Sunday, June 16, 2019

Baptized, Believing, Belonging: The Trinitarian Gift - Acts 2: 36-28


What must I do to be saved? This is the question that continues to plague the hearts and minds of men. Desperate people, seeking desperate answers, hunt anywhere, everywhere, trying to find someone or something that provides a seemingly reasonable answer.

If you did a man on the street interview in Victoria, or Goliad, or Cuero, what might people say? How might they answer that question?

You must always strive to do your best, one says, so that in the end the ledger leans in your favor of the good things outweighing the bad. Another warns that if you are having bad things happening to you, it may be the result of your parents or even grandparents moral failures – and there is no guarantee this might not get passed on to your own children!

You would probably find a good dose of moral relativism, to live a good life, to make wrongs right, and maybe even the well-intended but impossible suggestion of “Do what Jesus would do.” Unless you ran across a Muslim who would instead cite their prophet, Mohammad, from the Quran. And, it’s possible you could find a nihilist or an agnostic or an atheist who would say there is nothing to be saved from – when you die, they say, that’s it – turn out the lights, the party’s over.

But the men in Jerusalem weren’t asking just anyone. They were asking Peter – the formerly empty glass who had been made to sing by the power of the Holy Spirit, sent by Jesus, who was Himself sent by the Father. And, with their hearts broken and cut to the quick with Peter’s clear preaching, realizing they could do nothing to save themselves, they were seeking an answer: what must we do to be saved? The solution was simple and clear: repent and be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of sins.

Repentance is not a popular message in America because it flies in the face of everything that is our proud American ideology – or, perhaps I should call it idol-olatry. Our culture teaches us to be brash and bold, even if that means running over the weaker. Our society teaches us it’s OK to lie about and defame our neighbor, as long as we get something out of it. Our world worships self-happiness, demands individual rights, and refuses to bow down to the wants or needs of anyone else. Our age teaches that the only almighty trinity is me, myself and I. And Peter stands in the face of this and calls each of us to repent.

Repentance is humbling. Repentance recognizes that we have done something wrong towards or against another and labels it as it is: sin. Repentance is truthful. Repentance acknowledges that we are sinners and confesses our sins against God and against neighbor. Repentance is submissive. Repentance admits we can’t save ourselves and we desperately need help. Repentance is surrender. The Holy Spirit has worked through the Law in the hearer’s heart and mind and the repentant stands convicted concerning sin and righteousness and judgement (John 16:8). Repentance hurts and it saddens and, to one degree or another, it terrifies the conscience because they recognize what the sinful status deserves.

If that’s all repentance is, leaving the sinner with their own sorrow and despair, he or she is no better off than the man on the street we interviewed earlier.

But Christian repentance is different than what every other religion offers. Christian repentance finds it’s answer, it’s antidote, it’s resolution in Jesus. Repent and be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of sins. Repentance without Jesus is only sorrow coupled with despair: what must I do to be saved? But Christian repentance finds the answer to that very question in the cross of Jesus, the place of atonement, where Jesus’ blood was shed for sinners like you and me and the Pentecost crowd and all who cry out with the hopelessness and helplessness of this age and who, in faith, turn to Jesus. Confessing our sins, repenting of our sins, and like the Jerusalem crowd, desiring a change in our hearts and minds and lives, turn to Jesus. He hears; He forgives because His blood was shed for you. His life was taken for you. His holiness was traded for you. His perfection surrendered for your imperfection.

Baptism without Jesus is just washing – literally. To baptize means to wash, but being washed with the Word, that is baptized in the name of Jesus, is to have sins washed away, to be united to Christ through water and word, enlivened by the Holy Spirit, restored and connected to the Father as sons and daughters of God. In Baptism, the Father declares our debt of sin paid in full and He bestows on us His Spirit, enabling us with hearts to believe and with mouths to confess the saving name of Jesus. And with newly baptized hearts, and with ever-repentant hearts, the Holy Trinity changes us so that we no longer want to live as children of the world but as children of God. The Trinity at work in an extraordinary way.

Today we celebrate the Holy Trinity: God in three persons. In a few moments we will confess the Athanasian Creed. It is long and it is monotonous in it’s precise language. In the fifth phrase, we’ll confess that the Father is infinite, the Son infinite, and the Holy Spirit is infinite. In the old, Jacobean language, the phrase was “incomprehensible” – the Father incomprehensible, the Son incomprehensible, the Holy Spirit incomprehensible. I remember a friend of mine mumbling under his breath, “The whole thing is incomprehensible.” Why can’t we just stick with the Apostle’s Creed – that’s so much shorter and simpler. True, but this is important because the Church has continued to use these very words to defend the Christian faith against false teachings for a thousand years.  

I admit – I do not fully and completely understand the Trinity. But, here’s the beauty of it: while we may never fully and completely understand it, you don’t have to understand it to believe it. I don’t understand nuclear fission – but I feel the sun’s warmth. I don’t understand where wind starts – but I feel it’s breeze. I don’t understand how airplanes fly, but I get in one to travel. I don’t need to completely understand the mystery of the Triune Godhead – but, since this is how God reveals Himself to us, as Father and Son and Holy Spirit, and He tells us so clearly, I believe it.

In fact, every celebration of holy baptism and holy communion is a trinitarian celebration, just as every gathering, “in the Name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit,” is done in union with the Sacred three. In the power of the Holy Spirit, the Church gathers on Sunday—the day of the Resurrection—to offer thanksgiving to the Father for Christ’s saving-life given to us at the table of the Word and the table of the Eucharist. Listen carefully to the opening greeting, the baptismal “formula,” the Athanasian Creed traditionally confessed on this Sunday, the Eucharistic prayer, and the final blessing. We are accompanied in life’s journey by a community of persons, the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, who together are the one and only living God. And so, we are not alone. Indeed, the Church is intended to be a sign to the world of the Holy Trinity’s unity-in-diversity.

So, back to the question: What must I do to be saved? Nothing. Salvation is the work of the Triune God: The Father sent the Son who delivers the Holy Spirit; the Holy Spirit enables us to believe Jesus is our Savior, and through Jesus we see the Father’s love.


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