The Trinity--our three in one chord

One of the best decisions my parents ever made on my behalf was when I was in third grade. Now, I want to preface this with a few things—by maybe 4 or 5 years old one of my favorite things to watch was Lawrence Welk, the like 1960s/1970s variety show that aired reruns on PBS every Saturday or Sunday night. I loved watching the singers, the glamorous to me outfits, the cheesy smiles, and my very favorite, the guy who played the accordion. I also at an early age grasped on to the art that is musical theatre—not only because I grew up in the time that Disney movies were basically just animated Broadway shows, but also because my mom, an American Sign Language interpreter, was often the interpreter for musical theatre in our area, college shows, community shows, traveling Broadway shows. This meant, for her to really know all of the shows, we would listen to recordings of these musical non-stop. I knew Les Mis pretty much backwards and forwards by the time I was 7. All this to say, I was a pretty musical kid…And in 3rd grade, my parents made the very smart decision to transfer me to a music magnet elementary school where a part of my daily and weekly classes included choir, and piano, and eventually orchestra. I clearly didn’t use this education to go on to become a professional musician, but the lessons from my various music experiences that began there, continue to influence my work and my faith on a daily basis.

Today, we celebrate Trinity Sunday, a day to mark the three in one God, and as we are Trinity Church, a day we celebrate God present in this community. As I was preparing for this sermon, I kind of glanced back at the last few years of sermons, what we’ve explored together on this day previously. Last year, you may remember that we passed out and looked at together the famous painting of the Trinity—we learned a bit about the imagery in the painting, what that tells us about this big concept of the Trinity. Two years ago, I spoke about the biblical image of the mustard seed, the tree that grows from it, despite every practical understanding that such a thing shouldn’t grow from such a tiny seed. And Trinity Sunday three years ago, was luckily for me a week before I started my call here with you—and I say that because preaching on the concept of the Trinity is often a particularly challenging, sometimes downright unpopular topic, especially for someone not even a month out of seminary.

Throughout scripture there are many images and metaphors that we use to describe, to attempt to further understand God. The language that we use the most in Christianity is that of the Trinity—the idea of three persons in one: Father, Son, Holy Spirit. Three persons, but one god. Three names, one name, one God. Whenever we try to provide a metaphor for this we usually come up (somewhat necessarily) short…Throughout history people have used the ideas of a three leaf clover; water that can take on the form of liquid, solid, gas; the sun, the light that comes from the sun, and the heat that comes from the sun; a light prism, where the light is white light refracted into a spectrum of colors, but still remains one light. These metaphors are all helpful in their way, and all are incomplete in their way…there is still so much mystery that a physical metaphor won’t ever quite cover.

My favorite metaphor that I have experienced for a better understanding of the Trinity, and also my and our relationship and participation within God as Trinity was revealed to me at seminary. My liturgy professor took us to our chapel, where he sat down at the piano and began to play a progression of chords. A chord is when multiple notes are played at the same time—if we’re talking about the Trinity, three notes.

In her book, God Did Not Make Us to Hate Us, Lizzie McManus-Dail writes, “Each note resonates with its own sound and tone, but the sounds of the individual notes are inextricable from the sound of the three notes together. The notes are community, a nestled-in sound that is at once the sum of its parts, more than the sum of its parts, and its individual parts shining bright.”

I say that my parents’ decision to put me in a music magnet when I was 7 was one of the best ones not necessarily for the technical music skills that I learned—clearly, I’m a serviceable but not excellent musician. But because of the life skills music teaches. Music, like the Trinity, is inherently community. It is learning to blend and to shine all at once. To be apart of a group, but to embrace the difference of approach, tone, instrument, experience all at once.

As we look out at our world, our country right now, where we might feel at times emboldened by how we are called to act and respond to the injustice that we see around us as Christians, and at other times thoroughly overwhelmed by the amount of hurt and pain and confusion, there is a lesson from singing in middle and highschool choirs that has been incredibly helpful to me. Stagger breathing. When a group holds a sustained note together, stagger breathing allows those who need a breath to drop out, breathe, and come back in stronger. And then have their voice be present when the person next to them needs their breath. To stagger breathe is to recognize that no one person can power through the mess and the joys of this world on their own. We are called to cover for one another when we need to breathe. To not let the ones next to us run out of air. To come back in stronger. To know that when we drop out to rest, that God, our Trinity, three in one chord, is being held for us—present, continuing, ebbing and flowing, eternal.

When I arrived here three years ago, I don’t think this community was quite living out this kind of vision of the Trinitarian God. After a handful of really tough years, marked first by extended time without a consistent priest, then by COVID and the complications and heartache that came with it, there seemed to be a pattern of sort of siloed muscling through. That a few people were responsible for all of the goings on of this place, that working in community was more problematic and therefore less efficient. I have been so moved in the last year or so to witness this community moving through this phase and turning ourselves, communally, towards a way of being that feels more like chords, feels like harmony. Where people bring different notes of experience, and curiosity, and we get to navigate together how those notes sound together, and how they echo and amplify the notes that God is ringing in, through, and all around us. Where when someone needs to drop out for a time, the music doesn’t stop all together, but continues in a slightly different way, that might teach us something new, a new chord, and new tune.

Today, we will close our service with a hymn that I imagine we are all familiar with, Amazing Grace. I encourage you, maybe especially those who tend to bury ourselves in the hymnal when it comes time to sing, to sing out and participate, lift your voice confidently, but also listen—for the familiar melody that we know so well, for the harmonies that surprise you, that add more depth and diversity to the tune, for the notes that are ethereal, somehow, mysteriously here and not here. May that experience draw you nearer to the three-in-one God in creation, and the three-in-one God in yourselves and your neighbors. Let us pray…

Amazing Grace, who taught our hearts to fear, and Grace who relieves our fears—when we are lost, knit us back into Your fabric; when we are in danger, remind us that we are never alone; when we are tempted to think anyone is outside of your creation, remind us we have no less days to sing your praise in chorus, not as a solo; for your grace has brought us safe thus far, and your grace will lead us home. Amen. (From God Did Not Make Us to Hate Us, by Lizzie McManus-Dail)