Trying to Explain the Unexplainable (June 12, 2022) John 16.12-15

Earlier this year, in some larger churches, the senior pastor may have alerted the associate pastor that, “Congratulations!! You get the chance to show off your preaching chops on June 12. I have a very important….uh…. conference to attend. Good luck!” The associate realizes that the senior pastor has handed off one of the most difficult Sundays in the Church to preach. It is Trinity Sunday and the subject is just that, the Trinity.

Many will simply state that it is a mystery, that they do not understand it and that will be about it. Others will try to get all philosophical and try to come up with an explanation that makes sense. And then there will be some who try to explain without going over anyone’s head and making sure that they do not fall into the “heresy trap”.

It’s a touchy business, the Trinity. There are many who state that Christians may claim to be monotheists, but are in reality worshiping three gods. I mean, come on, how can there be three in one? It’s just impossible nonsense. Isn’t it? Thomas Jefferson was of the opinion that we should drop this nonsense arithmetic and just focus on the teachings of Jesus to be the best disciples. Shouldn’t we follow his advice?

In our text for this week in John, we find Jesus speaking to his disciples before his death. This passage is the last of the sayings about the Holy Spirit, or the Advocate, that Jesus is telling his followers.

The Spirit will be many things to them. A comforter, an advocate, one who will give them words when they stand before their opponents. Jesus tells them that the Spirit will be coming from the Father and himself. Which brings us to the question: is the Spirit just a subordinate of Jesus and the Father who does their bidding? Or is the Spirit more than that?

Jesus even continues saying that the Spirit will not speak on the Spirit’s own, but that what is said is what Jesus told the disciples. What Jesus has, which is what the Father has given to him, is given to the Spirit. The Spirit will help those left after Jesus is gone to understand what he has said.

With a text like this, is it any wonder that we have misunderstandings about the Trinity? And it is not just us who have these troubles. The Church has struggled with them from the beginning. So, let’s take a look at what has been said in the past and how we can move forward with this doctrine.

First things first. There is no explicit Biblical text that says trinity, but there are many places where the Trinity is found in the Bible. In both the First and Second Testaments, the Trinity is found to be at work. But there have been several major heresies that have arisen in the history of the Church by people who were studying their scriptures and finding different conclusions in how God was and is.

There are three that are the most prominent. There is Tritheism which is what it sounds like, three gods who perform different roles but who work together. Subordinationism says that God the Father is and has always been eternal, while Jesus and the Holy Spirit were created by the Father; “there was a time when he was not” was a saying in regards to Jesus. Finally, there is Modalism which is God fulfilling purposes in three different modes. Each of these is trying to preserve the divinity of God or the distinctiveness of the Trinity, but wind up denying the other part. And even today we have this issue Shirley Guthrie has this to say in his book Christian Doctrine: “Because everyone tends to emphasize either the unity-oneness or the distinction-threeness of God, we all tend toward one or another of these heresies. Which tends to be your heresy?” (Guthrie, 81)

With the rise of these heresies there was an effort to put a stop to them. There were two councils that were the places that established the doctrine of the Trinity. These are the Councils of Nicaea (325) and Constantinople (381). Nicaea was the council that dealt with the divinity of Christ, while Constantinople was the council where the divinity of the Holy Spirit was affirmed. It is from these two councils that we get the doctrine. From 381 on, the Trinity has been established and has been the bedrock of the Christian faith. Dr. Philip Cary has this to say in a lecture on the Trinity:

“The doctrine of the Trinity is the distinctively Christian conception of God. It is not about how God is three and one, but about how the one God is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Trinity and Incarnation are the two fundamental doctrines of Christian theology. Both arise because of the uniquely Christian insistence on the divine identity of Christ. Hence the doctrine of the Trinity does not often use the human name “Jesus” but rather speaks of his divine identity using the terms “Word” and “Son of God.” Unlike the doctrine of Incarnation, the doctrine of the Trinity focuses strictly on the divinity of Christ, not his humanity.

