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Isaiah 6: 1–9
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Lord, may we hear your voice in the words spoken in your Name. Amen.
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Years ago, when our grandson Jonas was just two and a half, he stopped
me in my tracks one day with a question. I’d been talking
with him about something going on outside and I must have mentioned God
in my explanation. Because — all of a sudden — he cocked
his head at me and asked, “Who is God?” Just like
that – “Who is God?”
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It wasn’t some philosophical question. He’d simply
never heard of the guy. And he wanted to know who it was that I
mentioned with such confidence. To say I was stunned is to put it
mildly. But within a split second I also realized that I
didn’t have time to ponder some lengthy explanation. Nor
did Jonas want one. So I said, “Well, God is the one who
made you and loves you more than you can imagine. God made the
whole world – your Mama and your Daddy and Nana and Gramps and
the birds and the trees and the cats and the dogs – and he loves
us all more than we can comprehend.” And for the time
being, that was all the answer Jonas wanted.
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Afterwards, when I thought about my answer, I was glad that I’d
framed it in relational terms. Because the earliest Christians
had asked the very same question: “Who is God?”
And their priests and bishops, meeting in Nicaea in the year 325, also
answered the question in relational terms. They said that God the
Father was always and forever reaching out in love to God the
Son . . . and that both of them together
were always and forever communicating to God the Holy
Spirit . . . who touches my life and
yours. And somehow, in this everlasting dynamic of love between
Father, Son and Holy Spirit our own lives are caught
up . . . and
renewed . . . and redirected. We
too are invited into this eternal dance of love. And that’s
a secret, a holy secret worth sharing. So every year the Church
sets aside one Sunday, Trinity Sunday, to celebrate this love, this
dynamic dance of love that holds us all in life.
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Now, it’s one thing to tell a child that God loves him to the
uttermost and that right there – right in the center of an
unending dance of love – is where he belongs. Because
that’s actually how things look when everything’s going
well for us. But what do we tell ourselves when times are tough,
when things aren’t going so well, maybe in a year of
pandemic? Do we still believe we’re right in the center
of God’s love? Does the doctrine of the Trinity work
for us then, too?
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Isaiah must have wondered the same thing in the year 740 BC, the year
King Uzziah died. Uzziah had been King of Judah for 52 years, and
for most of those years he’d been a good king, a wise king, humble
before God. So Judah had prospered. But towards the end of
his reign he’d grown arrogant – towards God and towards his
own people. Now he had died and nothing was going well at
all – neither Judah’s prosperity nor her political influence
over her enemies. In fact, everyone in Judah in those days was a
little nervous about what tomorrow might bring. Not unlike where
we are today.
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Isaiah’s response to this national crisis is to go to the Temple
to worship God, to seek God out. And there, all of a sudden, he
has a vision. In that vision of God’s utter holiness, Isaiah
is convicted by his own un–holiness, his own sin. But when
he acknowledges that sin, God cleanses him of it – and then
rewards him by making him his prophet to the nation. And the
implication is that the whole nation, now, will benefit from
Isaiah’s humility before God, his willingness to acknowledge his sin.
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This is such a familiar pattern, in the Old Testament at least, I think
many in our country – even today — see it as a remedy for
whatever problems beset us, whether it is global warming, the pandemic
or social justice issues. So fingers are pointing all around
us. People are looking for someone to blame, someone they can
hold responsible for whatever mess we are in. If only we can find
the guilty party — maybe some lab technician in Wuhan, China, or
a few bad apples in this or that police department — the rest of
the nation can rest easy, as God punishes the guilty ones and restores
the rest of us to health and happiness.
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But the more I’ve thought about that way of looking at the way
God works, the more I’ve realized how little sense that
makes. For this wasn’t at all how Jesus Christ, the Son of
God, did things. He met with plenty of sinners, plenty of people
whom others considered guilty. But instead of disqualifying them,
blaming them, he seemed to prefer their company to the company of
people who considered themselves sinless, above reproach. In fact,
when he met with people who were sick or possessed by demons or caught
in some flagrant sin, time after time the Gospel writers say he had
compassion on them. He healed them or sent their demons packing or
fed them. More than once, he simply wept with them. In other
words, in his compassion, he loved them. And right there, I think,
lies our answer to how we are to think of God in the midst of this
pandemic, in the midst of our struggling economy, in the midst of all
our social problems. We see God in the actions of people who love
him, people who receive his love and pass it on to others.
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A couple of weeks ago, I was reading an article about different ways to
think about God in the midst of this pandemic, and in a tiny footnote
I saw a reference to a book called Candle in the Window –
whose subtitle was “Reflections to Encourage Us in Tough
Times.” That sounded like a book worth reading, so I sent an
email to its author, telling him I was the priest of a small Episcopal
church in rural Georgia who was trying to hold things together in this
year of pandemic, when our ability to come together in worship was still
limited. And I asked if I might purchase a copy of his book.
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In response, Peter Millar didn’t just send a copy of his book to
me, for free, from Edinburgh, Scotland. He sent me several other
books as well, at his own expense. And sent a warm note as well,
encouraging me in my ministry and thanking me for my interest. And
when I began to read his little book I was floored by its
wisdom – seeing the good in people in the midst of
trouble. Seeing the light of the Lord in the midst of all our
darkness. And seeing the love of the Lord in the unexpected
kindness, the unexpected caring of one of his servants.
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On this Trinity Sunday in the year of our Lord, 2021, still in the midst
of our uncertainties, still in the midst of our darkness, I can tell
you I have glimpsed the light of God’s love. And my hope
today is to pass it along to you.
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Amen.
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