One God, One Calling, One Hope

This morning is Trinity Sunday, a celebration held every year on the Sunday after Pentecost…any guesses when the first Trinity Sunday was? Trinity Sunday was first observed on the Sunday after Pentecost around 900, but it wasn’t until the 1300’s that it became a celebration that the whole church observed. It is a day to honor the Trinitarian nature of God. So this morning, we turn to the Doctrine of the Trinity. A Doctrine is a statement of what we believe.

What do we believe about the Triune God – God who is the Father almighty, the Lord Jesus Christ, and the Holy Spirit – One God. The word Trinity is not in Scripture. Nowhere in the Bible does it say specifically that God is Triune. The relationship, though, of the Creator, Jesus, and the Spirit is described all throughout Scripture. The Doctrine of the Trinity is our attempt to explain what is described in Scripture. God in three persons are homoousion, one essence or substance, that are consubstantial, same substance despite different aspects or manifestations. Over the centuries, Councils of faithful church leaders have met and discussed it, they have put together some Latin words to try and explain, the most recent statement on the Doctrine of the Trinity from the Presbyterian Church (USA) was written in 2007 for the 217th General Assembly. Yet try as we might, ultimately, the details about how God who is Three-in-One works together are mystery.

We know that the Spirit and the Word were with God at creation, and the Word became flesh and blood. We know that the flesh and blood man Jesus prayed to the Father and promised the Spirit when he returned to the Father. We know that he commissioned us to make disciples of all and baptize them in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. We know that in Paul’s letters by about 20 years after the life of Jesus, the blessing he offered was for all three: “May the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all.” All three, together, with an equal role in a believer’s life.

And already we have in the passage from Ephesians this morning, an early doctrinal statement; it may have been a creed that they used at baptisms, an echo of Israel’s creed from Deuteronomy, “Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is One” and an affirmation of Christianity’s monotheism, “There is one body and one Spirit, just as you were called to one hope when you were called; 5 one Lord, one faith, one baptism; 6 one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all.”

There are several ways scholars have diagrammed these verses.
We have Body, Spirit, hope; Lord, faith, baptism. Either two sets of three, or three sets of two. The Body (the church) and the Lord (the head of the church), The Spirit (remember we are only able to confess Christ is Lord if we have received the Spirit) and faith, hope and baptism. And then after 6 statements of One, there is a final 7th One God. One repeated 7 times, the number of completion. And then a third set of 3, who is over all, through all, and in all. And some offer that perhaps those three positional descriptions match the persons of the Trinity: Almighty Father over all, Lord Jesus through all, the Spirit in all.

Eugene Peterson writes, “The symmetries and repetitions develop a kind of liturgical rhythm….The more we enter the unity, the more…we ‘lead a life worthy of the calling.” “The underlying and all-encompassing oneness that is church flows from the underlying and all-encompassing oneness that is God.”
We have One God. And One Calling. We describe that calling a lot of different ways: to lead a Christian life, to make disciples, to live a life worthy of the Gospel, to glorify God.

Danish theologian Soren Kierkegaard wrote about willing one thing. That one thing for Kierkegaard was to seek first the kingdom of God, to have purity of heart, to remain committed to God in all that he did, our one hope.

Now, that is a lot of words. But, what does it mean when you leave here today? We like to have clear instructions, a path to follow, steps to take. That’s why the self-help section of a bookstore exists, and so many TikToks are able to be monetized. Here’s the thing, though, none of those guides get us where we want to go. Happiness or contentment or success or legacy…a better life isn’t just around the corner if you just had more money or things or achievements or a better job.

It all goes back to the Doctrine of the Trinity. God is one-in-community, and we are made in the image of God. We are made to be one-in-community. The community Paul is writing to is in Ephesus, in modern-day Turkey, the people of Ephesus were Gentiles, not Jews. Paul went there and preached the Gospel to them and they believed. These Gentile converts aren’t to be another group in addition to the Jews who converted to Christianity. They are all one.

And this is the one calling that they have from the one God, who has one hope:
God’s intent, says Paul in Ephesians chapter 3, is that through the church, the manifold wisdom of God should be made known and that through faith in Christ we may approach God with boldness and confidence.

Our one calling is to live in such a way that demonstrates and communicates God’s glory. That is our one hope, our purpose, so that we can bask in God’s presence.
So, how do we do that? Paul says, “Conduct yourselves with all humility, meekness, and patience. Accept each other with love, and make an effort to preserve the unity of the Spirit with the peace that ties you together.”

It is all about community – about demonstrating the glory of the communal nature of God – it’s about church.

One church. In the Apostle’s Creed we call it the holy catholic church, and people sometimes get confused and ask why we say we believe in the catholic church because we are Protestant and not Catholic. The difference is that in the Apostle’s Creed, catholic is not a Proper noun, the c is lower case. The word catholic means universal.

One of the reports that I am excited about coming before General Assembly this year is from Churches Uniting in Christ. In 1960, 10 mainline denominations began consulting about unity, then in 2002 leaders from nine of the denominations met at the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, and agreed to begin to living together toward unity, deepening their relationships and seeking unity with justice. There are 5 task forces currently working and the next meeting just happens to be in Memphis this September.

God doesn’t intend for us to delineate capital “c” Catholic and lower case “c” catholic. God’s hope, God’s vision, is for us to be one – that is the kingdom of God.
God doesn’t intend for us to have denominations and to divide every time we disagree. We are to accept each other with love – you know sometimes we don’t like what someone is doing or how they are acting, but we still love them.

Here’s the problem with division – there is power in unity, when we come together, we can make a bigger difference, when we divide we diminish our impact. We have learned to come together most of the time if it involves mission. 16 denominations, including the PC(USA) are Covenant Members of Church World Services to respond to hunger, poverty, displacement and disaster in just and sustainable ways. Room in the Inn – Memphis brought together 37 congregations this year to offer congregation shelter to our neighbors experiencing homelessness. The Mexico Cistern Ministry brings together congregations in the US, a Presbyterian congregation in Castilla Brito, and families who need water to build cisterns, but also to be a witness of community. When we are on the worksite, we have 3 languages at once – English, Spanish, and an indigenous language, Chol – as we work side by side. Our partners were eager for us to come back after COVID, not because we are really good at shoveling sand and gravel, but because they said without us the Spirit was not in the work. When we are there, the families ask why we would come from our comfortable lives to serve – and that’s when our partners are able to share that we are following the example of Jesus – that’s when community shows God’s glory.

But, in other areas denominations and INDIVIDUAL congregations have not done as well preserving the unity of the Spirit. We separate over arguments about beliefs or behaviors, and then we have a hard time figuring out our way back together. But, that work, the work of unity, is the work of the Kingdom.
Show humility, meekness, patience. Accept each other with love.

SO THAT you will be a community – because community – many working as one in a way that is beyond full explanation – is a demonstration of God’s glory. That’s the kingdom of God.
One God. One Calling. One Hope.