Sermon – Lectionary B, 2: John 3:1-17 “One ” Zion Episcopal Church 5/30/2021 By James A. Hackney, LLP

I would be remiss if I didn’t mention that Day is tomorrow. Later in our service, we will share prayers for those we remember who gave their all for our nation. Today is also the first Sunday after the Day of , known as Trinity Sunday. On this day we celebrate the Christian doctrine of the Trinity, the three Persons of God: Father, Son, and . It is one of the seven Days in our church year, so it’s an important observance. In the early days of the Episcopal Church, Trinity Sunday was even more significant than today. In our original 1789 , all of the scriptures between Pentecost and were referenced from Trinity Sunday rather than from Pentecost, as they are now. The Trinity can be a difficult concept to understand, both for Christians and non- Christians. Some non-Christians accuse us Christians of worshiping three . I know several Episcopal priests who dread preaching on Trinity Sunday because of the challenge of addressing this abstraction. In my case, I believe I was led to a message to share with you today, so here goes. Let me start by telling you a story. A young man, we’ll call him Santiago, grew up in a devout Protestant Christian family in the Philippines. He was taught from birth that you had to believe in to go to Heaven, and he accepted that without question. Later in life, he felt called to the ministry, but he had a problem with Christian teaching. Although 89% of the Filipino population are either Catholic or Protestant, 6% are Muslim, and the other 5% include Jews, Hindus and indigenous religions. Many of those non-Christians Santiago knew were just as devout as he in their own religions, and most were just as loving of God and their neighbors as Christians profess to be. How could these people be denied eternal life in heaven because of the accident of their birth and upbringing in a family that wasn’t Christian? And so, he prayed about it. As he was praying, his consciousness was taken over, hijacked so-to-speak, by a power he believed was the Holy Spirit. The Spirit asked, “why do you think these people can’t go to heaven?”. His answer was, “because Jesus says so in the Bible”. Then came a revelation from the Spirit that was cataclysmic to Santiago. “You are interpreting the Bible too literally. Jesus knew the dangers of people taking his words too literally. That is why he usually spoke in parables. Besides, most of what he said wasn’t recorded until decades later. However, on one point he was very clear. Jesus repeatedly told us that He IS God. When He was walking in the temple in John 10, he told the Jews, ‘The Father and I are one.’ In John 14, he tells his disciples that If they know him, they will know God also. If they have seen Jesus, they have seen God. When Jesus said ‘believe in me’, he was actually saying, ‘believe in God’.” - 2 -

Then Santiago argued, “yes, but didn’t Jesus say that no one comes to God except by him?” The Spirit answered, “that’s right, but he meant that the way one comes to God and eternal life is by following his’, Jesus’, example and teachings. If you love God and your neighbor, it’s not important whether you are Christian, Jew or Muslim. If you don’t love God and your neighbor, you won’t make it to heaven, regardless of your beliefs. That love is the ‘truth and the way’ of Jesus for all people. Jesus told us in John 10:16 that he has ‘other sheep that do not belong to this fold’. He ‘must bring them also’. He was talking about everybody.” As Santiago considered this revelation, he gained a new understanding and appreciation of the Trinity of Father, Son and Holy Spirit. As I read the story, I also gained a new perspective on the Trinity. God has existed from the beginning of time. The Bible tells us that Jesus and the Holy Spirit have also existed since the beginning of time, and are simply God in a different form, not different beings. I have shared in a prior sermon that God picked the earliest practical time to come to earth to spread His message. At that time, God faced a decision: how would He go about doing this? God could have appeared like the genie in the lamp in Aladdin. God could have appeared as a talking animal, or an inanimate object like a rock or a plant. However, we have to remember the culture of the time. A human could walk among the people and cover more ground by traveling. People could relate to him. Miracles would get peoples’ attention and make them listen to the lessons being taught. Sacrifice was understood and practiced by everyone, so his death and resurrection would be significant. These were things people would understand and appreciate. So obviously, God decided on coming as a human, born of a woman and dying like a human. God had to choose a nationality for His coming, and he chose Jew, because of the long closeness of the Jewish people to God before Jesus. The stage had been set by centuries of prophets and prophesies. The Jews recognized early on that there was only one God, not a lot of different gods that controlled a lot of different things. The Holy Land was also at the population center of that era. It was on the trade routes most travelled. Everything combined to make it the right time and place to come. Once Jesus was gone, God needed a way to stay in the minds and hearts of people everywhere afterward. God needed a form which wouldn’t be limited by geography, or by language, or by ethnicity. So, God reverted back to the form He had taken before Jesus: God the Holy Spirit. I recognize the risk of criticism I took in sharing this message. Am I undermining Christian teaching and tradition? I don’t think so. I’m just expanding on what our Episcopal Church teaches and that we sometimes overlook. We recite the every Sunday. It says that we believe in one God, the Father, the Almighty; we believe that Jesus is one being with God; and we believe that the Holy Spirit proceeds from - 3 -

God. Our Episcopal catechism states that Jesus is the perfect image of God, and that the Holy Spirit is God at work in the world, even now. Those are direct quotes. We Christians are blessed to have been taught about God’s coming to earth in human form. We have shared the witness of those who were with Him at the time, of His examples and His teachings. We know of the miracles He performed to prove the truth of His existence and His words. And, our faith in God has been reinforced by learning of the impact the coming of God in the form of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost had on the believers at that time, and on the world forever. We Christians may not be the only ones going to heaven, but maybe we have a head start because of our knowledge of God’s coming to earth in the body of Jesus, and of His remaining with us in the form of the Holy Spirit. But if we have a head start, it also comes with a challenge. Because of what we know, we have a greater responsibility to put that knowledge to work in our lives. On this day of Trinity, it seems appropriate to recognize anew that there is only one God, in three forms. God is God to all people, regardless what they call themselves. God grants grace and forgiveness to all people, regardless what they call their religion. And God will welcome us all with open arms, if we follow the commandments of loving God and loving our neighbors; commandments that God, in the form of Jesus, taught us. Father, Son and Holy Spirit: the Trinity. One God. God is God. Amen.