Feast of The Holy Trinity

Readings: Isaiah 6:1-7 | Romans 11:33-36 | John 3:1-17

Text: Isaiah 6:1-7; John 3:1-17

Who is God? That question is the foundation all religion, all spirituality, all philosophy, all science, and all human knowledge. The answer to that question affects how we understand everything.

The atheist answers the question by saying no one is God. That answer shapes their every thought. Every idea must be filtered through their answer. Only the ideas which fit their answer can be considered. The agnostic, who calls him or herself “spiritual but not religious” is the same way. Every thought is filtered through this lens of who God is, for the Muslim, the Hindu, the Buddhist, the pagan, and even the Christian. Who is God matters that much. It affects everything. 

Who God is lets us know what in this world is important. Who God is shows us who is an ally and who is an enemy. At its very core, this question is at the root of every war that’s ever been fought. Some definitions of God have caused worse evils than others. The atheist’s answer, so far, causing the most deaths of all. That’s because who gets to say who God is has the most power in the whole universe. And every single person wants that power for themselves.

Do not think that you and I are so different. We want to define God using our terms and our experiences. We want God to be all the things we find positive, and to be none of the things we find problematic. Even us Christians like to find all the parts in Scripture that define God in the terms we like, and we pass over the parts of Scripture that describe God as someone we don’t like. All the while, we forget that it is not people who define God. It is not the Church who defines God. Only God can tell us who He is. And whether we like what He has to say or not, it doesn’t change who He is. He is the God who has revealed Himself to prophets and apostles, and told them to bear witness to what they had seen.

We don’t get to pick and choose from those witnesses and piece together our own picture.

• Early in the Church, in the second century in Rome, a man named Marcion tried to say Jesus was a different God than the one of the Old Testament. He liked the parts of Jesus that were about love and forgiveness, but ignored the parts where Jesus says the whole Old Testament is about Him.
• A few generations later, in North Africa, Arius tried to say that Jesus wasn’t really God; just the highest creature. Arius liked the parts where Jesus obeyed the Father, but ignored the parts where Jesus said that He and the Father are one. 
• A hundred years after that, Nestorius tried to differentiate between the divine and human natures of Jesus. He went so far as to say that Mary, who gave birth to Jesus, only gave birth to a human being. She could not be the mother of God, because God had no beginning. He liked the parts of Scripture that said God did not change who He is. But he ignored the part where the Word became flesh and dwelled among us.

When we pick and choose which parts of God are part of God, then the god we come up with isn’t the same one who reveals Himself to us. 

It sure makes us feel good. Who wants to be made in God’s image and at His mercy, when we can remake god into our own image instead? Package that god in shiny wrappings. Market that god in a way that appeals to me and others like me. Sell that god so that others buy into to it, buy into me. Who is god in such a scheme? You are god, I am god, and any other god is competing with us for space. We don’t actually care which of these gods wins, so long as it’s ours. And this cycle of sin and death and war continues on endlessly. It was going on before we were born. It will carry on after we die. So attached we are to the gods of our own creation, that we do not give them up easily. We love the idols make by our own hands, even if we call that idol Jesus and use the cross as its symbol.

But who God is isn’t up to us; God is who He shows Himself to be. In the year King Uzziah died, Isaiah saw God. The sight of God terrified him. Why? Not because God was ugly, or terrible, or evil. But because Isaiah was. “Woe is me! For I am lost.; For I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst a people of unclean lips.” The idolatry that infects us all also stained Isaiah. And bringing such sin before a holy and just God is a fully justified death sentence. 

But the Lord didn’t only reveal Himself to be perfect. He isn’t just the bringer of justice upon the sinner. He isn’t just holy to burn us into crispy critters. He also is Someone who gives. Even in that throne room of God, before the Lord, is an altar. And on that altar is a sacrifice. That sacrifice has been burned, reminding one of the sin offering God had ordained before. And the hot coals of what is left is carried to Isaiah and pressed against his lips. But no mention is made of searing pain, like we would imagine. Instead, the hot embers of the sacrifice made upon that altar took away all Isaiah’s guilt. That sacrifice upon his lips atoned for all Isaiah’s sin.

God is someone who offers the one needed and worthy sacrifice–His own sacrifice—in order that we may be forgiven. And our Gospel lesson today reveals who that sacrifice is. The Lord, who is high and lifted up is He also who descended from heaven. He came down not to scorch this wicked world with His holiness. The exalted “Son of Man must be lifted up.”

This is the way that God loved the world. This is the way that God loves every one of us rebellious, sinful, and hateful people. The Father gave His Son. He gave Him into our hands. And the most worthy people on the planet—the Jews who had the oracles of God, who had the commandments, who were the best of the best among this fallen race—killed the Lord of glory [Romans 3:2; 1 Corinthians 2:8]. By our sin, we killed God. Why would God give us His Son if that’s what we were going to do? God didn’t give His Son in order to condemn the world (although it was well-deserved), but in order that the world would be saved through that sacrifice of His Son. That’s who God is. We know who He is by what He says and what He does. 

And the Father did not leave the His Son behind. The Son said to the Father, “You will not abandon my soul to Sheol, or let your Holy One see corruption.” (Psalm 16:10) On the third Day, the Son rose from the dead. The Father is God; the Son is God; the Holy Spirit is God. Because God has revealed Himself to us in this way. He is a God who both loves and demands justice for sin. He is a God who both insists on holiness and also has mercy. He is a God who demands a sacrifice for sins and becomes that blameless sacrifice Himself. He is a God who rightly sentences to death, and who has conquered death for all who die by dying in our place. He is a God with no beginning who is born. He is a God with no end who dies. He is a God who reveals who He is to us by what He does, which we joyously confess in the Creeds.

Who is God? He is the God who washes us in His Holy Baptism. He is the God who gives us His Holy Body and Blood, born of Mary, to eat and to drink. He is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Not three gods, but one God, who is the foundation of all existence, including our own. And that is what we receive when we make the sign of the cross on ourselves: In the Name + of Jesus. Amen.