Gen 18:1-15 The LORD appeared to Abraham by the oaks of Mamre, as he sat at the entrance of his tent in the heat of the day. He looked up and saw three men standing near him. When he saw them, he ran from the tent entrance to meet them, and bowed down to the ground. He said, ‘My lord, if I find favour with you, do not pass by your servant. Let a little water be brought, and wash your feet, and rest yourselves under the tree. Let me bring a little bread, that you may refresh yourselves, and after that you may pass on—since you have come to your servant.’ So they said, ‘Do as you have said.’ And Abraham hastened into the tent to Sarah, and said, ‘Make ready quickly three measures of choice flour, knead it, and make cakes.’ Abraham ran to the herd, and took a calf, tender and good, and gave it to the servant, who hastened to prepare it. Then he took curds and milk and the calf that he had prepared, and set it before them; and he stood by them under the tree while they ate.
They said to him, ‘Where is your wife Sarah?’ And he said, ‘There, in the tent.’ Then one said, ‘I will surely return to you in due season, and your wife Sarah shall have a son.’ And Sarah was listening at the tent entrance behind him. Now Abraham and Sarah were old, advanced in age; it had ceased to be with Sarah after the manner of women. So Sarah laughed to herself, saying, ‘After I have grown old, and my husband is old, shall I have pleasure?’ The Lord said to Abraham, ‘Why did Sarah laugh, and say, “Shall I indeed bear a child, now that I am old?” Is anything too wonderful for the Lord? At the set time I will return to you, in due season, and Sarah shall have a son.’ But Sarah denied, saying, ‘I did not laugh’; for she was afraid. He said, ‘Oh yes, you did laugh.’
2 Cor 13:11-13 Finally, brothers and sisters, farewell. Put things in order, listen to my appeal, agree with one another, live in peace; and the God of love and peace will be with you. Greet one another with a holy kiss. All the saints greet you. The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Spirit be with all of you.
“You put your right hand in, you put your right hand out, your put your right hand in and you shake it all about, you do the hokey pokey and you turn yourself around. That’s what it’s all about.” (Read in a serious voice).
One thing that I have noticed is that kids love to dance. We had to teach our Luke lots of things—sharing, high fives, holding a spoon—the list goes on. But we never had to teach him to dance. Before he could even walk, whenever music was playing he was wanting to show his moves. I have noticed this about other kids too. Music sets their whole bodies moving.
We teach our kids fun songs that involve the body in action. I think that circle dances are some of the best. Like Ring around the Rosie, or the Hokey Pokey, it gets them moving and interrelating with other kids. These group dances teach our kids about right and left, where their arms are, and how to play with other children. I like circle dances because they are a historic form of dancing.
For instance, the Hokey Pokey was copyrighted in 1950, but its roots go far beyond that to many sources. One of the theories about the origin of the Hokey Pokey is that it came from an old Shaker dance called Hinkum-Booby. The lyrics to it were similar with hands in, hands out, and then they turned about. The Shakers were a group of Quakers that loved to dance. They believed that in some way dancing was a religious experience, not unlike the whirling Dervishes. The Shakers knew that it truly was a gift to be simple and uninhibited.
I think it is so amazing that children seem to be able to dance naturally. I am not sure what happens to us, as we grow older, but we dance less. We can hear the most beautiful music and not even tap our foot. I can remember as a child loving to dance, then who knows how one day I woke up no longer dancing. I became aware that I had two left feet, and no amount of dancing classes would ever make me feel comfortable on the dance floor.
Maybe we get too concerned about what others think about us. We grow inhibited and reserved. In dancing you surrender your control to the music. It is hard not to be too into it. You could make a fool of yourself. So we sit on the sidelines, but children are not weighed down with these concerns. Their lives are simple. They let the music carry them as they join in the dance.
Jimmy Buffett in one of his songs speaks about how life gets so complicated, “ the universe is run’in away” our lives are weighed down by so many concerns and things we have to think about. The chorus to that song is, “Maybe it’s all too simple, For our brains to figure it out, what if the Hokey Pokey is all it really is about.” While Buffett’s song verges on nihilism, and existential sorrow, he might have a point.
