Today is what many might call Trinity Sunday, which is observed the week after Pentecost Sunday in many Christian Churches.

Today I would like to reflect briefly on the doctrine of the trinity in light of the fact that historically, going back to the late 1800's, this Church was known by many as the Dromore Unitarian Church. And so I am aware that this congregation would include members, many of whom might still consider themselves unitarian today, and some of whom would consider themselves trinitarian.

A few weeks ago, Ernie Martin lent me a file with news-paper clippings and pamphlets regarding the life of Rev. Peaston that were left behind in the manse after Rev. Peaston died. It is clear from those clippings that theologically speaking Rev. Peaston would have regarded himself as unitarian, although it was clearly not a theological position that he ever sought to impose on others. Clearly for Rev. Peaston, he, together with the constitution of our denomination operated on a deeper principle of non-subscription.

The central idea of Non-Subscription in our constitution is that nobody in the NSPCI is forced to subscribe to any human test and confession of faith. Rather, with the Scriptures of the Old and New Testament as the central Rule of Christian faith, under the teaching of our Lord Jesus Christ, it is “...the inalienable right of every Christian to search these records of Divine Truth for our own instruction and guidance, and to form our own opinions with regard to what they teach.” And so a central principle of the NSPCI has been the principle of the right to private judgement and free inquiry.

This is quite unique in the world of Christian Churches. Most Christian Churches today require (at least officially) that their members and ministers subscribe to the Apostles and Nicene creeds. In the NSPCI, if a member wishes privately to subscribe to the Apostles and Nicene Creed they are free to do so. Just as others are free not to subscribe to these creedal statements. Thus there is room in our Church for those who might consider themselves trinitarians and unitarians. My understanding is that the name of the Church was changed to the Dromore Non-Subscribing Presbyterian Church because it is a more inclusive term and embraces people of differing theological positions.

Having set that as the back-drop, on this Trinity Sunday, I would like to share some brief reflections on trinitarianism and unitarianism.

The term Trinity doesn't appear in the Bible itself. Trinitarians who use the term however believe that the doctrine can be inferred from Scripture even if it is not explicitly stated in Scripture.

The term Trinity was first used by Theophilus of Antioch in 170 AD. In other words, for the first 140-150 years, the term was unknown to Christianity. The full Doctrine of the Trinity only came to be fully expressed and widely accepted in 381 AD at the Council of Constantinople.

Orthodox trintarian theology believes that God is made up of three separate but equal persons, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. From this perspective God is One but Three. It could also be said that God is three, but One.

God is One substance with three equal persons. The Father is not the Son or the Holy Spirit, but all of them are 100% God. From this perspective, Jesus is understood to be 100% God and 100% human. Trinitarians would say that God became a human-being in Jesus.

On the other hand….

Unitarian Theology emphasizes the Oneness of God. Unitarians are happy to use the terms Father, Son and Holy Spirit, but they would differ in how they are used. For Unitarians, Father, is a description of God as the loving source of all that is. The word Spirit is also regarded as a descriptive word for what God. Thus they are regarded as two ways of describing the One reality of God.


Christian Unitarians generally emphasize the humanity of Jesus whose life was filled in a special way with God's Spirit. Some would say that according to Paul in Romans 1:4 Jesus was appointed or regarded as God's son because of his spirit of holiness. In other words, his life was a life lived in complete openess to God and therefore he was referred to as God's Son.  Other's would say that Jesus was God's first creation in accordance with Col 1:15. Other's might say that in Jesus God's Divine Image was fully realised or restored in humanity and that that all human beings were made to reflect the Divine Image and therefore to be son's and daughters of God.

Unitarians might even speak of Jesus sharing God's divinity, but they wouldn't say that Jesus is God-Almighty because there are many passages of scripture where Jesus is regarded as subordinate to the Father.

Now, both unitarian and trinitarian Theologians will find passages of scripture to argue their positions.

I believe there is great wisdom and generosity of spirit in the position of the NSPCI that gives space for individual members and individual ministers to come to their own conclusions on these matters.

What I find most interesting though is that these doctrinal matters are not the focus of Jesus' teachings. One would think that if they were vitally important to matters of our salvation, then Jesus would have spelled it out in very clear detail.

What was of far more importance to Jesus was his teaching on love. When Jesus was asked what the most important commandment of all was, he summed up the whole of the Hebrew Scriptures with two commandments and one central word: the word Love.

“Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’The second is this: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’. There is no commandment greater than these.”

As the Apostle Paul would later write in Romans: Love is the fulfilling of the law.

