LIVING IN RELATIONSHIP WITH THE TRIUNE GOD

Sermon Summary (8/25/19) “Living in Relationship With the Triune God” (Luke 2:41-51; 3:21-23a)

Last week we said there are some that say “You can believe anything and be a Methodist.”  Not so, but we do an inadequate job of teach what we do believe.  My very first  theological conversation was with my Grandpa.  I was five.  I can see myself standing next to the kitchen counter.  I asked, “And who made God?”  He relied, “Nobody made God.  God had not beginning and he will have no end.”  I just found out this week that he was quoting the catechism of the church, what the church taught.  We don’t’ do that anymore.  My Mother’s baptismal booklet had a catechism in it that parents were to teach.  Guess you else learns when you teach?

Last week we talked about the First Commandment, “You shall have no other God’s before Me.” (Ex 20:3)  This week, the practical divinity of the Triune God.  What does it matter?  What does a Triune God do for us?

It is the Triune God with whom we have relationship.  When we say “Our Father,” we are not talking about God’s gender, but of a being with whom we have a relationship. 

When we say, “God the Son,” we acknowledge a God who became like us, to share life with us, to suffer with us and for us., a God who loves us so much that he gave his life for us.  At the baptism of Jesus, God said, “This is my beloved Son, with you I am well pleased.”  God was quoting from Isaiah and the listeners knew that it was a passage we call the “Servant Song.” God is telling us that his incarnate Son would be a suffering servant.

A Holocaust survivor tells of a death camp hanging  that all were forced to witness.  One of those hanged was just child.  A man asked, “Where is God?”  He answered, “There on the gallows.”  Jesus, the Son, suffered for that child and for us.  Jesus is God, the Savior.  He is also God of the promise, the “first borne of the dead.”  “Because he lives, we can live also.”

When we say, “God the Holy Spirit,” we mean God present with us, to teach us all things, to prod us, to bring us into the right relationship with God, to move us from who we are to who God wants us to be.  The Holy Spirit is the means of grace, God’s love for us.  And he links us to Jesus Christ; the Holy Spirit links our lives to the life span of Jesus!

It is the Triune God with whom we have relationship!  Who is God?  He is the Triune Being who has a relationship with us.  Where is God?  He is there on the gallows.  Wherever there is suffering, God is in the midst, What is God doing?  He is working to overcome the suffering, to bring good out of evil, working for reconciliation and wholeness to all of creation.  “Thy Kingdom come, thy will be done.” 

John Wesley on his deathbed said, “Best of all, God is with us.”  Be grateful that that is so.  Amen.