Today is Trinity Sunday in the Church calendar. It is the only Sunday of the church year that is named after a church doctrine. I think that shows the special place this doctrine holds in Christian theology. The doctrine of the Trinity is central in Christian theology. St. Gregory said, “When I say God I mean: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.” As Christians we believe that the very nature of God is Trinity—not a generic deity—but in essence: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
Like every other important belief this doctrine has been controversial. The scriptures never use the word Trinity, but that doesn’t mean the doctrine is not there. It was only a few decades later when church fathers like Tertullian began to use the word. The scriptures and church tradition make clear that the early church worshipped Jesus and experienced God through the Holy Spirit. In the Gospel of Matthew Jesus tells the church to “Go forth to make Disciple and baptize them in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.” And for 2, 000 years that is what we have done. We have baptized our neighbors and our newborns into the life of the Trinity. When the minister, gives thanks and consecrates the bread and wine for communion, thanksgiving is given to the Father, the Son is remembered, and the Holy Spirit is poured out. The church has developed many creeds to proclaim the life-giving doctrine of the Trinity—the Apostles Creed and the Nicene Creed. One of the Church Father’s arguments for the Trinity was that the church had been singing praise to God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit for generations—how could the doctrine be wrong. We still sing these songs of praise when we sing the Gloria Patri and the Doxology. At the conclusion of worship the people go forth into the world transformed in the name of the Trinity. All that we do as Christians is permeated with the living truth of the Trinity. Worship of the Trinity is what Christianity is all about.
That being said, ministers like myself tend to shy away from preaching on the Trinity, because the Trinity is not easy to explain. Saying that we worship three gods is wrong. Christianity does not fit on the list of polytheistic religions. Nor do we say that there is just one God, wearing three different hats or modes. Christianity doesn’t fit squarely on the list of monotheistic faith, either. We worship one God in three persons. Three persons sharing the same being. We come up with all sorts of images to help understand the Trinity like apples, eggs, water, but all of them fail—and end up pointing to ancient heresies. We should not be surprised that it is not easy to understand the very essence of God shrouded in mystery and majesty. Teachers often get into math mode when teaching the Trinity--trying to explain that 1+1+1=3 normally, but with God it can =1. This turns out to be fuzzy math. It is here in the argument when rationally driven people have laughed in disbelief at our church’s highest doctrine. We can get so wrapped up in trying to understand the mathematics of God that we miss the point. I do think trying to understand the nature of the Trinity is a worthy enterprise, albeit impossible but worthy. But study should never be divorced from prayer and piety. Often we try to make faith so complicated that we miss out on what the Trinity is all about.
The great Methodist liberation theologian Justo Gonzalez states that Christians make the basic mistake of approaching the Trinity as a puzzle to be solved rather than an example to be imitated. We can spend so much time trying to understand the Trinity that we lose our sense of awe and worship. We can reduce the Trinity to mathematical equations, rather than relationships. Saying that God is Trinity is saying that God in God’s very self exists in dynamic relationship. The God that we worship dwells eternally in community. It is because of this John can state that “God is love.” No wonder why community has been so important for Christians. Our God is about relationships. The Trinity created us to be in relationship.
It was a dark day in Russian history. Genghis Khan’s Mongolian armies were rampaging the land. Despair and depression had set in. There were no safe places to be. A man by the name of Andrei Rublev was living in a monastery founded to be a place of sanctuary from the war going on outside. His monastery took in strangers a welcomed them with food and shelter. Extended the ancient tradition of Christian hospitality from which hospitals get their name. It did not seem like much. This band of believers wanted to do something that would make a difference in a hatred filled-war torn world—so they devoted themselves to prayer, gardening, painting, and taking in the lost, wounded, and traveling—no one was turned away. It did not seem like much—But St. Paul said you can’t overcome evil with evil—only with goodness. Andrei one day decided to paint a picture to adorn the chapel devoted to the Trinity in the monastery. His deep longing for unity and peace was made manifest in a simple painting. It is printed in the center section of your bulletin. He painted an image that was every thing the land of Muscovy lacked—relationships, abundance—peace. The image of the Trinity is actually derived from an unlikely place—the Old Testament. It comes from the lesson read this morning. It has some mysterious elements. The scripture says, “the Lord appeared to Abraham—but when he looked up he saw three people. How mysterious! He welcomes these strangers to dinner in hospitality. It is hard to know whether or not it was the Trinity that delivered the miraculous message to Abraham and Sarah that day. The miraculous message to which Sarah laughed in disbelief. But we do believe as Christians that from the foundations of the earth God dwelt as Trinity. So there in Andrei’s picture the Holy Three sit in a circle around the table. One of the many mysterious messages of the picture is that when we welcome the stranger we welcome the very presence of the Trinity. Or as the New Testament says we “entertain angels unawares” or “whatever we do for the least of these we do unto Christ.” This is something that those involved in Stephen ministry know firsthand. At the same time that Abraham has welcomed the Trinity, the Trinity is setting around a chalice. With heads bowed inviting all to the table. It is hard to remember who is welcoming whom. Are we to welcome the presence of God into our lives, or are we to welcome the stranger, or is it God that is welcoming all of us.