8 Let no debt remain outstanding, except the continuing debt to love one another, for whoever loves others has fulfilled the law. 9 The commandments, “You shall not commit adultery,” “You shall not murder,” “You shall not steal,” “You shall not covet,”[a] and whatever other command there may be, are summed up in this one command: “Love your neighbor as yourself.”[b] 10 Love does no harm to a neighbor. Therefore love is the fulfillment of the law.

And in 1 Cor 13: I can have all knowledge (in other words, I can have a doctorate in theology and understand the intricacies of trintarian and unitarian theologies), and I can have faith that can move mountains, but if I do not have love, I am nothing.

Today is Pentecost Sunday the day in our Christian calendar in which the Christian Church traditionally reflects on the Spirit

Often Christians speak as though God's Spirit was only present after Pentecost however in Genesis we see the work of the Spirit at the very beginning hovering over the waters of chaos.

Today we examine one of the Old Testament passages that speaks of God as Spirit. It is that well known text from Ezekiel 37:1-14 often entitled “The Valley of Dry Bones”.

1. Firstly in this text we see that the Spirit of God meets us in the valley's of life.

The valley in scripture is often contrasted with the mountain top. The mountain top experience is where we feel on top of the world. The experience of walking into the valley is to feel a closeness with the deep realities of life. It is sometimes to feel the shadow of life over us.

We see it in Psalm 23 “Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, you are with me. ”

That was certainly Ezekiel's experience. In verse 1 and 2 we read that the hand of the Lord was on Ezekiel and that in a vision, the Spirit set him in the middle of a valley. To experience the Spirit of God is not only to have mountain top experiences. Sometimes the spirit of God leads us into the valley's of life to be sensitized to the pain of other's and the pain of the world. Sometimes God God comes to meet usin the valleys of our own pain and brokeness.

In our passage, not only is Ezekiel in a valley, but it is a valley that is full of dry bones, bones with the life sucked out of them, a symbol of the pain and brokeness of the people of Israel. A picture of a nation's shattered hopes and dreams. A picture of desolation. Ezekiel was writing at a time when the people of Israel were in exile in Babylon, living in a foreign land, having lost everything.

But the brokeness and desolation not only exists in the world out there. If we allow ourselves to walk down into the depths of our own hearts, most of us will find deep within valley's of brokeness, valley's of desolation.

Maybe at the moment, you are feeling like you're in a dark valley of dry, dislocated bones. Maybe at the moment it feels like you have had the life and the muscle drained out of you and you are feeling that life has become empty and meaningless.

This passage reminds us that we encounter God not only on the mountain-top, but also when we find ourselves in the valley's of life. God comes to meet us. God comes and joins us in the valley of dry bone's.

In the valley of dry bone's, God asks Ezekiel a pointed question: “Can these bones live?” To put it another way...“Can these bones know life and joy once again?”

Ezekiel replies: "Lord, Only you know".

2. Secondly we see in this passage that where the Spirit of God is, life increases and flourishes.

As the Spirit begins to work through Ezekiel, as Ezekiel begins to prophesy to the bones, the dead dry bones begin to find new life. They grow muscle and flesh and skin once again and God gives life to them as the Spirit is breathed into them (vs 4-9).

Irenaeus, one of the early Church leaders once wrote that “The glory of God is a human being fully alive.”

In John's Gospel, Jesus says: “ I have come that you may have life, life in all it's fullness” (John 10:10).

Where the Spirit of God is, life increases and flourishes. God is that presence in the world that nurtures us and brings life to our spirits once again. Maybe today you are needing for the breathe of God to breathe new life and new hope into you.

It is an important spiritual discipline for us, especially when we are going through difficult times to ask ourselves the question: What are the things that help to make me feel alive. What are the things that help me to feel joy?

Those things that bring us life and joy are gifts from the Spirit of God.

3. Thirdly, as the Spirit of God breathes into us, so God uses us as ordinary frail human beings to bring life to others and the world.

In verse 3 God refers to Ezekiel as the Son of Man. It is a phrase in Hebrew that would read: Ben Adam meaning the “Son of Adam”. In other words, God is simply referring to Ezekiel as a “Human Being”.

Verse 3 would then read: “Human Being, can these bones live?” As God commands Ezekiel to begin prophesying, so through Ezekiel, the ordinary human being, God brings life to the dry bones, God begins to breathe new life into the people of Israel. God's spirit works through ordinary frail human beings to bring life to others and the world.

On Facebook a few weeks ago, I found a short post that left an impression on me. It is just a few poetic lines expressing the desire of an ordinary human being to make a difference in the world in simple and very ordinary ways:

“She felt like doing her part to change the world, so she started giving thanks for all the blessings in her life, rather than bemoaning all that was missing from it. Then she complimented herself in the mirror instead of criticizing herself as she usually did. Next she walked into her neighbourhood and offered her smile to everyone she passed, whether they offered theirs to her. Each day she did these things, and soon they became a habit. Each day, she lived with more gratitude, more acceptance and more kindness. And sure enough the world around her began to change. Because she had decided so, she was single-handedly doing her part to change it.”

