attributed to Him. And this information brings us a great deal of comfort. Let’s talk about this...
In the Apostles Creed we confess: "I believe in God the Father Almighty, maker of heaven and earth." To God the Father we attribute the work of creation. We, as Bible-believing Christians, consider Genesis chapter 1 and 2 to be a true and accurate (although not exhaustive) account of how this world came to be. Few of us need to be told that this puts us at odds with most of the world, which trumpets the theory of evolution. The fact that we are "Creationists" opens us up to the charge of being anti-intellectual, ignorant and essentially backwards, something which, I suspect, many of us have experienced to one degree or another. Be that as it may. When God has spoken in His Word, the issue is settled. We believe it. End of story. He is the Creator, and here is the best news: His creation extends to each of us.
Think about what this. We are not products of random chance. We are not a cosmic accident. And our first ancestors were not one-celled creatures who somehow rose from the primordial ooze to eventually evolve into what we are today over the course of billions of years. That kind of understanding doesn’t lend itself to a particularly good self-image, does it? Not a whole lot of comfort in seeing myself as nothing more than an indiscriminate collection of molecules that just happened to converge.
But there is great comfort in knowing that we are all original creations from the hand of God. Luther, in his explanation to the First Article, says: "I believe that God made me and every creature and that He gave me my body and soul, eyes, ears, and all my members, my mind and all my abilities." And the bottom line is that our all-wise and all-knowing Creator doesn’t make any junk.
This is especially good to know since we live in a society that pretty well tells us we shouldn’t be happy unless we are striving to be something different from what we are.
Isn’t that true? The world idolizes youth and beauty and intelligence and wealth and athletic ability and a thousand little innuendoes a day promote the idea that everybody ought to be to some degree in pursuit of them...
But God says something far different to us. He says He has given us the gifts and abilities He wants us to have (and certainly develop), so we can stop worrying about what we aren’t and, with His help, work on what we are. God tells us we don’t need to find our value in what we are compared to others, but in what we mean to Him. Luther, again, put it this way: God does not love us because we are valuable. We are valuable because God loves us.
There is more. Besides creating us, our Heavenly Father also preserves us. He takes care of our physical needs by way of material blessings. He takes care of our emotional needs by way of His many promises to us that we don’t have to worry because He is in control. Finally, and most importantly, He takes care of our spiritual needs, the greatest of which is the forgiveness of sins, without which we would be lost and condemned forever. And meeting that need is the work of...
God the Son. Jesus Christ. We call His work redemption. To redeem means to buy back; and Christ has bought us back from the damning consequences of sin, death and the devil. How? In a most amazing way. 2000 years God broke into our time and space and became one of us. God the Son took on our flesh and blood and rendered what God asks of us, but what we couldn’t give Him: perfect obedience. For 33 years Jesus lived perfectly as our substitute, never sinning. After that perfect life, Christ then offered Himself as the perfect sacrifice, taking upon Himself the punishment our sins deserve, dying on the cross. Three days later He rose again, thus proclaiming to the world that His mission of redeeming us was complete.
And because He lives, we will live. Eternally in heaven. Because He has removed our guilt before God, we are in a right relationship with God. Because He has dismantled the barrier of sin between God and us, nothing bars us from an eternity of glory. Because of Jesus Christ we know where we are going. And this is relevant to every single one of us, because we’re all getting older, and eventually we’re all going to die...
This great love for sinners like you and me is just as hard to understand as the Trinity. Why should Jesus love us so? Why should God do this for us? Like the doctrine of the Trinity, the Gospel message is ours not to understand, but to enjoy...
And the fact that we can and do enjoy the Gospel message is the work of God the Holy Spirit. We call His work sanctification. In the widest sense this means that God the Holy Spirit brings us to faith. Working through the Word of God and the Sacraments He, in the words of the Old Testament prophet Ezekiel, turns our lifeless, cold, hearts of stone into hearts of flesh; living, beating and alive in Christ.
He also preserves us in the faith as we stay close to the Word. The Apostle Paul tells us faith comes through hearing the message and the message is heard through the Word of Christ. The Holy Spirit is like our personal trainer once we enter the gymnasium of God’s Word. He strengthens us and instructs us as we exercise our faith. In this regard, the Bible also mentions that the Holy Spirit can be grieved and that His fire can be put out through neglect and indifference. So let us take that as encouragement to always take our spiritual lives seriously.
So... there we have it. An abbreviated contemplation on the doctrine of the Trinity. And what a comforting doctrine it is...
We have God the Father, our Creator and Preserver, never turning His back on His creatures, but lovingly providing for us in all our needs... We have God the Son, our Savior and Redeemer, demonstrating the ultimate act of love by dying for us and our sins so we might live with Him eternally in heaven... We have God the Holy Spirit, opening our eyes to the truth of the Gospel message and strengthening us through Word and Sacrament.
Today, then, let us simply marvel at, reflect upon and rejoice in this divine truth: GOD IN THREE PERSONS, BLESSED TRINITY! And then may the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with us all. Amen.