When Andrei’s picture was complete, immediately people knew there was something special about it. Thousands of visitors from all over came to see it, some said that the image gave them a glimpse of hope, even a glimpse of God. Only a few years after Andrei died, the people begged that he be beatified as a saint. Usually this was a long process of verifying miracles, but it was argued that the icon was miraculous enough. St. Andrei’s image has gone on to inspire millions as the most famous icon of the Trinity-inspiring peace and unity across the turning globe.
His loving image of the Trinity in a circular pattern was part of a long tradition.
It was developed in the long battles on how the persons of the Trinity relate to the other persons. Many people wanted to think of the Trinity as one God in three modes or functions. For instance: the Father as Creator, the Son as Redeemer, the Spirit as Sustainer. But the Church felt like this did not capture the true nature of the way God dwells in eternal relationship. After all, Scripture and tradition say that the Son and the Spirit were involved in creation, the Father, and the Spirit are involved in redemption, and the Father and the Son are involved in sustaining. While it is appropriate to think of certain activities more associated with one person than the others, the Trinity is fundamentally about sharing and unity. Each person is connected in being to the others. You can’t have one without the other. One of the church’s theologians described the Trinity with an image word: Perichoresis. From the word peri—we get words like perimeter. Form the word choresis we get words like choreography. This is a Greek word meaning circle dance. What a way to think about our God—a God that dances—the intimate loving nature of God in perfect step—when one is moving they all are moving in perfect community. 1-2-3, 1-2-3, 1-2-3. We worship a dancing God. A God that swirls in a circle like kids on the playground. This image is substantiated in the Epistle reading from the end of second Corinthians. This verse has been the standard benediction for Methodists since our inception. “The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Spirit be with all of you”. What a beautiful image of God in relationship blessing us with grace, love, and communion.
Look again at St. Andrei’s icon. The figures are seated in a circle, but part of the circle is missing. It is where we are. The Trinity has invited us to join the dance. We are invited to experience the life of the Godhead—through the Father and the Son and Holy Spirit. The Trinity is an example for us to follow—of holy relationship—community—unity. We are invited in. Can we let our inhibitions drop and dare to dance the dance? That is what it is all about.
I remember going to my high school prom several years ago. The DJ was playing fun music and all of the couples including myself and my date were out on the dance floor. As I was dancing I noticed a young man standing by himself. I had never seen him before, it was easy to tell that he was a member of one of the special education classes. He was mentally and physically challenged, yet he knew he was missing out on all the fun. He had no partner to dance with. He stood against the wall with a sad look on his face. He felt left out. It was then that a young lady walked over to him. She asked him if he would like to dance. He said nothing. At first it did not look as if he were going to move, but she persuaded him onto the floor. Their dancing was quite unconventional—they went round and round in a circle holding hands. On the one hand it wasn’t the most beautiful dance in the room—no special moves—very sloppy and out of step—some even laughed, but on the other hand it was the most beautiful dance we had seen. Our laugher of mockery and disbelief was transformed. Like Sara’s before us, we continued laughing, but now because we had been invited into a miracle.
God, our God, our dancing God—Father, Son and Holy Spirit, has invited us into a miracle. 1-2-3, 1-2-3, 1-2-3. Are we ready to put our whole selves in and shake it all about? We have been invited to join the dance that really is what it is all about—love of God and neighbor. As we are embraced by God, we embrace God back by embracing others spinning and laughing in the cosmic dance of the Triune God. Shall we dance?