The Passage<\/p>\n
\u201cI have yet many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now.\u00a0 When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth; for he will not speak on his own authority, but whatever he hears he will speak, and he will declare to you the things that are to come.\u00a0 He will glorify me, for he will take what is mine and declare it to you.\u00a0 All that the Father has is mine; therefore I said that he will take what is mine and declare it to you.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 [Revised Standard Version; The New Oxford Annotated Bible]<\/p>\n
\u201cYour way, O God, is holy; who is so great a god as our God?\u00a0 You are the God who works wonders and have declared your power among the peoples.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 [Psalm 77.13-14]<\/p>\n
\u00a0 In the Name of Christ + Jesus Our Lord<\/p>\n
Today\u2019s homily opens with a question from Psalm 4 \u2013 \u201cYou mortals, how long will you dishonor my glory; how long will you worship dumb idols and run after false gods?\u00a0 The question startles because it accounts for all the hells occurring in the world\u2019s life and it refreshes because it turns us to the only God which exists!\u00a0 This God, THE LORD God, emerges from today\u2019s Gospel.\u00a0 The passage is brief, but is brimming with power as it unpacks the realities of the Lord\u2019s Life.<\/p>\n
This passage comes from the middle of the Farewell Conversation that Jesus is having with his disciples on the night of Maundy Thursday.\u00a0 In that holy, yet fierce, night Jesus transformed the Passover Meal into his Holy Eucharist, and then was forcibly arrested for a rushed trial.<\/p>\n
In the passage we see that the Spirit given us at our Baptisms is THE Guide to the realities of Jesus\u2019 Life: He guides us into complete Truth (a Greek word describing eternal Life); He tells us of the things to come (such realities break in now and at the End-of-Time); He glorifies the Son since all he tells us comes from the Son himself (such telling originates and continues with the Son\u2019s Father).<\/p>\n
First,<\/strong> the Holy Spirit guides us into complete Truth.\u00a0 The verb, \u201cguide,\u201d is the same word used in the book of Revelation to describe how the Lamb leads the saints to living water (a person cannot make their way to that water on their own, they need a Guide).\u00a0 Only after the Son\u2019s crucifixion, resurrection and ascension is there a fuller understanding of what happened and what was said during Jesus\u2019 ministry.\u00a0 The Spirit will guide Jesus\u2019 followers to the full Truth of what he revealed in his ministry of three years.\u00a0 Such guiding involves much more than a deeper intellectual understanding of the Life running from the Father, Son and Spirit; this guiding involves the way of Life which flows from Jesus\u2019 teachings.<\/p>\n Second,<\/strong> the Holy Spirit will tell us of the things to come, the things streaming from the Life which Jesus is bringing to the world.\u00a0 Back in Isaiah, this declaring of the things to come is THE privilege of the LORD God, a privilege that the world\u2019s gods do not possess.\u00a0 Such privilege flows from the Lord\u2019s authority, an authority seen unique and clearly in the Son\u2019s Cross.<\/p>\n If we wonder about such a declaration from Isaiah, consider what happens when we throw our lives in with those thousands of world\u2019s gods:\u00a0 The pursuing of pleasure alone does not give way to durable satisfactions; The pursuing of income alone does not result in less anxiety and more security; The pursuing of power alone does not make everything calm and right; The pursuing of one\u2019s self does not secure one\u2019s identity and meaning!<\/p>\n The realities to come always have to do with the LORD God\u2019s actions of rescuing, sustaining and creating, both now and at the End-of-Time!\u00a0 The realities to come are always imbedded in the Trinity\u2019s Holy Writings along with the Sacraments of Baptism, Forgiveness and Eucharist.<\/p>\n Third,<\/strong> the Holy Spirit will glorify the Son.\u00a0 Throughout his ministry, the Son glorified the Father by revealing him to the world\u2019s people through the works of that ministry.\u00a0 The Spirit, in turn, glorifies the Son by revealing him to his followers, continually through the mysterious workings of the Scriptures and Sacraments.<\/p>\n The Son recognizes that the world has glory.\u00a0 Remember the wilderness temptations after Jesus\u2019 Baptism where its glory was paraded before him?