You come home...

put the key in the lock and turn it...

push the front door open and enter...

but it's not how you left it.

Everything has been disturbed--

cupboard doors ajar...

drawers half open...

jars smashed...

books pulled from the shelves...

papers and clothing strewn across the floor...

empty spaces where the TV and the computer once were.

As the realisation of what has happened begins to sink in...

perhaps, initially, it's accompanied by anger and shock...

but as the full significance begins to dawn on you...

you realise that, perhaps, the greatest loss wasn't what was actually taken or damaged;

rather, it was the loss of the sense of security...

the loss of innocence or naivety...

the realisation that your home--

the place that was yours...

a place of comfort and retreat...

a place of safety and security--

is no longer that.

 

Maybe you haven't been burgled.

But there may be other experiences that you have had that have had a similar effect.

It might have been discovering-- 

as a small child-- 

that Father Christmas was not real;

it might have been finding out that you were adopted;

it might have been the late night knock on the door by the police...

breaking tragic news; 

or it might have been the realisation that the relationship you thought would last forever was over.

As some point in our lives...

most of us have experiences that cause us to question--

experiences that cause us to doubt what we have always been told or believed...

or been brought up to expect--

experiences that shatter the taken-for-grantedness of our world.

 

This morning's reading is one that is only found in Matthew's gospel.

There's probably nothing here that stems from the life of the historical Jesus--

it's clearly been composed by the author himself...

in order to address certain concerns or issues within his community...

particularly, in regards to their engagement with the wider world.

And it's a text that has been used to justify much missionary endeavour down the ages.

But I'm not interested in any of that this morning.

The reason that this reading is set for today--

Trinity Sunday--

is no doubt because of the author's inclusion of the baptismal formula...

"in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit".

And yet, in many ways, that formula tells us very little.

It tells us very little about what the author--

or his community--

understood by that formula;

it tells us very little about what they understood about the relationship between the three;

and it tells us nothing about how they understood them existentially or even essentially.

At most, it hints at a process of reflection that had begun...

but which was nowhere near completion.

And I think we have a further clue as to that process... 

in the author's comment regarding the disciples, namely:

"When they saw him, they worshipped him; but some doubted".

Or, perhaps a more accurate translation, "but some hesitated".

What the author attests to here... 

is the struggle for many of the earliest Christians to rethink their understanding of God.

After all, it would have been a huge step.

As Israelites, they had been brought up to believe that there was only one God.

It was something that set them apart.

So it can't have been easy for them to accept that-- 

in Jesus of Nazareth--

they saw and heard and experienced God in a special way;

in a way that seemed to challenge so many of their assumptions...

and their taken-for-granteds.

It wouldn't have been easy for the earliest Christians...

as they struggled to reconcile their beliefs and traditions...

with their experience...

as they stumbled their way toward a new understanding of God.

But it was--

first and foremost--

their three-fold experience of God that led them to a new conception of God.

As the theologian, Elizabeth Johnson points out: 

"In the process, the monotheistic view of God flexed to incorporate Jesus and the Spirit...

Their language expanded creatively to accommodate their threefold religious experience".

And yet, that process was one that continued for quite some time.

The doctrine of the Trinity-- 

as we know it today--

wasn't formulated until the mid-fourth century. 

It arose through a process of intense struggle between diverse understandings and experiences. 

Those Christians of the early centuries reflected upon their experience of God...

within the limits of their time and place.

Like all theology... 

and all theological formulations...

it was contextual--

it reflected the worldview and the thinking of its day; 

it also reflected the political machinations of the time. 

But, let's be honest-- 

all theology does!

And, frankly, it's quite dangerous, potentially... 

to divorce any theological formulation from its historical and cultural context...

and to treat it as a timeless truth.

Rather, the challenge in this and every age--

and in this and every culture--

is to honour the process that the earliest Christians followed.

We're called to reflect deeply upon our experience of God... 

without being limited by the way that God has been understood in the past--

regarding any historical formulation not as a timeless truth but--

in the words of the theologian, Jason Derr-- 

as "a signpost on the journey of faith".

 

So, then, where do we begin?

 

Of course, it almost goes without saying...

that no image or metaphor for God can ever be sufficient.

God is always bigger and greater than our comprehension and the bounds of language.

That said, perhaps our starting point is the same as that of the earliest Christians--

it's reflecting upon our experience of God.

We experience the mystery we call God as utterly transcendent--

as 'beyond' and 'other';

at the same time, we experience God in the personal...

and the inter-personal;

and we experience God as a presence within.

But we also experience God in the light of our history...

and our participation in a global community...

recognising that God is experienced in different ways...

by different people...

in different times and places.

Thus, in a very fundamental sense...

behind the language and imagery of the Trinity--

be it expressed as "Father, Son, and Holy Spirit"...

or "Source, Saviour, and Sustainer...

or even St. Augustine's "Lover, Beloved, and Love"--

behind all of that is the affirmation that God is experienced in diversity.

Even more than that...

as Jason Derr asserts...

what the concept of God as Trinity affirms--

at its very heart or core--

is that God is "rooted in plurality and multiplicity"...

indeed, that God "thrives in plurality".

Affirming God as Trinity is not... 

in the end...

about restricting our understanding of God to some culture-bound, historical formulation;

affirming God as Trinity is not about making absolute claims...

or exclusive constructs;

it is, rather, about embracing the diversity and plurality of our experience of God...

always being open to experience God in new and different ways--

even having our theological taken-for-granteds overturned...

or blown apart.

But, even more than that...

if diversity, plurality, and multiplicity are major manifestations of God's nature and being...

then it is by embracing diversity, plurality, and multiplicity--

in all of their forms--

that we actually affirm the image of God in which we are formed...

and we become, ever-more fully, children of God.