Working Together As One
Sermon
Sermons On The First Readings
Series I, Cycle C
Nature is filled with examples of how the world functions better when things come together and act as one. Ancient philosophers understood this need for unity quite well. In their efforts to explain the world which they observed, they postulated, without the advantage of modern science, that all things were composed of four basic elements: earth, water, air, and fire. Everything that existed was a measured combination of these four elements and could exist in no other way. Earth was the "stuff" of the object observed. Water was added to the stuff to form it into various objects, be it a rock, tree, or human being; air was what filled the stuff. Fire was the glue which solidified the earth, air, and water combination. All things existed as a combination where four became one.
Ancient civilizations also discovered, I am sure quite by accident, the value of alloy metals. Probably around some evening fire two dissimilar metals were melted, mixed, and then when cooled formed a third metal which was stronger, longer-lasting, and more durable than either of its constituent elements. Brass and bronze are good examples. Brass is made from a combination of copper and zinc; bronze is created from a fusion of copper and tin. The copper, zinc, and tin each contribute in important and unique ways to create the third metal. Brass and bronze can exist only in these ways.
A river system is another example of nature's desire for unity. The Mississippi River system is a good example. The Mississippi itself is formed in the northern regions of Minnesota from a combination of several tributaries. As it flows south it combines with additional rivers, two of which, the Ohio and the Missouri, are mighty in their own right. When the Mississippi flows into the Gulf of Mexico it is a unity of many which act as one.
Nature in seeking unity imitates in a very real way the oneness that is God. This is an appropriate image as we celebrate the Holy Trinity and our belief in God as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Throughout the Christian era, theologians have made attempts by use of models or other analogies to understand the Trinity. Augustine analogized the Trinity to the processes of the brain -- memory, intelligence, and will. A person's mind could only exist if these three constitutive parts were present. Thomas Aquinas, the great scholastic theologian and philosopher, and even the twentieth-century German Jesuit, Karl Rahner, wrote extensively on the Trinity. After 2,000 years, however, the Trinity is and will remain a mystery of the faith. Along the road as well several infamous heresies have arisen in attempts to explain God's action in the world, including Modalism, a fourth-century concept which said that God has acted in history at different times in different modes, initially as Creator, later as Redeemer, and later still as Sanctifier, but not as a unity.
Despite all the intellectual attempts to understand this fundamental mystery of our faith we are no closer to perfect knowledge, but as our reading from the book of Proverbs indicates, we do know that the way God exists is how it was ordained by God. God's first great action was to create all that we have. We hear that wisdom is the great creation of God, existing before the physical and material world. Wisdom was present with God at the creation of the world, rejoicing with the Lord in what God created. Wisdom is seen to be preeminent. If God's wisdom preceded creation, then God is the one who created all. God created the world, but God did not stop. Rather, our world is recreated each day through the dynamic forces present and the miracle of life which produces all sorts of new forms, both plant and animal throughout the centuries.
God's second action in the world is redemption in the person of Jesus Christ. Saint Paul tells us in his letters that it is through the faith given us by Jesus that we have the ability to boast, not only of our ecstacies, but of our afflictions as well, with the certainty that through faith we can persevere.
Sanctification in the person of the Holy Spirit is God's third action in our world. It is the Holy Spirit, God's Spirit, who came in a special way on Pentecost Sunday to dispel fear and doubt, to enlighten, and as Jesus says in the Gospels to guide us. It is God's Spirit active in the world which guides all creation and gives all men and women the opportunity to exercise faith in order to build the Kingdom of God in our world.
God has acted in history in different ways, but always as a unity of one. God can only be God in this one way, a unity, a community enveloped in love which is the Creator, Redeemer, and Sanctifier -- Father, Son, and Spirit. The most fundamental revelatory characteristic of the Trinity is that the unity of God is lived as a community of love. Salvation history demonstrates this through the mighty acts of Yahweh recorded in the Hebrew Scriptures, the miracles and message of Jesus of Nazareth as recorded by the Gospel evangelists, and the action of the Spirit who descended upon the Apostles at Pentecost. Besides Salvation History the communitarian nature of God has been expressed through the human understanding of the mutual indwelling of the Godhead. In the Orthodox tradition we are told that the divine persons within God draw life from each other. The divine persons in God sustain each other through a community of mutual love.
