Opening Verse of Scripture Psalm 8:1

O LORD, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth! You have set your glory above the heavens.

Collect Prayer for the Day—Before we read we pray

Almighty and everlasting God, you have given us your servants grace, by the confession of a true faith, to acknowledge the glory of the eternal Trinity and in the power of the divine majesty to worship the Unity,

keep us steadfast in this faith, that we may evermore be defended from all adversities; through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord, who is alive and reigns with you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. CW

Holy God, faithful and unchanging: enlarge our minds with the knowledge of your truth, and draw us more deeply into the mystery of your love, that we may truly worship you, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. CW

First Bible Reading Proverbs 8:1-4, 22-31 

1-4 Does not wisdom call, and does not understanding raise her voice? On the heights, beside the way, at the crossroads she takes her stand; beside the gates in front of the town, at the entrance of the portals she cries out:‘To you, O people, I call, and my cry is to all that live.

22-31 The LORD created me at the beginning of his work, the first of his acts of long ago. Ages ago I was set up, at the first, before the beginning of the earth. When there were no depths I was brought forth,

when there were no springs abounding with water. Before the mountains had been shaped, before the hills, I was brought forth – when he had not yet made earth and fields, or the world’s first bits of soil. When he established the heavens, I was there, when he drew a circle on the face of the deep, when he made firm the skies above, when he established the fountains of the deep, when he assigned to the sea its limit, so that the waters might not transgress his command, when he marked out the foundations of the earth, then I was beside him, like a master worker; and I was daily his delight, rejoicing before him always, rejoicing in his inhabited world and delighting in the human race. NRSV

Second Reading Romans 5:1-5

Since we are justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have obtained access to this grace in which we stand; and we boast in our hope of sharing the glory of God. And not only that, but we also boast in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not disappoint us, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit that has been given to us. NRSV

Gospel Reading John 16:12-15

Jesus said to his disciples: ‘I still have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now. When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth; for he will not speak on his own, but will speak whatever he hears, and he will declare to you the things that are to come. He will glorify me, because he will take what is mine and declare it to you. All that the Father has is mine. For this reason I said that he will take what is mine and declare it to you.’ NRSV

Post Communion Prayer

Almighty and eternal God, who hast revealed thyself as Father, Son and Holy Spirit, and dost ever live and reign in the perfect unity of love: hold us firm in this faith, that we may know thee in all thy ways and evermore rejoice in thy eternal glory; who art three Persons yet one God, now and for ever.

Commentary 

None of our readings today use the word ‘Trinity,’ yet God as Father, Son and Holy Spirit is central to them. Indeed the word ‘Trinity’ is not used by Jesus, it is not found in the Bible at all, yet faith in the Holy Trinity is the touchstone of what it means to be a Christian. Those who do not believe in God as Father, Son and Holy Spirit cannot use the term Christian to describe themselves—Jehovah’s Witnesses, Christadelphians etc. 

Trinity Sunday is a special Sunday because we think about who God is—the Trinity of Father, Son, and Spirit. Even the most committed Christians find this hard because we all know that something cannot be individually three and also completely one. But this Sunday expresses and celebrates the fact that we encounter God in contradictory ways. 

In our world there are some certain simple truths, like - ‘water is generally wet.’ But when we start to speak about things which really matter - like God, then we soon find out that we run out of words. Human language and thoughts simply fail to work. Truth is no more easily reduced to trite slogans than the scientific explanation of the creation of this wonderful world can be reduced to two chapters of Genesis. Through history we can see times when people have imagined that they did possess understanding and knowledge of God. But, actually this is an illusion, faith is not built upon the measure of the human mind. 

As Christians we need to be honest about our inability to explain God. It would be wonderful to be able to speak of God in certain and simple truths, but if we are honest, certainty is the property of fools, not the learned. Those who are more intellectually secure will usually admit that the more that we find out - the less we seem to know. Issues are only seen in simple terms of black and white by the simplistic and those who seek to lead them. 

Does this make our task of speaking about God more difficult? I think not, it is a fact that people cannot be argued into belief. They can be attracted, they can be welcomed and embraced but they cannot be argued. People most usually come to believe through faith not through facts. Preachers will often preach the certainty, the black and white. However, truth is much more often grey. The more we learn the more we realise that the less we know. This is not to say that we should stop the task of learning, but we must be more prepared to recognise that God is too big for us. It is human sin and pride aspire to lift us to God, humility sees that God into the human mind will not go. It is no more possible for us to understand God than to put the ocean into a bucket.