It doesn't take much for the Spirit of God to breathe into ordinary frail human beings like you and me to bring about a change in the world. Single-handedly, God can use us to do our part to bring a change in the world.

“Human being, can these bones live?”

Mark 2:1-12

In verse 5, of our passage we read the following words: “Seeing how much faith they had, Jesus said to the paralysed man, 'My son, your sins are forgiven.'”

Jesus' response to the paralysed man on the mat is and interesting one, because it suggests that in some way that there is a link between his paralysis and something from his past. Perhaps something he had done about which he felt guilty, or ashamed. Perhaps some area in his life where he needed to hear a word of forgiveness.

And so the story is powerful symbolic reminder that sometimes our actions in the past, our mistakes, our faults, our failings from the past, can paralyse us in the present.

Our sense of guilt or shame from the past can so haunt us that it prevents us from living fully and joyfully in the present. Sometimes we become disabled and paralysed by our attachment to guilt and shame.

A few months ago I found a wonderful little book called the Rule's of Life by Richard Templar. It is a condensation of one persons observation of life and people. From a young age, he was a keen observer of people, observing what made people tick, observing the habits, priorities and values of those who seem to live healthy, well-rounded lives in this world. He put these observations into his book “The Rules of Life”.

Rule 56 deals with the issue of guilt. The chapter has a large heading: “If you feel guilty, that is a good sign”. He goes on to say, bad people don't feel guilty, they are too busy being bad. Good people feel guilty because they are good, and they feel they have done wrong, let somebody down. If you feel guilty, it is therefore a good sign. It shows you are on the right track.

But it's important to know how to deal with our sense of guilt, because as Templar writes, guilt can be a terribly selfish emotion. Unless it leads us to a constructive action or a constructive resolution, it is wasteful and pointless. As our passage suggests today, often it becomes paralysing and disabling.

Richard Templar suggests we have two choices: Put it right, or dump the guilt. He reminds us:

"We all make mistakes.
We all mess up from time to time.
We don't always do the right thing.
And if we have a conscience we will feel guilty."

But as Templar writes: Guilt is utterly pointless unless it is acted on for the better. If you mope about feeling guilty, but do nothing about it, then it's a waste of time, a waste of energy and a waste of life.

The first thing we need to do is to gauge whether we really need to feel guilty or not. It could be that we simply have an over-developed conscience or sense of duty. For example, if you are the kind of person who always desires to help others, and on one occasion you say 'No', then there is no need to feel guilty. Not all guilt is morally or ethically accurate. Not all guilt is a sign of moral or ethical failure.

Secondly, if our guilt is more than just an over-developed conscience and there is something that we can do to put right what we have done wrong, then for our own sake, as well as the sake of the other, we should do so.

Putting right mistakes we have made brings wholeness and peace. It is one of the foundational principles of Alcoholics Annonymous.

People who have been through the 12 steps program of Alcoholics Anonymous know that recovery and wholeness is facilitated by putting right the things we have done wrong in the past. It not only helps to heal relationships, but also repairs our fragmented souls, it heals our broken psychology and fractured emotions.

Putting right what we have done wrong is a way of becoming or being a psychological adult – taking responsibility for our actions. It is children who have to be taught to clean up after they make a mess. Putting right what we have done wrong is the adult way of cleaning up after we have made a mess.

Thirdly, if it is not something we can put right and have offered an apology, then all we can do is learn from the experience. All we can do is ask what life lesson we have learned from it and move on without wallowing in our guilt forever. Learn the lesson, make a resolution, dump the guilt and move on by letting it go into the ocean of God's grace and forgiveness.

And perhaps this is the one thing missing from Richard Templar's book, the sense that there is One that we can go to who can take receive our guilt. One who in Divine love can ease our sense of shame and help us start over. That Infinite Wisdom and Love we call God.

“My son, my daughter, your sins are forgiven… pick up your mat and go home”.

Like the pharisees in this passage, there will always be those who will watch in judgement and who would prefer to see us paralysed by our guilt forever. There will always be those who will want to hold the past over us and never see us move on. And sometimes, if we are honest, we are like those pharisees.

Lastly, One commentator writes that when Jesus says to the man “My son, your sins are forgiven”, Jesus was declaring that God is not offended by our humanity. God is not offended by our weaknesses and frailties. God is not offended by our mistakes and our bad judgements. Which is another way of saying “Your sins are forgiven”.

