Mapping Relationships

Sermon preached by the Rev. Lowell E. Grisham, Rector
St. Paul's Episcopal Church, Fayetteville, Arkansas
June 7, 2009; Trinity Sunday, Year B
Episcopal Revised Common Lectionary

(Collect for Trinity Sunday) – Almighty and everlasting God, you have given to us your servants grace, by the confession of a true faith, to acknowledge the glory of the eternal Trinity, and in the power of your divine Majesty to worship the Unity: Keep us steadfast in this faith and worship, and bring us at last to see you in your one and eternal glory, O Father; who with the Son and the Holy Spirit live and reign, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.
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We've had a beautiful week. It's a lovely time of the year in the Ozarks, isn't it? The sun and rain have greened the earth. We've had some cool evenings and mild sunny days. It's harder now to see the broken limbs from the ice storm and its frigid assault just a few months ago.

All of this teeming life and fecundity is a by-product of relationships. Our earth spins a complete circle on its axis once every twenty-four hours and its relationship to the sun's light gives us day and night. The planet revolves around the sun in a 365-day orbit, a relationship that measures our years; and a slight tilt of the earth's axis in relationship to the sun creates the beautiful flavor of our four seasons.

It's all made possible by relationships. The very being of our life is energized by the mass and movement of our earth, the light and energy of the sun, and the gravity and motion that defines the dance of life between them. The sun, the earth and the forces between them are a singular system that nurtures and sustains our very life.

Here's another way to think about it. The sun is the light and warmth beyond us, transcendent in the heavens, source of the energy that is creating life. We walk into the daylight, and feel the sun's intimate warmth on our face, its light beside us illuminating our way. We eat a meal, and the sun's vital energy is captured by photosynthesis, united to the ground of the earth, and converted into edible foods that sustain us within, entering and nourishing every molecule in our bodies. The sun beyond us, the sun beside us, the sun within us, energizing our world and blessing our lives.

We have an intimate, life-giving relationship with the sun. No wonder early humans worshiped the sun, as a powerful, generous source of life and light.

Well, I hope you've picked up the trinitarian flavor of this conversation thus far – the earth, the sun, and their relationship in space; the sun beyond us, beside us and within us, giving us energy for life. Trinitarian patterns. I'm convinced that a trinitarian pattern is imprinted in the heart of virtually everything in creation. From the dance of the atoms to the symphony of the stars, all of creation is in relationship, and relationship is fundamentally trinitarian.

For any relationship to exist, there must be self-definition between each of the parties and the relationship that exists between them. Atoms are a nucleus, electrons and the atomic field that connects them. For love to exist there must be the lover, the beloved and the love that unites them. For intelligence to occur there must be the thinker, the object of thought and thinking process itself. For creation to happen there must be creator, the medium of creation and the artful act of creating.

All of life is trinitarian, and in that sense everything is created in the image of God. We know God as one Being, a singular source of life and energy – Being Itself. And we experience God as three: God the Father, God-beyond-us; God the Son, God-beside-us; and God the Holy Spirit, God-within-us.

We look beyond us and sense the presence and power of God the source and creator of all, transcendent, "dwelling in light inaccessible from before time and for ever," as we pray in Eucharistic Prayer D. "Fountain of all life and source of all goodness, you made all things and fill them with your blessing; you created them to rejoice in the splendor of your radiance." We are moved with awe – to worship and adore God-beyond-us.

We also know that God has drawn near. Whenever human beings experience beauty, truth or goodness, we know the near presence of God, manifest in the ordinary stuff of our existence – the Second Person of the Holy Trinity, God-beside-us. In Jesus we see the human face of God, God incarnate as one of us, the Word made flesh. Showing us how to live as authentic humans, inviting us to walk with him along the way of life – Jesus, God-beside-us, our loving friend and guide.

We also know God within us, the divine agent of inner renewal and transformation, breathing all things into being, mysteriously present, energizing us with the yearning for union and wholeness that alone can fulfill us. God the Holy Spirit, loving us into being and then blowing us into the new and unexpected way of life – God-within-us.

C. S. Lewis enjoyed calling church doctrines, like the doctrine of the Holy Trinity, maps. They are maps of reality. Maps aren't the reality that they represent. If I follow a map to the Fayetteville square on Saturday morning and look up at the Farmers' Market, and then look down at a map of Fayetteville, I am turning from something real to something less real.

Even though a map is only colored paper, C. S. Lewis said that there are two things that are important about a map. First, a map is based on the cumulative experiences of thousands of people. A map of the Atlantic Ocean is based on the experience of thousands of people who have sailed and flown over the actual ocean. When we stand on the beach and gaze at the ocean, we have a "single glimpse." The "map fits all of those glimpses together." A map reflects the cumulative experiences of thousands of people.

And the second important thing about maps, Lewis said, is that if you want to go anywhere, you need the map. "As long as you are content with walks on the beach, your own glimpses are far more fun than looking at a map. But the map is going to be more use than walks on the beach if you want to get to [Europe]."

The church has a lot of maps. They chronicle the combined the experience of centuries of faithful people and their relationship with God and with one another. One of our maps is the doctrine of the Holy Trinity – God is One God in three Persons. It can be a fascinating thing just to look at that doctrine, to think about and ponder the theology of the Trinity.

But if you want to know God, you are going to have to let the map lead you into the reality it represents. You'll need to go exploring – let the map we call the Doctrine of the Holy Trinity lead you toward the reality that it describes.

Can you embrace the reality of God-beyond-us – the awesome, transcendent source of all that is, beyond time and forever? Can you walk with God-beside-us – the Way of love, compassion and courage inviting us to die in order to live? Can you enter the dazzling darkness of the immanent mystery within, the yearning spirit drawing us forward and deeper into transforming union?

What we are talking about is relationship. Our relationship with reality itself. Our dance with God, giving light and life to our being.

We look into the vast, infinite wonder of God-beyond-us and we experience ourselves in relationship to the all. We walk intimately in relationship with the loving presence of God-beside-us, leading and guiding us into life abundant. We open trustfully to God-within-us, the energizing spirit that breathes us into being from our inmost depths. It's all one God: creating, renewing, sustaining us into being. One relationship experienced in three persons. The Holy Trinity – our map revealing the experience of generations in relationship with the infinite and holy presence. The Holy Trinity – our map and guide into the fullness of our relationship with God.