God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit, this is what we celebrate today on Trinity Sunday. We need to start by acknowledging that none of us can totally understand God, we are human and therefore fallible. But this is not an excuse to leave God as a mystery and walk away. The challenge for all of us is to try to grow closer to God.

So where do we begin? Sometimes we make the three persons of God so different and separate that you would think we were talking about three Gods not one God with three persons.

There are Christians who believe that Jesus had to die because the Father had to punish someone for our sins which if you think about it makes Jesus’ death divine suicide unless you really believe in three Gods. Is that what we really believe?

I believe Jesus came to this earth to show us a ‘New Way’, a way of love, care and compassion and we, human beings, could not cope with that because we were more concerned with power, greed and violence. Each one of us here today has to decide do I want a world of love, care and compassion or a world governed by power, greed and violence?

Where were the Father and the Holy Spirit as Jesus died upon the cross? They were there with him feeling his pain and suffering as much as Jesus was feeling the pain and suffering and they stayed with him even when Jesus was in such pain that he could no longer feel that God was present. It is this that is the ‘Good News’ for us!

Everything that you and I experience whether good or bad, whether joyful or painful is also being experienced by God the Holy Trinity. In joy and in sorrow God is always with us even when we are not aware of his presence. God never leaves us, God is present not only with us but with every other person in the world.

For the great gift of the Holy Trinity let us give thanks and praise to God.

Andrew SSL