\u00a0 Remember, too, how the world\u2019s glory dangles before our lives on a daily basis?\u00a0 Let us recall, though, how Jesus turned his back on the temptations presented to him.\u00a0 And, although it is carried out with much difficulty, Jesus enables us to turn our backs on such glory as well.<\/p>\n The only glory with substance and meaning in this world is that given to the Son, the glory which flashes brilliantly from his Cross.\u00a0 During the Son\u2019s ministry this glory was revealed in his miraculous signs.\u00a0 The mightiest display of the Father\u2019s glory (glimpses of which were already seen in the Old Testament) is the Son\u2019s crucifixion and resurrection!<\/p>\n The Spirit now publicizes the crucified, risen and ascended Son who shares and reflects the Father\u2019s glory to all the Lord\u2019s people!<\/p>\n All of this responds to the opening question from Psalm 4 \u2013 \u201cYou mortals, how long will you dishonor my glory; how long will you worship dumb idols and run after false gods?<\/p>\n Today\u2019s Gospel makes it quite clear that the Holy Spirit is revealing the only and authentic God which exists!\u00a0 The Son\u2019s Spirit is THE Guide to the realities of the Holy Trinity\u2019s Life!<\/p>\n Such realities stream out from the Forgiveness of our sins.\u00a0 It is sin, the natural desire to have all of life wrapping around ourselves which dishonors the Lord\u2019s glory, which worships dumb idols, which runs after false gods!\u00a0 It is the sin that creates and maintains the hells on this earth, inside and outside our lives!<\/p>\n Thankfully, the LORD God has stepped into such hells and confronted its realities with the Son\u2019s Cross!\u00a0 He reveals their cruelty and swamps us with the realities of his rescuing<\/p>\n Forgiveness, realities which pour out steadily from the Church\u2019s three Creeds!<\/p>\n As participants in the Church\u2019s liturgical and sacramental tradition, we are accustomed to confess our understanding of the Holy Trinity through the Apostles\u2019 Creed (the one spoken when we were baptized), the Nicene Creed (the one spoken when we take part in the Eucharist) and the Athanasian Creed (the one we are confessing today!)<\/p>\n What is striking about these three Creeds is that they ground the Life and Work of the Holy Trinity in the Forgiveness of sins.\u00a0 From Martin Luther\u2019s Large Catechism we learn that [1] The Father loves us without condition as he creates us!; [2] The Son loves us in our sinfulness so intensely that he became a man to live, suffer, die, rise and ascend for us!; and [3] The Spirit loves us with full force through his sacramental work in our lives now and, beyond our deaths, in eternity!<\/p>\n What is so stunning about this Forgiveness is that it reminds us we are baptized to live in the Holy Trinity, not in the gods of this world!\u00a0 As the Holy Spirit breaks our lives free from sin and immerses us in the Trinity\u2019s Life, he reveals the Son as our Rescuer along with the Father who sent him to this world to be its Redeemer.\u00a0 This breaking and immersing is fierce and frightening work, but it always leads to our redemption and salvation!<\/p>\n Beginning with the month of June, the Lord\u2019s baptized people have six months to plunge into the incredible realities of the Life that Jesus brought to this world.\u00a0 Having been brought into the Life of the Holy Trinity and imbedded in their holy places, we are in significant conversations with parishioners and pastors during these months.\u00a0 These vital conversations will not only be with the LORD God and among us, but also with those individuals whose participation in the Church\u2019s life is either sporadic or non-existent.<\/p>\n The world\u2019s life is attractive, but is also terrifying; it promises, but cannot always deliver; it satisfies, but only on temporary basis \u2013 to put it bluntly, world\u2019s life can be hell-like!\u00a0 It is the Church\u2019s task, then, to faithfully proclaim the Life of the Holy Trinity so that the attractive and terrifying life of this world can be pierced and its people rescued from its numbing and horrific realities.<\/p>\n As we celebrate the Trinity\u2019s Festival today, we are deeply grateful that the Father, Son and Spirit have and will continue to immerse us in their eternal Life, stirring and sustaining us in their Life on a daily basis!<\/p>\n Now may the peace of the LORD God, which is beyond all understanding, keep our<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0 hearts and minds through Christ + Jesus Our Lord<\/p>\n —<\/p>\n