3 in 1 and a baptism
Sermon for Pentecost I, 2023, delivered at St. Paul's Episcopal Church, Louisville, KY
Welcome to the season of Pentecost! We started it last Sunday with a celebration of the Holy Spirit and continue with a celebration of the Trinity today. We have only two other major celebrations or feasts between now and Advent, which are Transfiguration Sunday in August, and All Saints in November. Pentecost is the longest season of the church calendar, when we put into action all that we have learned and experienced between Advent and Pentecost Sunday.
In preparing this sermon, I had to check the liturgical calendar again to be sure that the Gospel reading was correct. It doesn’t fit today, Trinity Sunday. In fact, the only thing the passage has in common with the Trinity is the mention of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, all three who make up the Trinity. And this is ok, because the doctrine of the Trinity was developed centuries after Matthew’s Gospel was finished. We can find the elements of the Trinity throughout the Gospels, but understanding the relationship of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit with each other came much later. The Trinity has always been difficult to explain, as I have found out first hand. One of my college roommates was muslim, and he asked me about the Trinity, claiming that we worship three gods. I tried to explain the unity of the Trinity and that we worshiped and believed in one God, but I couldn’t get the concept across, because I didn’t understand it well myself. I think for the Eastern Orthodox churches this isn’t an issue because they view the Trinity as a holy mystery, one that does not have, and should not have a rigorous explanation. To us in the Western Church, this sounds like a cop-out or laziness, because we go to great lengths to try to explain the Trinity and everything else about God and Jesus. We see a mystery as a challenge, and the inability to explain it as a failure, where the Eastern church sees mystery as part of the nature of God, held in awe. I prefer to hold it as a mystery, something to be experienced or contemplated as part of deepening my spiritual life. We believe and trust in God, we have known Jesus, and we experience the Holy Spirit, but it's hard to explain the Trinity unless we see how it affects our lives.
What is more relevant to the Gospel reading this morning is Jesus’ call to the disciples to go out and baptize in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. And that is what we are doing this morning as we baptize Luke in a few minutes. There is a mystery surrounding baptism that is like the mystery of the Trinity, something to be held in quiet awe and wonder. It is the work of the Holy Spirit in this place that requires faith, because we won’t see the evidence of its action on Luke until years from now. But the mystery will remain: it will be a mystery how his bedroom can go from being neat to being totally wrecked in an hour, and a mystery how unfinished homework suddenly appears in his school folder the night before it is due. But the true mystery, the one where the Holy Spirit acts, is to see this child of God grow and mature spiritually. When I was baptized years ago with the 1928 prayer book liturgy, my sins were forgiven and that was it. But in the 1979 prayer book revision, a new dimension was introduced: the beginning of ministry, like Jesus’ ministry. There is still an element of forgiveness of sins in today’s liturgy, but the vows and the prayers all speak to a ministry that starts here, in this sanctuary.
This is not to say that Luke has to be a certain way or learn specific things to be a minister. His vows, that we say for him this morning, are the foundation of his ministry: fellowship, worship and membership, admitting wrongs and mistakes, bringing to life Jesus’ teaching through what Luke says and does, loving others unconditionally and tending to their needs, and bearing witness to the dignity of others by seeking justice and peace. Notice that these are things that we all can and do perform, regardless of who we are. That’s a lot to do in ministry, and a lot to ask of someone so young. But that is why we have all assembled here this morning to lift him and his family up, to support them, to guide them, to pledge that we will help Luke grow into who God sees him as, to help him understand his ministry to the world. That, too, seems to be a lot to ask of us, but we have been doing it for as long as there have been followers of Jesus. And we start at the font, with a simple yet profound act of washing Luke as John the Baptizer, the predecessor, washed Jesus. Like John, we baptize with water, but it is through our ongoing faith in the living Christ that we are baptized with the Holy Spirit. God sends us into the world to continue Jesus’ ministry, empowered by the Holy Spirit.
Paul wrote a letter to the Christians in Corinth and presented to them the wonderful metaphor of the faithful, that includes us, making up the Body of Christ. He goes on to say that we are all part of that body, our roles and activities being the result of our gifts and abilities, and this is true for Luke as well. We make a promise to help him find his place in this world, and in the community, and in this church, because as Paul puts it, there is a place for him in this body of Christ. There is also a place for him in this world, where he will be welcomed and where he can contribute as part of God’s Creation. So, we are pledging our support to help Luke determine what being one of God’s children looks like in today’s world, and God willing, to the end of this century. We are pledging to help him and his family understand what his ministry will look like. We will look for God to create in Luke what God created on Earth, and it will be good. What happens here this morning is a mystery, a holy mystery, one to be celebrated, and welcomed, and held in awe and wonder. It is the beginning of and will be the continuing work of the Trinity, God, Christ, and Spirit, acting in different ways and at different times in Luke's life directly, and at times indirectly through the Body of Christ. Welcome, Luke. We are so glad you are here.
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