Holy Astonishment & Sacred Familiarity - A Sermon for Trinity Sunday

Well, it’s that time of year again. It’s the late spring feast day that preachers the world over dread. It’s Trinity Sunday. To be fair, I think Trinity Sunday can be difficult for all people of faith, not just preachers. In a few moments, we’ll say the Confession of Sin together for the first time since Maundy Thursday. And now that the Great Fifty Days are over, there are significantly fewer “Alleluias” in our worship. Today may be a major feast day, but we have officially landed in the liturgical season of Ordinary Time, and this can be a tough transition.

The shift is noticeable in our lectionary, as well. We marked the Easter season with stories of the risen Christ and the early church. Now here we are, nine weeks out from Easter Sunday with a complicated, pre-resurrection story in the Gospel. The joy of resurrection, and the confidence it brought us, is starting to fade. Like the disciples after the Ascension, we too must stand on our own two feet, so to speak, and start embodying resurrection without all the trappings of Easter. It feels a bit like leaving the nest.

But, now that Pentecost has come and gone, we’ve got all three persons of the Trinity, which means we’ve got everything we need. No more shirking our responsibilities, it’s time to be the Body of Christ in the world. As it turns out, that’s really hard. Plus, the church calendar wants us to try to unpack Trinitarian theology today which can make a girl feel very foot-stompy.

I would like nothing more than to climb back into that proverbial nest where Jesus did most of the heavy lifting and the Gospel passages spoke for themselves. Instead, in today’s passage from John’s Gospel, Jesus says explicitly that his message for us might be more than we can bear right now. And just like that, the last of our Eastertide certainty flies out the window. In its place, the lectionary offers us wisdom.

The book of Proverbs offers us an incredible description of how wisdom has been present in the world since the beginning of time, and how it calls out for us to see it in every aspect of creation. But the wisdom of Proverbs is not simply intelligence, cleverness, or even keen judgment. Benedictine nun and theologian Joan Chittister describes wisdom this way: “Wisdom is holy astonishment, complete wonder and awe at what God does in my life and the life of everyone around me. Wisdom is the first thing God created.”

You have all heard many a sermon from this very pulpit about the faithfulness of wonder. We are a congregation that delights in creation and finds meaning in acknowledging the vast and miraculous qualities of God compared to our small but valuable presence on the earth. This perspective is the wisdom Proverbs proclaims and it is indeed a holy antidote to the certainty and complacency we are tempted to cling to as we transition into this new season in the life of the Church.

Wisdom pursues us relentlessly, but it does not bring rest. Wisdom startles us. It awakens us to the magnitude of the work to be done for the Kingdom of God. Moving into Ordinary Time from Pentecost is like a snowball that grows as it tumbles downhill. The mission is immense, and as Jesus promised, we only fully grasp it in pieces, over time. This pattern of constant surprise can wear on us. Sometimes, even when it’s good and holy, we don’t want new and shocking, we want safe and familiar, or at least a good balance between the two.

Several years ago, I visited a dear friend who was living in Northern Japan. It was a rural area, but there was an Anglican Church nearby, so of course we went. I was admittedly jet lagged and experiencing a pinch of culture shock, so it only took about five minutes of full Japanese language worship for me to get totally and completely lost. But about halfway through the service, we all stood up and the congregation began speaking in union. My Episcopalian instincts locked into the pacing and I realized, without understanding a single word, that we were at the Nicene Creed.

I was having a wonderful trip exploring a new and exciting place. Still, recognizing something deeply familiar was a huge comfort. I tearfully and quietly recited the Creed in English, and the service turned out to be one of the most life-giving I’ve ever participated in. In the midst of my astonishment at the newness all around me, I managed to find something familiar that grounded me.

This interconnection between wisdom - holy astonishment - and familiarity is at the heart of Trinity Sunday. Before his Ascension, Jesus promised that we would not be left comfortless. Our comfort comes when the Holy Spirit enters the picture and the full Trinity is present. Because then, even when the world is totally and completely astonishing, we will be able to recognize God’s presence and we will be recognized in return. We will know that we are not alone.

The gift of the Trinity is relationship. Our God is triune, relational by nature, and so is our call to be God’s children. We cannot be Christians alone, we must discern, grow, learn, and practice our faith in community. While God is always making things new, our faithful relationships remind us of who we are and who created us, and that we cannot ever be truly alone thanks to the love of a Trinitarian God.

This is not just lofty theology for an esoteric occasion. The way the Trinity holds us between wisdom and familiarity impacts our daily lives. When I am struggling to determine the next right step, I often hear my mother’s voice in my head. Even after all these years without her - and all the times we disagreed - I find strength and comfort in her holy wisdom. Not simply because the older I get the smarter she gets, but because the longer I strive and the more I risk to proclaim the Gospel of Christ, the more I need reminding of who I am, and that I am not alone.

Yesterday, people all over the nation gathered in celebration and in protest, bearing witness to our remarkably divided social and political culture. In the face of which, our holy astonishment calls us to proclaim God’s truth boldly to the broken places of the world. God’s message of peace and freedom for the vulnerable needs to be heard. This is the moment Jesus has prepared us for. We may not feel ready, but our time is now.

And yet, in the midst of chaos, grief and loss, there will be familiarity. We will see the God we know and love in unexpected places. When we need it most, Jesus’ words will come back to us with clarity and understanding. We will find moments of connection with those we’ve lost. We will remember who we are and to whom we belong. We will discover that we can remain grounded in relationship with one another and with God.

So, I don’t know if I’ve revealed to you any new insights about this complicated doctrine that is the foundation of our faith. But whether you’re a lifelong Episcopalian or still new to our way of worshipping, I encourage you to look for moments of astonishment and moments of familiarity as we pray our way into Ordinary Time. And remember that with the coming of the Holy Spirit, the gang’s all here, we are not alone, and we have everything we need to be the Body of Christ in the world. Amen.