+ A short reflection given for “Our Endless Song: A Festival for Holy Trinity” on Holy Trinity Sunday (Year C) at First Lutheran Church, St. Peter, MN on May 22, 2016 +

Texts: Proverbs 8:1-4, 22-31; Psalm 8; Romans 5:1-5; John 16:12-15

Trinity Sunday is a strange day.
Rather than celebrating a story or an event, we celebrate a doctrine.
And a rather strange and convoluted doctrine it is too.
We confess that we worship one God in Three Persons, the Three-in-One and One-in-Three. Our vision of God is so confusing that preachers may think that the celebration of this festival was instituted by seminary professors to test whether their students and see if they will commit heresies.

So rather than attempt to explain how the Trinity works, I will simply commend to you that this is a wonderfully beautiful mystery beyond our comprehension. And that attempting to explain the Trinity may be less important than what we can learn from it. The Trinity shows us how our God is inherently relational: Three Persons living eternally in the most intimate community with each other as our One God. And what’s more, God invites us into that same intimate community, because God wants to be in relationship with us too.

God the Father, the Maker of the cosmos – all creation – all that is, seen and unseen; that same God also chose to make you and me and to know us.

God the Son, co-creator of all things, desired to know us so much that he came to us to dwell with us and become fully human – to experience all the joys and pains of humanity, to show us God’s love for us, and to invite us to join God in the Body of Christ.

God the Spirit, the Spirit of Truth – our advocate and our companion – who kindles faith, empowers us to live into our mission as the Church – Christ’s living Body on earth – and to serve our neighbor in action and proclamation of God’s love for all people.

One God. Who has loved all of creation since the world was formed and who loves each and every one of us individually.

Our God is not distant and explained by doctrine alone. Rather God reveals Godself to us through the prophets and scripture, through water and bread and wine, and through the display of God’s love for us on the cross. Our God yearns to be in relationship with us as just as closely as the Three Persons are in communion as our One, Triune God.

So let us, who have been joined to God through our baptism and this table and through our fellowship in this Body of Christ go from this place to proclaim and to serve and to love all people as God has loved us.