Meditation on the Trinity

The Father's role is to create the world and generate the Son from all eternity (which is a continuous process) -- The Generator.

The Son's role is to be the one through whom all things come into being and to bring about the work of redemption through his incarnation, sufferings, and death -- The Redeemer.

The Holy Spirit's role is to inspire men and women for special tasks, to equip Jesus for his task, to inspire scripture, to unify and direct the church. The Spirit's role is to bring the work of God to completion in creation and redemption -- The Completer.

Writes ethicist Gabriel Fackre: "The unique source of the unique Christian story is the one tri-personal God. Father, Son and Holy Spirit are Persons that indwell one another in such a manner that ‘They' are, in fact, a ‘Thou.' While other religions may profess that God is loving, the Scriptures of this faith declare God is Love, the triune Life Together" (Christology in Context: The Christian Story: A Pastoral Systematics, Grand Rapids, Michigan: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 2006, 241).

Connection with Lectionary Texts for May 30, 2010
Romans 5:1-5 -- The "grace cycle," in which suffering leads to endurance, which leads to character, which leads to hope because God's love has been poured into our hearts by the Holy Spirit which has been given to us.

John 16:12-15 -- Jesus promises the "Spirit of truth" who will lead us into all truth.

Proverbs 8:1-4, 22-31 -- Woman Wisdom, a female metaphor for an aspect of God's character, recounts her participation with God in Creation.

The theme of the Triune God as calling for a personal, participatory response certainly gleams through these texts in which, in one place and another, all three persons of the Trinity join in the dance.

Woman Wisdom
Woman Wisdom (Prov. 8) might be said to be an aspect of the character and work of all three persons of the Trinity. She deserves a whole sermon series of her own, but this short treatment will have to suffice for now.

Woman Wisdom, as a personification of God's guidance of the community, arose in the tumultuous postexilic period when traditionally male bastions of authority had crumbled (king and court, priest and temple). The authority of parents, including mothers, in the home was more important than ever. The figure of personified Wisdom remained an important symbol as Judaism developed in the Hellenistic world and focused on her Greek name, Sophia. Both Sirach and the Wisdom of Solomon developed her portrait as acting at God's command, ordering the cosmos and revealing God to Israel. Philo of Alexandria used Wisdom and Logos interchangeably as symbols of the working of God in the world, even while insisting that the male Logos was superior to the female Wisdom, thus preparing the way for the substitution of Logos for Wisdom that we find in the Prologue to the Gospel of John.

In 1 Corinthians, Paul attributes to Christ the cosmological role in creation that had been held by Wisdom (1 Cor. 8:6). He proclaims Christ crucified as "the power of God and the wisdom (Sophia) of God" (1 Cor. 1:24). Most early church writers identified Wisdom with the Logos, and with the divine in Jesus Christ. Others, like Irenaeus of Lyons, identified her with the third person of the Trinity. The affirmation of Sophia of Proverbs 8:22-31 as fully divine and consubstantial with the Father was crucial for Athanasius's claim that Jesus was begotten by God and not a creature who had a beginning in time (Alyce M. McKenzie, Preaching Proverbs: Wisdom for the Pulpit, Westminster JohnKnox Press, 1996, 71-72).

In Proverbs 8, Wisdom's teaching are said to yield reward more precious than worldly wealth (8:19-21). In verse 22, Woman Wisdom weights her words with the authority of her relationship with Yahweh. She asserts that she was created before anything else and points to this as a mark of the highest honor. She was with Yahweh, beside him, during the creation.

The word translated "master worker" (amon) may refer to a "crafts (wo)man" assisting in the work of creation, or it could connote a child playing. Woman Wisdom is a heavenly being who wishes to form a relationship with disciples modeled on her relationship with Yahweh. She was daily his delight and she rejoices (plays) before God and the created world. She delights in the human race. She brings these joyous verses to a close by affirming her role as the one who summons human beings to blessedness and happiness (8:32-34) (Alyce M. McKenzie, Preaching Biblical Wisdom in a Self Help Society, Abingdon Press, 2004, 114).

Here we can't help but think to ourselves: She reminds me of someone . . . It is no coincidence that Jesus himself may well have viewed himself as an envoy of Wisdom (Lk. 7:33-35; Mt. 11:18-19).

In Proverbs, Woman Wisdom actively seeks out followers, standing at the city gates. She speaks to everyone, not just the simple. Her teachings are trustworthy and lead to great benefit. This trustworthiness is grounded in her relationship with Yahweh. She loves God, God's creation, and human beings. This is no pale, static love, but an active delight, a playful, sportive love. Wisdom seeks us out because she loves us. And she seeks us out because she loves God. There is some mysterious delight to the life of Wisdom that involves the love of God, humankind, and Wisdom in a kind of circle dance (Preaching Biblical Wisdom, 115).

Alyce M. McKenzie is Professor of Homiletics at Perkins School of Theology in Dallas, TX.  Visit Alyce McKenzie's site at Patheos.