What is interesting in this passage, is that the pronouncement of forgiveness is without even a confession of guilt by the man on the mat. God's offer of forgiveness is not conditional. It is simply given. It is like the parable of the prodigal son who returns home. Even before he has been able to make his confession to his father, the father has already embraced him. The father has already ordered that a ring is put on his finger and a robe placed around him.

In one of the beautiful communion prayers in the Anglican Book of Common Prayer we read: "O God, it is your nature always to forgive, and on that we depend."

It is the very nature of God to forgive. In other words, that is what God is like.
It is the sun's nature to shine.
It is the nature of water to be wet.
It is the nature of grass to be green.
It is the nature of God to love and forgive.

Hearing that I am not an offense to God is healing.
It is possible to start over.
It is possible to pick up the mats of our of paralysis and go home.

 
Today in Mark 2:13-17, we focus especially on verse 16 “Why does he eat with such people?”

In Holy Communion the focus is often placed specifically on Jesus' death. The broken bread, a symbol of Jesus body broken on the cross. The wine or grape juice, a symbol and reminder of Jesus blood that was shed.

But I believe that we limit the full meaning of Holy Communion if we just limit it to a remembering of Jesus death. Holy Communion should be as much about remembering how Jesus lived as it is about how Jesus died, because how Jesus died in many ways was a consequence of how Jesus lived.

And that is why I have chosen our Gospel passage today, because it is a story that illustrates how Jesus lived his life. He lived his life with an open table.

Eating meals with people was a central element to the ministry of Jesus. And the thing that stood out about Jesus' meals, is that everyone was welcome. Both saint and sinner were welcome to eat with Jesus. This was in marked contrast with the Pharisees, and in fact most Jewish groups of Jesus day. For most Jews there were strict rules about who you could eat with and who you should not eat with. Anyone who was regarded as a sinner was not welcome at most Jewish meals.

For most Jewish groups therefore, the meal table was reserved only for the righteous and the respectable.

And this is what set Jesus apart from most other Jewish rabbi's and teachers. One of the most radical things about Jesus is that all were welcome to eat meals with him. Saint and sinner alike. At no point in the Gospels does one see Jesus refusing to eat meals with other people. Jesus is pictured eating meals with prostitutes and tax-collectors (the lowest of the low in Jesus day).

This practice of Jesus was a source of great scandal. The rest of Jewish society was deeply disturbed by this ..

We see it reflected in our passage today. As Jesus calls Levi the tax-collector to follow him, so in the next scene, Jesus is pictured eating a meal with Levi. But not only with Levi. The Gospel writer points out that there were a large number of tax collectors and other outcasts who were with him and we read these scandalous words “...many of them joined him and his disciples at the table”.

When the Pharisees asked his disciples the question “Why does he eat with such people?” It expresses just how disturbed they were that Jesus should do so. “Why does he eat with such people?” You can almost feel the sense of horror, disdain and disgust in their voices.

But Jesus didn't only eat with the lowest of the low. In Luke's Gospel, Jesus is even pictured eating meals with respectable Pharisees, the very one's who were most opposed to Jesus. He eats meals even with his enemies.

And according to Mark's Gospel, in the last supper, Jesus even eats his last meal with Judas, his betrayer present.

Throughout Jesus ministry, Jesus refused to place boundaries around his table. All were welcome.

And so it is intriguing that for much of Christian history, despite the example of Jesus, at Holy Communion, where we come to remember and celebrate the life of Jesus, most Church's have had rules about who can and who cannot attend. Rules about who can and cannot receive. The suggestion is that somehow, only the righteous are welcome at the table of Christ.

In our passage, when the Pharisees ask Jesus's disciples “Why does he eat with such people”, Jesus replies: “People who are well do not need a doctor, but only those who are sick. I have not come to call respectable people, but outcasts”.

And so based on this text, Communion is surely not somehow only for the worthy, in fact, if Jesus is anything to go by, then it is most especially for those who are unworthy.

“People who are well do not need a doctor, but only those who are sick. I have not come to call respectable people, but outcasts”.

In the 1980's there was a hit song by James called Sit Down. In the middle of the song there are some beautiful words that express something of the spirit of Jesus in this passage:

Sit down, oh sit down, sit down next to me...
Those who feel the breath of sadness
Sit down next to me
Those who find they're touched by madness
Sit down next to me
Those who find themselves ridiculous
Sit down next to me
In love, in fear, in hate, in tears
Sit down next to me…

And so today, if you feel unworthy to receive Holy Communion, then know that this meal is especially for you. All are welcome at Christ's feast of love, for it is only in the light of Christ's love that sinners can be made well. Christ invites us to his table of love saying: Sit down next to me.