“The Mathematics of God”: a sermon (Proverbs 8: 1-4, 22-31; Psalm 8; Romans 5:1–5; John 16:12–15)

1 + 1 + 1 = 1

3 = 1

1 = 3

Any child in second grade can tell you that this is very bad mathematics.

1 + 1 + 1 = 1

3 = 1

1 = 3

In our lessons today for Trinity Sunday, we have hints of how this bad mathematics can be a sign of hope for us, and for the whole world.

Our Psalm is a hymn to God the Creator, to God whose name is majestic and whose glory is above the heavens.  The Creator’s glory is revealed in the width of the universe, but is also reflected most closely in the human mind and conscience. 

As Christians, we worship this God, but we are not alone in doing so.  This Creator God, the first person of our Christian Trinity, is worshipped in all monotheistic faiths, by Christians, by Jews, by Muslims, by Sikhs and by Baha’is.

·         This is the One whom Muslims worship as Allah, the All-Compassionate and All-Merciful.

·         This is the One whom Jews worship as the One whose name is too holy to pronounce.

We worship God the Creator.  We share God the Creator with other people of faith.

While we share God the Creator with other people of faith, we also hear in our lessons of an experience that is unique to us as Christians.  In our lesson from the letter to the Romans, we hear the affirmation that God the Christ has enabled us to share the glory of God the Creator and the peace of God the Creator.  For Paul, the life, the death, and the resurrection of Jesus were the ways in which the Living God was most fully known.  As Christians, we worship God the Christ, knowing that we worship a Jesus-shaped God; God who has experienced our human life to its very depths.

In our lesson from John’s Gospel, we hear of the third element in this equation, the Holy Spirit, ... the Spirit of God, ... the Spirit of Truth, ... the Spirit of Life.  God the Spirit is promised to the people of God, revealing both the Creator and the Christ. 

In a real sense, God the Spirit is the hardest of the three to put in a box.

·         God the Christ is unique to us as Christians.

·         God the Creator is shared by Christians, by Jews, by Muslims, and by other people of monotheistic faith.

·         But God the Spirit resists all our categories.  The Spirit of God is experienced by all people of faith.  The Spirit of Truth is present among all people of ethical sensitivity.  The Spirit of Life is found among all living beings.  God the Spirit refuses to be limited by our human categories of culture, religion, or even species.  God the Spirit is the hardest of the three to put in a box.

But we also affirm, as Christians, that the Three are really One:

God the Creator,

God the Christ,

God the Spirit:

truly Three,

yet truly One.

1 + 1 + 1 = 1

3 = 1

1 = 3

In our lesson from Proverbs, we have a hint of what this can mean.  This was written in a Jewish context, not a Christian one.  The writer of Proverbs had no idea of any sense of a Trinity; it’s not what the passage was about.  But in his celebration of Wisdom as a true expression of God’s life, we have an early glimmer of the idea that God is not radically solitary.

In our lesson, Wisdom is personified.  Wisdom is portrayed as a woman.  In Hebrew, Lady Wisdom is called Hokmah; in Greek, she is Sophia.  In our lesson, Ms. Wisdom calls out on the streets, like a peddler selling her wares:

O simple ones, learn prudence;

acquire intelligence, you who lack it.  

As we sang a few minutes ago, perhaps it was a bit like Molly Malone on the streets of Dublin in the old song:

“Wisdom and knowledge, alive, alive –o”

And, as the passage progresses, we hear of Wisdom as God’s companion from the beginning of God’s Creation.  Before the earth was formed ... before life evolved ... before humanity emerged, Wisdom was God’s fellow-worker in the artistry of Creation.  God was not alone.

“Wisdom and knowledge, alive, alive –o”

It is a jump, but not an impossible jump, from this ancient Hebrew celebration of Ms. Wisdom as God’s fellow-worker to the later Christian affirmation of God-in-Trinity, ... God-as-Community, ... God who is radically relational at the depths of God’s very being, ... God who is not alone, ... God who calls all humanity into relationship, both with each other, and with God.

1 + 1 + 1 = 1

3 = 1

1 = 3

Today we celebrate Trinity Sunday.  We celebrate the God who is radically One while truly Three.  We celebrate God-as-Trinity, God-as-Community, the Living God whose incarnational self-giving radically subverts our human notions of power, even while simultaneously offending our human notions of mathematical certainty.

1 + 1 + 1 = 1

3 = 1

1 = 3

It is still very bad mathematics but, in God’s own strange way, it is the source of our hope.