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The last 6 months of the Church’s Year have been a gradual unfolding of the story of God.
In Advent and Christmas we reflected on a God who came with new creative love into the life and history of our world. The technical name for this is “Incarnation” -a word whose root is carnal – fleshly – embodying humankind. “The word became flesh, he came to dwell among us, and we saw his glory, such glory as befits the Father’s only Son, full of grace and truth”. The season of Epiphany – which means “manifestation” is the period when the church reflects on what this coming of God among us means. We read the stories of the wise men – Magi from the ancient world – around the Tigris and the Euphrates – generally regarded as the cradle of civilisation – coming to worship the child of God. We read the stories of the baptism of Christ – when he receives the Holy Spirit and begins his work: we read the stories of his miracles – like turning water into wine at a wedding to discover what God coming into our world might mean; we reflect on his healing powers – God with us is upsetting our natural order of things and we discover that in God’s kingdom all things are possible.
Then comes Lent, Passiontide and Easter, when the focal point in the cross. In this period we celebrate the life of Jesus Christ as the way to God, the truth of God and the life of God shared with all humankind – to the point of suffering and death. It tells us that when things go wrong there is still love and forgiveness in the eternal purposes of God – there is ALWAYS a fresh start. We are never consigned to hell- a life without God.
Last week we celebrated Pentecost – when we are reminded of the continuing presence of this God who is the Father of Jesus Christ alive in every place and every circumstance in which love and creativity flourish and where forgiveness is sought and expressed.
All these events are not separate events; they are all part of the whole story of God which demonstrates a fundamental unity in God. Jesus calls his Father, “Abba” (Dad) – an intimate adult relationship with the source of all things, and the Kingdom is present in his person and life. This lies behind all the parables that Jesus told, and all the stories that the gospels tell us about Jesus.
This story is about God who moves out to be inclusive. In the New Testament time and again, Jesus, by his actions, includes everyone by putting right what goes wrong in life. The people who were cast out of society for ritual reasons, or for reasons of taboo, or for moral reason – all of them, says Jesus, are included. No one is left out. Now that is something that we need to regain for society today. When an MP can suggest that disabled people should be encouraged to work for less than the minimum wage, then we know that there are sections of society that are not being included. God is inclusive; therefore we also need to be totally inclusive. I felt very sorry, on friday, at a funeral, that an elderly gentleman in a wheel chair had to be manhandled by others up the steps of our church: we could not put up the ramp because it interferes with the passage of the coffin into church. The sooner we can get direct access through a new entrance in the west wall into church, the better it will be than we can truly claim to be more inclusive and stop treating wheel chair bound folk as second class citizens.
And then we can look at this story of inclusion to new levels. Christians soon came to understand and appreciate that they were included in the life of God. After the resurrection of Jesus, it was as if God was including them in his own life: the very Spirit of God was given to humankind. So, not only were all human beings being included with each other in God’s purposes for human society: all humanity was included in the life of God. Peter, in his letter, wrote of our being sharers in the divine nature.
Trinity Sunday is the day when we can celebrate this fact that we are included in the life of God. And it is something that we need to demonstrate – and we can do this by the way we live. If we are taken up into God’s life then we should try to act in unity with God’s life. We should always endeavour to be loving and creative; we should strive to break down the barriers and taboos of society and culture to demonstrate that God wants to include all people everywhere in his life.
Even the Church, at times, fails to demonstrate the inclusive God by putting up barriers and controls. God welcomes all, and therefore the Church must welcome all, at all times, and in all places. Every time we come to the altar to receive Holy Communion, we receive the body and blood of Jesus, reminding us again that we are all, equally, included in the life of God – given for us all to eat and drink, and then to go out in love and service to proclaim his love in the world.