Whilst the word Trinity is not found in the Bible, the belief which it expresses is stated many times. The early Christians soon discovered that they simply could not speak of God without speaking of the three ways in which he had revealed himself to them. This does not mean that there are three Gods. It means that there is one God who has shown himself in three ways: God the Father, God the Son or Jesus, and Holy Spirit of God who came to them and made God alive in them.

Clearly this teaching is absurd from the point of human logic, it makes no human sense! All of the clever illustrations (Clover leaf, the sun as heat, light and energy etc.) which we have heard since Sunday School, they all fall short of explaining how logically God can be totally three and yet totally one. Indeed some of the best illustrations used in sermons serve only to illustrate serious heresies such as modalism! If we are honest it is something which is more clearly explained in terms of that great Christian word, mystery. It is a mystery of our faith. We know why we use the term ‘Trinity’ because it expresses our experience of a God who can be present in Jesus, whilst at the same time, the voice of God is heard to speak from heaven and the Spirit descend as a dove. But nevertheless it is a mystery. 

It is important to remember that the Trinity does not actually attempt to explain God. It only explains what we know about God, that which he has revealed to us in a very elementary way. So we Christians affirm the Trinity, not as an explanation of God, but simply as a way of describing what we currently know about God. This is honest and it should not make us frightened. In 1 Corinthians Chapter 13 it says 

'where there is knowledge, it will pass away. For we know in part and we prophesy in part, but when perfection comes, the imperfect disappears. When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put childish ways behind me. Now we see but a poor reflection as in a mirror;'

Knowledge will pass away. Human knowledge will be revealed to be a lot less important than some might care to believe. As Christians we need to have the honesty to say that we see but a poor reflection of God as in a mirror, we see through a glass darkly. Our knowledge of God is imperfect, we know in part and the rest is guesswork. Moreover we will never know all the answers until we see God face to face. Charles Royden

Meditation

O Lord our governor, how glorious is your name in all the world! Your majesty above the heavens is praised 

out of the mouths of babes at the breast. You have founded a stronghold against your foes, that you might still the enemy and the avenger. When I consider your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars that you have ordained, what are mortals, that you should be mindful of them; mere human beings, that you should seek them out? You have made them little lower than the angels 

and crown them with glory and honour. You have given them dominion over the works of your hands and put all things under their feet, All sheep and oxen, even the wild beasts of the field, the birds of the air, the fish of the sea and whatsoever moves in the paths of the sea. O Lord our governor, how glorious is your name in all the world! 

We bless you, master of the heavens, for the wonderful order which enfolds this world; 

grant that your whole creation may find fulfilment in the Son of Man, Jesus Christ our Saviour.

Meditation

To God, our ability is less important than our availability. Our ability can even get in the way if it obscures God's role in our achievement.

"You can't have a God. If you have, if you possess a God, if you talk about ‘My God’, my own little possession that helps me, my asset, then what you have is not the true and living God, father of our Lord Jesus Christ, but an Idol, a God made in your own image. And, brothers and sisters, much of the history of religion, even in the Christian Religion, is an attempt to make Gods of ourselves, by launching ego-projections into the middle distance - plop - and then having an affair with that ego-projection. That's what religion has been, so very often." 

Bishop of London, Bishop Richard Chartres, writing on the Holy Trinity

The story is told that Saint Augustine was walking along the beach one day, puzzling over the doctrine of the Trinity, when he came across a little child who was running back and forth with a bucket, pouring water from the ocean into a hole he had dug in the sand. Augustine asked the boy, "What are you doing?" The boy replied, "I'm trying to put the ocean into this hole." Augustine abruptly realized that he had been trying to put an infinite God into his finite mind.

Hymns

1. Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord God Almighty (Tune Nicea)
2. Spirit of Holiness (Tune Blow the wind southerly)
3. Lord thy Church (Tune Abbots Leigh)
4. Blessed city heavenly Salem, (Tune Westminster Abbey)
5. Father God, I wonder how I managed to exist
6. King of kings and Lord of lords,
7. Thine be the glory - Tune: Maccabaeus
8. Christ is made the sure foundation - Tune: Westminster Abbey Purcell
9. God is our strength and refuge - Tune: Dambusters March
10. Angel voices ever singing
11. Thou whose almighty word 

Prayers for Sunday and the week ahead

Let us remember the Creator God 

O God the Father, we thank you that your are a creator God. We thank you that you have made all things and have made them well. That you have given to us all things richly to enjoy. For the beauty and the bounty of this fair earth. We thank you, O Father who has made all things and all people. 