As nature seeks to imitate the unity of God, so must we, God's greatest creation, search for greater unity in our lives. We have some good examples of human solidarity with which we are all familiar. How is it that peoples from many lands, every continent, and numerous tongues could come together in what was described in the early part of our century as the "melting pot" and be as one nation? Why would fifty independent and sovereign governments choose to forego their autonomy and form one United States of America? More fundamentally, how is it that two people, sometimes very different, can through the magic of love and lots of hard work come together as one through marriage?
We must seek unity in every aspect of our lives. In the work place, if we can form one unit and work together then the tasks we undertake become easier and are completed more swiftly, the product we produce is of better quality, and the possibility for future work becomes greater. In our neighborhoods if we come together we can celebrate who we are as a community. Using the Saul Alinksky approach of organizing, we can find methods which will allow us to come together to accomplish important tasks of advocacy or the important business of political action. We can celebrate as one in block parties and we can watch over each other through Neighborhood Watch programs. In our families we most especially need to come together. Families, especially with the hectic pace of life today that often forces both parents to work and the demands of time and energy, must, despite the challenge, come together as one. Families must not only eat together, they must pray together as well. Families must make decisions and they need to do it together. Families need to experience both the agonies and the ecstacies, as the famous novelist Irving Stone would say, and they must do it together. Whether it is the company, the neighborhood, or the family, each person contributes in a unique and important way.
Humankind lives Trinitarian faith, the unity of God, by our common response to the generic call to holiness and by the relationships we enjoy. The closer we come to imitating Christ and living his message of love, the more developed our relations with others will become. We must live for others and by this example of discipleship experience more fully the triune life of God. Our life in Christ must be one that imitates the co-equality of God; oppression, domination, and the objectification of others are incompatible with Trinitarian faith. As Saint Paul writes, "There is no longer Jew or Greek, there is no longer slave or free, there is no longer male or female, for all of you are one in Christ Jesus" (Galatians 3:28). Living as Christ lived gives us the perfect model for a community of faith. Since through Jesus we have the revelation of the triune God, and with the triune God community, it follows that in order to live Trinitarian faith we must be people who live for others. We do so in the ordinary and the great things of our daily lives. If our attitude ever centered on ourselves, today's celebration of the Trinity must tell us that we need to live more fully for others, in imitation of Jesus, who lived totally for others.
Living for others and seeking to be united, as God Incarnate, Jesus Christ, lived for others and is united with the Father and the Spirit, must be our goal. Jesus himself prayed for this very thing. John the Evangelist (17:21) records Jesus' prayer before he died in this way: "That they may all be one. As you, Father, are in me and I am in you, may they also be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me." My friends, may we act and believe the same.
Ancient civilizations also discovered, I am sure quite by accident, the value of alloy metals. Probably around some evening fire two dissimilar metals were melted, mixed, and then when cooled formed a third metal which was stronger, longer-lasting, and more durable than either of its constituent elements. Brass and bronze are good examples. Brass is made from a combination of copper and zinc; bronze is created from a fusion of copper and tin. The copper, zinc, and tin each contribute in important and unique ways to create the third metal. Brass and bronze can exist only in these ways.
A river system is another example of nature's desire for unity. The Mississippi River system is a good example. The Mississippi itself is formed in the northern regions of Minnesota from a combination of several tributaries. As it flows south it combines with additional rivers, two of which, the Ohio and the Missouri, are mighty in their own right. When the Mississippi flows into the Gulf of Mexico it is a unity of many which act as one.
Nature in seeking unity imitates in a very real way the oneness that is God. This is an appropriate image as we celebrate the Holy Trinity and our belief in God as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Throughout the Christian era, theologians have made attempts by use of models or other analogies to understand the Trinity. Augustine analogized the Trinity to the processes of the brain -- memory, intelligence, and will. A person's mind could only exist if these three constitutive parts were present. Thomas Aquinas, the great scholastic theologian and philosopher, and even the twentieth-century German Jesuit, Karl Rahner, wrote extensively on the Trinity. After 2,000 years, however, the Trinity is and will remain a mystery of the faith. Along the road as well several infamous heresies have arisen in attempts to explain God's action in the world, including Modalism, a fourth-century concept which said that God has acted in history at different times in different modes, initially as Creator, later as Redeemer, and later still as Sanctifier, but not as a unity.
