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+ + + In Nomine Jesu + + +
Please join me in prayer: May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be pleasing in your sight, O Lord, our Rock and our Redeemer. Amen.
Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,
Grace to you and peace from God our Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ.
This past Tuesday night, the weathercaster on the ten‑o’clock news I saw talked about a storm cell moving southeast out of Oklahoma. The weathercaster said that that storm was not likely to make it to East Texas. Early the next morning, when booming thunder and heavy rainfall awakened me before my alarm clock, I knew that that forecast was wrong. Not that I was surprised, mind you, when I worked in television newsrooms probably the most‑frequent viewer‑complaint telephone call was about the accuracy (or maybe I should say “in-accuracy”) of the weather forecast. Sometimes I had to remind the complaining viewers that the weathercasters were really only guessing. Sure, they have all sorts of high-tech equipment, but what Jesus in today’s Third Reading said to Nicodemus is in some sense still true of them: they do not know from where the wind comes or to where the wind goes. In the Third Reading, Jesus likens Nicodemus’s inability to understand the wind to his inability to understand those born of the Spirit, which birth of the Spirit Nicodemus seemed to think was impossible. We may have similar thoughts about what is or is not possible relative to the Triune God, so, on this Trinity Sunday, we spend a few minutes focusing our thoughts on the theme of “Understanding the Possibility of the Triune”.
In these seventeen verses from St. John’s divinely‑inspired Gospel account that we heard as our Third Reading, Jesus contrasts what Nicodemus and (apparently) the Jews “know” with what Jesus and (apparently) the Father and the Spirit “know”, and, based on that comparison, Jesus makes clear that Nicodemus does not “understand” the very things Nicodemus (apparently) was noted for teaching. Just as “understanding” is an important part of today’s Third Reading, so is what is “possible”. Six times in only seven verses Nicodemus or Jesus speaks of what is or is not “possible”, what can or cannot “be done” or simply “be”. And, the Triune God is a part of this Reading, too, perhaps most obviously with God the Father loving the world so much that He gave His only Son, saving whoever believes in Him and is born of water and the Spirit. So, our theme of “Understanding the Possibility of the Triune” is a fitting one. As St. John says just before today’s Third Reading, Jesus knows what was in man, and so Jesus knew what was in this man of the Pharisees, Nicodemus. Jesus knew Nicodemus did not understand the possibility of the Triune, and with one sentence Jesus “sweeps away all that Nicodemus stood for”, and Jesus calls for Nicodemus to “be remade by the power of God.” How about us? Do we understand the possibility of the Triune? Do we need to be remade by the power of God?
To be sure, there are lots of things that we probably at least think we know and understand, and some of them may even be things that we on our own can and do know and understand. Yet, in today’s Third Reading Jesus makes clear that “that which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.” Since the fall into sin, flesh on its own has no knowledge or understanding of God, and flesh can do nothing to save itself from being lost in sin. By nature, we do not understand the possibility of the Triune. By nature we do not know what we really need, which is to be remade by the power of God—to be born anew from above of water and the Spirit, as in Holy Baptism.
The rulers of the Jews, (apparently) including Nicodemus, went out to the Jordan River where John the Baptizer was baptizing and so, along with that, calling people to repentance, but many of the rulers of the Jews did not repent. They would not turn from their sins in sorrow and trust God to forgive their sins. God similarly calls you and me to repent. Do we turn from our sins in sorrow and trust Him to forgive our sins? Do we recognize that by nature we have no knowledge or understanding of God? Do we know that we can do nothing to save ourselves from the punishment now and forever that we deserve? Do we recognize that we do not understand the possibility of the Triune? Do we know we need to be born anew from above of water and the Spirit? When we turn from our sins and trust God to forgive them, God does just that—He forgives them for Jesus’s sake.
Jesus is the only Son, Whom God the Father gave out of His great love for you and for me, so that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life. Jesus is the Son of Man Who de‑scended from heaven, was lifted up on the cross as the serpent in the wilderness, and a‑scended into heaven (as Peter in today’s Second Reading preached so clearly), so that whoever believes in Jesus may have eternal life. Jesus is the Word the Father speaks of Whom the Spirit testifies, which testimony the Spirit enables us to receive by faith and so be forgiven of all of our sins by grace through faith in Jesus. God’s will and plan to save us in Jesus are the heavenly things God wants us to believe. Nicodemus may not have truly believed when he first came to Jesus by night, and Nicodemus even may not have yet truly believed later when he essentially asked his fellow rulers to give Jesus a hearing and learn what Jesus was doing, but Nicodemus certainly seems to have believed by the end of St. John’s Gospel account, when Nicodemus brought myrrh and aloes for use in Jesus’s burial. Believing, Nicodemus was forgiven and saved, as are we. Believing, we are forgiven of all our sins, whatever our sins might be, and us who believe God remakes by His power working through His Word in all its forms.
In the Third Reading, Jesus says that unenlightened fleshly knowledge does not know from where one born of the Spirit comes or to where one born of the Spirit goes, but, when we receive the testimony of the Triune God, we understand the possibility of the Triune. We may not fully understand how there can possibly be three distinct Persons in one divine substance, nor may we fully understand how one Person of that divine substance can possibly be made man and crucified without the other two Persons being made man and crucified, but God reveals to us—and so we know—how God possibly remakes us by His Word and what the benefit is of that remaking. There, at the Baptismal Font, God gives us a new birth from above, of water and the Spirit. In the Third Reading Jesus said that unless one is born of water and the Spirit he or she cannot enter the kingdom of God, and so, under normal circumstances, Holy Baptism is “necessary” for salvation. Similarly, Jesus later in St. John’s Gospel account says that unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink His blood, you have no life in you. Thus, under normal circumstances, receiving the Lord’s Supper is in some sense also “necessary” for salvation. For, as we sing “Holy, Holy, Holy”, the song of our First Reading, heavenly food from this altar touches us and removes our sin and its guilt. By Word and Sacrament, God’s remaking us is not only possible but His remaking us is also accomplished.
For a number of years that I was in television news, I worked with some very good meteorologists, even though they were occasionally wrong, since they were working with imperfect knowledge. On the other hand, what our Triune God knows and speaks, sees and testifies is perfect. His remaking us is already accomplished as He sees it and as we know it to be true, even if in this lifetime we do not yet fully experience or understand that remaking as accomplished. Remade, we should love God and our fellow human beings better than we do, and we should not keep on sinning as we do. However, as we continue to repent and believe, to live in the forgiveness of sins, our experience is not what matters. Rather, we trust God’s testimony to us and receive as true what He says about us: that our remaking is accomplished; we are forgiven. We understand that with the Triune God, all things are possible, chiefly our salvation. We conclude with St. Paul’s words to the Ephesians (3:20-21) about the possibility of the Triune:
Now to Him Who is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think, according to the power at work within us, to Him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, forever and ever. Amen.
The peace of God, which passes all understanding, keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.
+ + + Soli Deo Gloria + + +