Greet One Another With a Holy Kiss

A Sermon for Trinity Sunday (RCL A) 6-19-2011

Offered by Nathan Ferrell for Trinity Episcopal Shared Ministry

Texts:              Genesis 1:1-2:4a; Psalm 8; 2 Corinthians 13:11-13; Matthew 28:16-20

Themes:         creation, the great commission, perichoresis

During the period from the 5^th to the 8^th of May in this year, the Gallup company conducted a random poll of American citizens and discovered that 92% of all Americans say that they believe in God. This is only slightly lower than the 94% who responded affirmatively to this same question in 1947. (see the website: http://www.gallup.com/poll/147887/Americans-Continue-Believe-God.aspx )

Even today, nearly all Americans say that they believe in God – 92%. What is more, a poll undertaken by Gallup in 2002 revealed that 93% of all Americans, regardless of their religious background –if any, claim that Jesus has had some impact upon their lives as a moral and ethical leader. Going back a bit further, a 1993 Gallup poll found that 84% of all Americans at that time said they believe that Jesus is God or the Son of God. (see the website: http://www.gallup.com/poll/7471/Who-Jesus.aspx)

What does all of this professed belief among Americans mean? And what, if anything does all of this have to do with Trinity Sunday?  

Well, let me ask you this: what is the value of belief without action? What is the importance of belief with commitment? What is the purpose of thinking thoughts that make no difference in one’s actions?

In the Gospel of Matthew, the very last words spoken by the Lord to his closest friends have been recorded and handed down to us as the Great Commission. They are powerful words, direct and forceful. “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything that I have commanded you. ”

Let me suggest to you that there is absolutely no correlation at all between the kind of insipid belief in God that is so ubiquitous in American society and the call of Jesus to make disciples who are baptized and who obey what Jesus actually taught us.

To say that you believe in God but you are not really interested in following what God has taught us is the same as saying that you believe in marriage but you are not willing to make the full commitment of your entire life to another human being!

There is nothing wrong with that kind of belief. The problem is that it has no real value, because it is devoid of a relationship.

What our Lord Jesus is interested in is not some kind of general belief in some vague idea that makes no real difference in real life, but rather in a living relationship with those who love him.

And this is what Trinity Sunday is all about: real, loving relationships between living beings.

On the sixth day of creation, God said: “Let us make humankind in our image, according to our likeness.” In the Church, we understand this Divine “We” to be a conversation within the Blessed Trinity, and we see this as a plan by all three Persons of the Trinity to crown this wonderful new creation with sentient, aware beings capable of love and relationship.

What, after all, does it mean to be made in God’s image, according to the likeness of the Trinity?

We can never answer this definitely, but surely at the very least it points to the relational nature of human life, in just the same way that God is always, eternally in loving relationship.

The great theologians of the Church have spoken of this as the perichoresis of the three Persons of the Trinity.

This is a beautiful word, but it is foreign to most of us. It comes from two roots: peri – which means around, and choreio – which means to contain or to embrace. Think of one of our words which come from this root, choreography: the planned, intentional, deliberate movements of an entire group.

Perichoresis was first coined by St. Gregory of Nazianzus, one of the 3 great Cappadocian fathers of the 4^th century. It is all about the intimacy of relationships within the Trinity: how three can be perfectly united together so as to act and think and be as one.

It’s a beautiful image, a lovely reality, worthy of our contemplation.

But the reason it is so important for us is that God has created you and me to manifest that same type of loving relationships in this world in our real, daily lives.

The shocking fact of the matter is that the Church is God’s message to the world – and that’s you and me and all those who are disciples learning to obey all that Christ taught us.

 John Yoder, a well-known Mennonite teacher, has written this about the place of the Church in God’s plan for the world:

“The work of God is the calling of a people, whether in the Old Covenant or the New.

The church is then not simply the bearer of the message of reconciliation, in the way a newspaper or a telephone company can bear any message with which it is entrusted. Nor is the church simply the result of a message, as an alumni association is the product of a school or the crowds in a theater are the product of the reputation of the film.

That men and women are called together to a new social wholeness is itself the work of God, which gives meaning to history” (quoted in Common Prayer).  

We are a crucial part of God’s plan to change the world, and we fulfill our part through the relationships that we build with God and with one another.

This is the primary reason why I believe that any healthy, vibrant congregation today will inevitably be shaped by small group ministries. What we do on Sunday morning is crucial and vital. There is no replacement for our gatherings on the Lord’s Day to celebrate Christ’s resurrection and to be formed together by the Word of God and the Body of Christ.

But Sunday morning worship is not enough; it is never enough. If we only gather on Sunday mornings for the Eucharist, then we will not be faithful in being the Body of Christ in the world.

 We must be more than this. And I am not speaking of volunteer work. All of the efforts that many of you make in this place as volunteers are very helpful, but this is not the critical work of the Body of Christ that must be done. Fundraisers, gardening, administrative organizing – all of this is well and good, but we must never allow it to take the place of our true work in building up the Body of Christ.

One of the reasons that small fellowship groups are essential is that they connect what happens here on Sunday mornings to what happens in our lives throughout the week. These groups are a reminder that this place is not the Church of the Holy Spirit (or the Ascension, or St. Luke’s Church).

It is not. This building is a place where the disciples in this area gather together.  

Remember this, please: you cannot ever go to church! What a silly thing to say.

Let’s work on changing our language, because how we speak affects how we think and how we act. It is impossible for you to wake up on Sunday morning and go to church, just as much as it is impossible for you to leave work on Tuesday afternoon and go to family.

Church is who we are; family is who you are with those related to you. You can never GO there, because it is you! You are it, no matter where all of you might be at any given moment.

On Sundays, we gather for worship; we do not go to church. The difference in mindset is critical.

In the Autumn, when many of you begin to meet together during the week in home fellowship groups for Bible study and prayer and conversation, you will be the Church of the Holy Spirit (or the Ascension, or St. Luke’s Church) meeting in that place. The bonds created in reading and studying and learning and praying together in small groups are vital. They are true reflections of the perichoresis of the Trinity: that intimate union of distinct persons in one mind and will and heart.  

I am convinced that this is the great truth that we need to understand and embrace today.

We are God’s plan to redeem, change and restore the world! And our primary task is to be the people whom God has called us and re-created us to be.

We are the yeast of Christ that is sprinkled into the dough of humanity, to slowly leaven it by being the channel through which the influence of the Holy Spirit can spread to all people.

Listen once more to these beautiful closing words of St. Paul’s second letter to the disciples gathered in the city of Corinth: “Put things in order, listen to my appeal, agree with one another, live in peace; and the God of love and peace will be with you. Greet one another with a holy kiss.”

May it always be so among us here in this fellowship gathered around Christ our Lord. Amen.