Brothers and Sisters:
This coming Sunday is Trinity Sunday. Many of the pastors I know approach Trinity Sunday with a bit of fear and trembling. When speaking of the doctrine of the Trinity, it’s too easy to say something incorrect or to confuse everyone.
I still remember my first Trinity Sunday sermon clearly: I tried to teach through the Athanasian Creed. I was still very newly ordained and new to preaching, and at one point, I asked the congregation if they were following what I was saying. To my surprise, they told me that they didn’t get it! I had to correct course mid-sermon, which was a wonderful learning opportunity.
Fortunately, our Collect for Trinity Sunday is fairly straightforward:
Almighty and everlasting God, you have given to us your servants grace, by the confession of a true faith, to acknowledge the glory of the eternal Trinity, and in the power of your divine Majesty to worship the Unity: Keep us steadfast in this faith and worship, and bring us at last to see you in your one and ever. Amen.
The true faith referenced by the collect is the acknowledgment of one God in three Persons: the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. In confessing the Trinity, we acknowledge the glory of God. In confessing the Trinity, we worship the Unity of this one God.
This isn’t an abstraction or a theory. Our hope is that, one day, we will see this God that we confess, that we will behold the glory of the Trinity forever. May the Lord keep us steadfast in this faith and worship.
In Christ,
Fr. Caleb