Forgive us if in pride and selfishness and in anger we have misused your gifts and have used for death that which was meant for life. 

Let us remember the Redeemer God 

O Lord Jesus Christ, the Son, we thank you for your redeeming power. You love us and we see your love shown most clearly on the cross where you gave of your life to conquer death and to make well the brokenness of the universe. We thank you Son of God who loves us with a never ending love. 

Forgive us if we have treated your love lightly as a little thing and if we have shown little love in return 

Let us remember the Spirit of God 

O Holy Spirit of God we thank you that your are with us at all times and in all places. For the guidance which you give to us, for the knowledge which you have given to us for your continual upholding, strengthening and protecting power. We thank you that you are with us Spirit of God 

Forgive us if we have tried to live alone, and have been reluctant to walk with you or draw strength from you. 

May the blessing of God the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, the Three in One and One in Three be on us now and stay with each one of us always. Amen. 

Lord God in spite of our unbelief and lack of understanding of who you are, show us your new way of living. Amen. 

Almighty and everlasting God, you have given us your servants grace, by the confession of a true faith, to acknowledge the glory of the eternal Trinity and in the power of the divine majesty to worship the Unity: keep us steadfast in this faith, that we may evermore be defended from all adversities; through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord, who is alive and reigns with you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. 

Most exalted Trinity, divinity above all knowledge, whose goodness passes understanding, who guides Christians to divine wisdom; direct our way to the summit of your mystical oracles, most incomprehensible, most lucid and most exalted, where the simple and pure and unchangeable mysteries of theology are revealed in the darkness, clearer than light; a darkness that shines brighter than light, that invisibly and intangibly illuminates with splendours of inconceivable beauty the soul that sees not. Let this be my prayer. 

Denys (Dionysius) the pseudo-Areopagite (c500)

Father, you sent your Word to bring us truth and your Spirit to make us holy. Through them we come to know the mystery of your life. Help us to worship you, one God in three Persons, by proclaiming and living our faith in you. Grant this through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, Who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, One God, for ever and ever. Amen. 

Father, all-powerful and ever-living God, we do well always and everywhere to give you thanks. 

We joyfully proclaim our faith in the mystery of your Godhead. You have revealed your glory as the glory also of your Son and of the Holy Spirit: three Persons equal in majesty, undivided in splendour, yet one Lord, one God, ever to be adored in your everlasting glory. 

And so, with all the choirs of angels in heaven we proclaim your glory and join in their unending hymn of praise: Holy, holy, holy Lord… Lord God, we worship you, a Trinity of Persons, one eternal God.

Be to us, O Christ, like the sight of the sea to wearied eyes; like a walled-in garden to a troubled mind; like home to the wanderer; like a mighty fortress to the soul pursued. Come as living water for our cleansing. Come as a song to comfort our sadness. Come as the inward voice to direct our days; and all for your name’s sake. Amen 

E Orchard, 1877-1955

Declaration of Faith

Declaration of Faith

Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord God Almighty

Who was, and is, and is to come.

We believe in God the Father, who created all things:

for by his will they were created and have their being.

We believe in God the Father 

from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named

We believe in God the Son, who was slain: for with his blood he purchased us for God, from every tribe and language, from every people and nation.

We believe in God the Son who lives in our hearts through faith, 

and fills us with his love.

We believe in the Holy Spirit who strengthens us with power from on high

We are called by him from every tribe and tongue and people and nation 

a kingdom of priests to serve our God.

We believe in One God, Father Son and Holy Spirit. Amen

Blessing

To God the Father, who loved us, and accepted us: 

To God the Son, who loved us and loosed us from our sins by his own blood: 

To God the Holy Ghost, who spreads the love of God abroad in our hearts: 

To the one true God be all love and all glory for time and for eternity. Amen.

God of heaven and earth, before the foundation of the universe and the beginning of time, you are the triune God: the Author of creation, the eternal Word of salvation, and the life-giving Spirit of wisdom. Guide us to all truth by your Spirit, that we may proclaim all that Christ revealed and rejoice in the glory he shared with us. Glory and praise to you, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, now and forever. Amen.

'God of pilgrimage Be with me on my journey through this life; Guard and defend me, Shelter and feed me, Challenge and inspire me, Teach me and lead me, and when my days are ended Welcome me home at last To rest in your love for ever. 'A Pilgrim's Prayer', 20th Century