On this first Sunday after Pentecost, Trinity Sunday, we read some familiar biblical texts. The creation story from Genesis and the Great Commission from Matthew’s gospel. Trinity Sunday is an unusual little day. As our own Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) website states plainly, “On Trinity Sunday we proclaim the mystery of our faith in the triune God: Father, Son and Holy Spirit, One-in-Three and Three-in-One.” The Companion to the Book of Common Worship includes this description of Trinity Sunday, “Unlike other festivals in the church’s liturgical calendar, Trinity Sunday centers on a doctrine of the church, rather than an event. It celebrates the unfathomable mystery of God’s being as Holy Trinity. It is a day of adoration and praise of the one, eternal, incomprehensible God” (CBCW, 149). Again, from our own PCUSA website, the historical background of Trinity Sunday: “The celebration of Trinity Sunday began among Western Christians in the 10th century and developed slowly until it was formally established on the Sunday after Pentecost by Pope John 22^nd—who was Pope from 1316 to 1334.” Very interesting, but even with all of that, it always seems funny to me to celebrate the Trinity on a particular Sunday because isn’t every Sunday a reminder of that doctrine? Every time we baptize or celebrate the Lord’s Supper or pray we invoke that ancient, trinitarian language. It is an integral part of who we are as Christians and as Presbyterians—that “unfathomable mystery of God’s being.” “In celebrating Trinity Sunday, remember that every Lord’s Day is consecrated to the triune God. On the first day of the week, God began creation. On the first day of the week, God raised Jesus from the grave. On the first day of the week, the Holy Spirit descended on the newly born church. Every Sunday is special. Every Sunday is a day of the Holy Trinity.”

 

 

 

Pastor and scholar John Brokhoff writes, “The world is to be won by baptizing and teaching. Without teaching, entrance into the Kingdom may be only a ritual or a fleeting feeling. The mind as well as the heart is dedicated to God. The lack of teaching of new members may be a major cause of the church’s heavy dropout rate. Teaching is necessary for understanding the nature and implications of Baptism: the nature of God, the work of Christ, the meaning of sin, the will of God, and the nature of the church. Teaching and Baptism should be inseparable partners in the making of a Christian” (LPW, 160). Amazingly—and it may just be that this is amazing to me—but, amazingly, Brokhoff wrote those words twenty-five years ago. In particular, I am struck by his statement: “The lack of teaching of new members may be a major cause of the church’s heavy dropout rate.” Unfortunately, this trend noticed by Brokhoff is still very true a decade into the 21^st century. Why is this? Why can’t we, the church manage to teach those whom we lovingly bring into the fold?

 

I have found myself preaching a lot of “get up and go to Nineveh” sermons in recent years. Here is this wonderfully complicated and mysterious triune God, the writings about whom should inspire devout and highly committed believers. I mean, think about the two texts we read for this morning. One the one hand, we have this incredible creator, who it seems can create anything and everything and on the other this deeply spiritual God, willing to live and die as a human being, as one of us, on our behalf. So, we have this God: Father, Son and Holy Spirit calling us to discipleship and service, and we seem to be incapable, maybe the word should be unwilling, we seem to be unwilling to make the final commitment. I don’t understand. Perhaps our teaching in the church is as bad as Brokhoff’s thought twenty-five years ago.

 

I am still in contact with some people from the church I mentioned earlier, and in fact, I was recently contacted about its 50^th anniversary celebration. In the course of the conversation with the Director of Children’s Ministries, we talked about how things are going there, how the congregation is doing, just catching up. She shared a candid conversation she’d had with a member of the Christian Education committee a couple of weeks ago—a woman who was a member when I was still a pastor at the church. They talked about commitment—why is it so hard to recruit teachers and volunteers, why is it so hard to get consistent attendance at children and youth events, why don’t people center their lives on the church—the same kinds of things we ask at St. Philip. The woman’s response was frank. She explained that her kids were in select sports leagues and that she and her husband paid thousands of dollars per child per year to be on these teams. The expectation from the coaches is explicit: if the kid misses a practice, they are not permitted to play for two games. While this family is fairly active in the life of the church—they are usually at worship and Sunday school—they feel like they are giving as much as they can give to the church at this time. So they miss a youth group meeting, so they miss Sunday school—they come when it is convenient for them. I was so saddened to hear this story. Truly saddened but not surprised. How can the church compete with that? Seriously. How can the church compete with that? We struggle to convince congregations to pay the required per capita on our members and select sports teams are charging an unbelievable amount of money per kid per season. Per capita is only a handful of dollars per member, by the way.

 

Somewhere in our story, the church has failed you. We have failed to move you from being joyfully baptized in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit into an understanding of what teaching you everything Jesus has commanded really means. Because coming to church should not be boring. Sharing your faith should not be a chore. Teaching Sunday School should be at the top of your list. Spending time with each one of your brothers and sisters in faith should be as exhilarating as it was the first time you realized that you believed in a gracious and loving God. And by the way, none of this has anything to do with how smart you are or how smart you think you are or how smart you think you need to be. We spend our whole lives learning what it means to be a child of God. Sometimes our teachers are expected—the person with the PhD in Theology from Princeton—and sometimes our teachers are unexpected—the kid with the runny nose who sits quietly in the Sunday school class we teach but who says the most profoundly theological things we have ever heard. But for any of these good blessings to happen, we must be present. We must be present, and we must leave behind the old ways of doing things—isn’t that what we are called to do in our baptism?—we must leave behind the old ways and embrace the new ways of doing things. The old life is gone, see, a new life has begun. So, friends, I invite each one of you into this new life we are called to. John Wesley, the founder of the Methodist tradition wrote in his journal of an experience he had while listening to a sermon. He had been feeling particularly down after what he considered an unsuccessful mission trip to America. As the preacher was mid-sermon, Wesley had a profoundly spiritual awakening. In Wesley’s own words, “while he was describing the change which God works in the heart through faith in Christ, I felt my heart strangely warmed. I felt I did trust in Christ, Christ alone, for salvation; and an assurance was given me that He had taken away my sins, even mine, and saved me from the law of sin and death.” Did John Wesley feel this call to new life when his heart was strangely warmed? Can we renew our call? “Now the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain to which Jesus had directed them. When they saw him, they worshiped him; but some doubted. And Jesus came and said to them, "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. And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age."” Amen.

 

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Bibliography

Brokhoff, John R. Lectionary Preaching Workbook, Series A. C.S.S. Publishing, Lima, Ohio, 1986.

The New Oxford Annotated Bible with Apocrypha, New Revised Standard Version.