John 16 12-15 2004
Trinity
John 16:12-15
June 6, 2004
“Beyond Reason, the Place of Faith”
Introduction: St. Augustine so the story goes was struggling to understand the doctrine of the Trinity, the belief that God is one, and still Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Therefore, he went for a walk on the beach. He saw a little boy digging a hole in the sand with a seashell and then running to the ocean, filling the shell, and rushing back to pour it into the hole he had made. “What are you doing, little man,” Augustine asked. “I’m trying to put the ocean into this hole”, the boy replied. Peace came to Augustine as he realized that this was indeed, what he had been trying to do…to fit the great mysteries of God into his human mind.
Martin Luther, speaking bout the Holy Trinity said, “Here the foolishness of God and the wisdom of the world clash. For when the world hears God speaking of Himself as being one God and yet three distinct Persons, it considers such declarations very offensive and foolish; and all who listen to reason and hear this consider people who believe and teach their doctrine downright fools…But shame on you , disgraceful reason! How can we miserable, poor mortals comprehend this mystery? We do not know the how of our own speaking, laughing, or sleeping although we daily perform and experience these natural functions. And yet we want to speak of God and the conditions existing within His divine Being. We want to do so without the Word of God, solely according to our own mind. Is it not blindness above all blindness for a man who cannot explain the most insignificant function he daily observes in His own body and to presume to know what is beyond and above all reason and of which no one except God alone can speak, and to have the audacity to state so rashly and bluntly that Christ is not God” Luther continues, “Only Christians know and believe this article. The world cannot bear it. Jews, Muslims, Tartars and heretics forcefully oppose it; they are offended at it; they ridicule and mock us Christian for being so mad and foolish as to believe in more than one God and worship Him. Whoever deems God’s Word a fable and a fairy tail…will of course not believe this article.”
Trying to understand the Trinity is like looking into the sun. No one is able to do it. And anyone that tries may go blind in the attempt. So is the glory of God with a brightness that is beyond our understanding. That this should surprise us I don’t understand. For a person to understand something their mind must be bigger than the thing comprehended. For us to understand God we would have to be bigger than God.
What is at stake and why do we celebrate Trinity Sunday? What makes it so important? Almost all attacks on the doctrine of the Trinity focus on the person and work of Jesus Christ. These attach focus on His divinity. The Jews, Muslims, the Jehovah’s Witness and for that matter most of the people of the world consider Jesus Christ to be only a man, a prophet perhaps, enlightened maybe, and morally upright definitely, but still only a man. This cannot be true. If this were true than Jesus could not be the Savior. We know and understand this because no man can die for another man. No man can die for another man’s sins. But God alone can do what man cannot do. God in the person of Jesus Christ was able to, and did die for the sins of all people. This you believe to the salvation of your souls. Therefore we celebrate and defend the doctrine of the Trinity as we would defend our very life’s breath. This is the place where we must leave our reason behind and depend solely on God’s Word and live by faith alone.
I. GOD REVEALS HIMSELF AS THREE IN ONE AND ONE IN THREE
There is only one God. The first commandment (Ex. 20:3) reads "You shall have no other gods before ME." There is only one God. "You have not listened to ME" God said through the prophet Jeremiah Jer. 25:7. In Genesis God told Abraham, "I am Almighty God; walk before ME and be blameless." God told Moses (Ex. 3:14) "I am Who I am." God said at Deut. 6:4 "Hear, 0 Israel: the Lord our God, the Lord is One." St. Paul writes I Cor. 8:4 and 6: "There is no other God but ONE" and "There is only ONE God." Jesus says Jn. 10:29 "I and My Father are ONE." There are not three gods but only One God, one in essence, from all eternity. Here too we must leave our reason behind and depend solely on God’s Word and live by faith alone.
There are three persons in One God. I Cor. 8:6 The Apostle Paul writes "There is only one God, the Father, of whom are all things, and we for Him; and one Lord Jesus Christ, through whom are all things." The unity and Trinity are here mentioned side by side. When Jesus was baptized the Father spoke from heaven, the Son was being baptized and the Holy Spirit descended as a dove. Mt. 3:13-17. When Jesus ascended to heaven He prayed the Father to send the Spirit. Jn. 14:16; 14:26; 15:26; 16:7. All three creeds (Apostles, Nicene, Athanasian) ascribe creation to the Father, redemption to the Son and sanctification to the Holy Spirit, God is one in essence and three in persons. We cannot fathom that mystery but we believe it. All three articles of the creed are comprehended only by our God given faith. We cannot fully understand but we believe what God says. This is beyond reason and it is the place of faith.
Today we celebrate graduation. Through hard work and mental effort you are closing one chapter of your school life and opening another. Having mastered something’s you move on to even greater challenges, from ABC’s to algebra, from the history of the United states to the history of the world. Many of the things you have been taught make since. Some things probably still don’t. I always had a problem with algerbra. For instance how can two letters a + b equal a number. My wife is still trying to explain that one to me. Our Christian faith is like this too. Some things make since and others things don’t. As I believe my wife and all mathematicians that a + b can indeed equal 1, we must believe God when He says that He is three yet only one God. This is beyond reason and it is the place of faith.
Conclusion: Martin Luther wrote, “Now if this article seems foolish, what do I care. For if criticism were in order, I too would be able to offer it very well, better, in fact, than any Muslim or Jew. But I thank God, who has given me the grace not to dispute about the truth and reasonableness of this article. Since I see that it is so distinctly contained and grounded in Scripture, I believe God more than my own thoughts and reason and do not worry about how it can possibly be true that there is only one Essence and yet that there are three distinct Persons in this one Essence: God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Ghost.” With Luther and Augustine we stand back in awe of the glory of our God, Father Son and Holy Ghost. Amen