As Augustine showed, the fundamental logic of the orthodox doctrine of the Trinity can be stated fairly simply, in seven statements. The first three statements about the Trinity are “the Father is God,” “the Son is God,” and “the Holy Spirit is God.” Three more statements differentiating the Trinity are “the Father is not the Son,” “the Son is not the Holy Spirit,” and “the Holy Spirit is not the Father.” Then to cap it off, the seventh statement says, “There is only one God.”

This definition is one of the best that I have ever heard and it states what the Trinity is and is not. But how does the Trinity work? How does God work as Father, Son and Holy Spirit? As I pointed out, too often we like to compartmentalize the work of the three persons in one. We often say that the Father’s job is creation, that reconciliation is the work of the Son and sanctification is the role of the Spirit. But Scripture is clear that all of God is involved in everything that God does. Creation is also the work of the Son (“All things came into being through him” (John 1:3) and the Spirit (or wind) of God moves across the waters in Genesis 1:2. The Father and the Spirit is are participants in the reconciliation and redemption of humanity and the world (see 2 Cor. 5:19 and Eph. 2:18). Finally, sanctification, which brings us back to fellowship with God and neighbor, is part of the work of Father and Son as well as the Spirit (see 1 Thess. 5:23 and Eph. 5:26). The Trinity does its work not separately and independently, but together in relationship and community.

Most of us have seen the drawing of an equilateral triangle with Father, Son and Holy Spirit at the three points. This is a Western Church model of the Trinity. What you might not know is that the original version of this had the persons on the sides of the triangle rather than the points. In this way they all were the same. The representation most know can make the Trinity somewhat hierarchical. Whichever member is at the top, is, well, at the top and is seen as the “top dog” or chairman of the board, so to speak. The other two are to do the bidding of the one on top. This has led to many issues that have led to new ways of giving new titles to the members of the Trinity.

Needless to say, the triangle of the Western Church can cause some problems. The Eastern Church, however, has a different model of the Trinity. In this model, the three are pictured as being in a circle with arrows pointing from each member to the others. This is known as perichoresis. The term means this: Peri (around, think perimeter), Choresis (dancing, choreography). Think of the Trinity as three dancers holding hands and dancing in a circle together with joy and freedom and you have the image that the Eastern Church has of the Trinity. The oneness of God is contained not in individuals (as we so often in the West think of the “person”) but in community. Jesus told the disciples that the Spirit would come to them not just individually but as a community (the you in the text is plural). The personal side of God is inter-personal as one cannot be personal alone but only when in relationships with others. Guthrie states this about the Trinity in this this model: “They are what they are only in relationship to each other. Each exists only in this relationship and would not exist apart from it. Father, Son and Holy Spirit live only in and with and through each other, eternally united in mutual love and shared purpose.” (Guthrie, 92)

As I said before, there is no above or below in the Trinity, no higher or lower rank, no preferential jobs or purposes. If God is in relationship as this model shows with openness, respect and self-giving love, then should not the community of saints, the family of God, reflect the same things even in all of our differences (race, social standing, politics, etc.) that threaten to, and do, divide us? When we understand the Trinity as perichoretic society, then we begin to see that we are called to also be perichoretic in humanity.

Augustine has this to say about trying to understand the Trinity: “…anyone who denies the Trinity is in danger of losing her salvation, but anyone who tries to understand the Trinity is in danger of losing her mind.”[1] Each member of the Trinity is distinct, but is also God. It is said that the Trinity is to be a “mystery to be confessed, not a mathematical problem to be solved”. (Guthrie 95) Augustine also said that “If you can understand it, then it isn’t God.” Everything hinges on us remembering that the works of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit are indivisible. They cannot be separated from or set against each other. There can only be understanding that they are all in agreement. And when we understand that they are in perichoresis, divine community, dancing together in joy and shared purpose, then we understand that we are called as humanity, made in the image of God, to be the same. May we understand that we will never fully understand, but that because of the work of the of the three in one and the one in three, we don’t have to. We just have to trust. Thanks be to God. Amen.

[1]Olson, Roger E., and Christopher A. Hall. The Trinity. Grand Rapids, MI: W.B. Eerdmans, 2002. Print. Guides to Theology.