Despite all the intellectual attempts to understand this fundamental mystery of our faith we are no closer to perfect knowledge, but as our reading from the book of Proverbs indicates, we do know that the way God exists is how it was ordained by God. God's first great action was to create all that we have. We hear that wisdom is the great creation of God, existing before the physical and material world. Wisdom was present with God at the creation of the world, rejoicing with the Lord in what God created. Wisdom is seen to be preeminent. If God's wisdom preceded creation, then God is the one who created all. God created the world, but God did not stop. Rather, our world is recreated each day through the dynamic forces present and the miracle of life which produces all sorts of new forms, both plant and animal throughout the centuries.
God's second action in the world is redemption in the person of Jesus Christ. Saint Paul tells us in his letters that it is through the faith given us by Jesus that we have the ability to boast, not only of our ecstacies, but of our afflictions as well, with the certainty that through faith we can persevere.
Sanctification in the person of the Holy Spirit is God's third action in our world. It is the Holy Spirit, God's Spirit, who came in a special way on Pentecost Sunday to dispel fear and doubt, to enlighten, and as Jesus says in the Gospels to guide us. It is God's Spirit active in the world which guides all creation and gives all men and women the opportunity to exercise faith in order to build the Kingdom of God in our world.
God has acted in history in different ways, but always as a unity of one. God can only be God in this one way, a unity, a community enveloped in love which is the Creator, Redeemer, and Sanctifier -- Father, Son, and Spirit. The most fundamental revelatory characteristic of the Trinity is that the unity of God is lived as a community of love. Salvation history demonstrates this through the mighty acts of Yahweh recorded in the Hebrew Scriptures, the miracles and message of Jesus of Nazareth as recorded by the Gospel evangelists, and the action of the Spirit who descended upon the Apostles at Pentecost. Besides Salvation History the communitarian nature of God has been expressed through the human understanding of the mutual indwelling of the Godhead. In the Orthodox tradition we are told that the divine persons within God draw life from each other. The divine persons in God sustain each other through a community of mutual love.
As nature seeks to imitate the unity of God, so must we, God's greatest creation, search for greater unity in our lives. We have some good examples of human solidarity with which we are all familiar. How is it that peoples from many lands, every continent, and numerous tongues could come together in what was described in the early part of our century as the "melting pot" and be as one nation? Why would fifty independent and sovereign governments choose to forego their autonomy and form one United States of America? More fundamentally, how is it that two people, sometimes very different, can through the magic of love and lots of hard work come together as one through marriage?
We must seek unity in every aspect of our lives. In the work place, if we can form one unit and work together then the tasks we undertake become easier and are completed more swiftly, the product we produce is of better quality, and the possibility for future work becomes greater. In our neighborhoods if we come together we can celebrate who we are as a community. Using the Saul Alinksky approach of organizing, we can find methods which will allow us to come together to accomplish important tasks of advocacy or the important business of political action. We can celebrate as one in block parties and we can watch over each other through Neighborhood Watch programs. In our families we most especially need to come together. Families, especially with the hectic pace of life today that often forces both parents to work and the demands of time and energy, must, despite the challenge, come together as one. Families must not only eat together, they must pray together as well. Families must make decisions and they need to do it together. Families need to experience both the agonies and the ecstacies, as the famous novelist Irving Stone would say, and they must do it together. Whether it is the company, the neighborhood, or the family, each person contributes in a unique and important way.
Humankind lives Trinitarian faith, the unity of God, by our common response to the generic call to holiness and by the relationships we enjoy. The closer we come to imitating Christ and living his message of love, the more developed our relations with others will become. We must live for others and by this example of discipleship experience more fully the triune life of God. Our life in Christ must be one that imitates the co-equality of God; oppression, domination, and the objectification of others are incompatible with Trinitarian faith. As Saint Paul writes, "There is no longer Jew or Greek, there is no longer slave or free, there is no longer male or female, for all of you are one in Christ Jesus" (Galatians 3:28). Living as Christ lived gives us the perfect model for a community of faith. Since through Jesus we have the revelation of the triune God, and with the triune God community, it follows that in order to live Trinitarian faith we must be people who live for others. We do so in the ordinary and the great things of our daily lives. If our attitude ever centered on ourselves, today's celebration of the Trinity must tell us that we need to live more fully for others, in imitation of Jesus, who lived totally for others.
Living for others and seeking to be united, as God Incarnate, Jesus Christ, lived for others and is united with the Father and the Spirit, must be our goal. Jesus himself prayed for this very thing. John the Evangelist (17:21) records Jesus' prayer before he died in this way: "That they may all be one. As you, Father, are in me and I am in you, may they also be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me." My friends, may we act and believe the same.
