The pride and excitement among the people of Trinity Muscatine was palpable. Not only were they celebrating 175 years as a congregation, the
oldest in the Diocese of Iowa, they were also dedicating the renovated parish
hall with its new entrance and vestibule. In November
2011, I was rededicating the bell and bell tower after lightning had
struck it and caused severe damage. A year ago, we dedicated the Jubilee Community Center during
my visitation. This time it was an occasion of much joy, typified in the
congregational photograph, which followed proceedings on Sunday morning.
The first community of Episcopalians was formed in
Bloomfield (now called Muscatine) at the initiative of Matthew Matthews, a
layman who had come from Ohio. He gathered a group for prayer book services at
his home, which soon became two house churches as we would call them. Bishop Kemper took some time to recognize that he was passing an Episcopal community as he
sailed up and down the Mississippi visiting the missionary personnel he had
placed in Dubuque and Burlington; eighteen months in fact. But by1839 he managed to stop in Bloomfield and confirmed
several members of both congregations, also celebrating Eucharist with them. It
was not long before a parish was formed; which became the building block for
the Diocese of Iowa. In August 2003, as a new bishop fresh from the Minneapolis
General Convention, I preached and presided at the 150th anniversary
of the Diocese of Iowa, which was founded at Trinity Muscatine.
This event, however, was very much a celebration of the
parish—recalling all the ups and downs that can happen within a community
seeking to remain faithful to God over the decades. There is something
important about not taking that ability to be still thriving for granted. It
was a joy also to be able to present to the congregation a UTO grant of $2,500
toward their ministry through the Jubilee Center,
especially to those who are differently abled.
The weekend had begun with an open house for the community
and evening prayer in the form Matthew Matthews would have used in 1859. Donna
and I were able to join the congregation for the evening banquet, at which
several members spoke and messages from former Rectors were read. As I looked
around the room I saw the impact that the congregation had over time on the
Diocese and the leaders, like John Stevens and Elizabeth and Chuck Coulter that
had come from them. I thought, too, of their support in past days of the
Cursillo movement in Iowa as well as that of the current Diocesan Youth
ministry. Their present Rector, Cathi Bencken,
has done a marvelous job in spearheading the restoration not only of the
building but of the people. It seemed only appropriate to be there on Trinity
Sunday and to be able to ask the question in my sermon: What does it mean to be
a people shaped by being named after the Holy Trinity?
Sermon at Trinity Episcopal Church, Muscatine—15 June 2014
Trinity
Sunday Readings: Genesis 1:1- 2:4; 2 Corinthians 13: 11-13; Matthew 28: 16-20
Most of us preachers are not very keen on the complex
concept that meets us on Trinity Sunday. The collect of the day does not help;
and yet because this was such a special anniversary—175 years from your
founding —my mind wondered to ask the question, “What does it mean to have the
Trinity as your Patronal Festival?” It is one thing to try and get your mind
around the Trinity, but what impact does it have on you if it is your
community’s named identity?
Let me put the question in a different context. I was rector
of St Barnabas Episcopal Church in Eagle Rock, California. Barnabas was the son of encouragement—in other
words a patron saint of easy identification. His name lent itself to our major
work as a congregation—to encourage one another into confidence in ministry as
baptized members of the Body of Christ. We certainly punched above our weight
in developing a variety of ministries for such a relatively small group of
people. I identified personally with Barnabas who had found Paul and given him
a second chance when no one else would vouch for him. His split with Paul later
was over a similar manifestation of the same characteristic as Barnabas was
ready to give Mark a second chance and Paul would not. It was easy to find that
spirit of encouragement to invite parishioners to discover their giftedness in
the Spirit and their calling.
So I often see a connectedness between Patron Saints and a
congregation’s identity. It stands to reason. Is it, however, more difficult when
it is the Triune God that you are named after? Do you have to understand the
name to be able to identify with it or be impacted by it? Can you grow into it?
Can the “Trinity” inspire you?
Perhaps you have never given it any thought, but you could
not be more wonderfully invited to such a reflection than through the words of
the Apostle Paul marked out for this day; nor by an occasion any finer than
this one as you celebrate 175 years of such patronal branding.
In England we are very familiar with the words of what we
simply call “The Grace.” It is often customary to end church meetings or house
groups with the invitation to recite together “The Grace” as offered to us in
Paul’s letter to the Corinthians, namely “The Grace of our Lord Jesus Christ,
and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you now and
ever more.” It is a good custom and not as widely used here in the States, from
my limited experience.
Through your name you are being shaped to be a people of
grace, love and communion or fellowship. Given what you have gone through over
recent years of our joint memories—what some might call the pre- and post-Rick
Simpson years—how blessed it is to be the people of the Trinity in this special
way! For, we can never underestimate the pull of the grace and love of God
through Jesus Christ, nor the power of the invitation to be in communion with
the Living God through the Spirit.
Your very name as the people of God in this place reminds
you, and reminds you to remind the rest of us, of the nature of our character
as made and restored in the image of God. So Paul says, “Live at peace with
each other and the God of peace and love will be with you.”
Obviously as with everything our God puts before us, there
is a choice. There is also expectation to put things in order; to agree with
one another (which is not uniformity nor unanimity but a resolve to live at
that deep level where you are learning to honor each person even if you have
differing opinions); and to live in peace. What is promised for such a willing
commitment is that the God of Peace and Love will, in turn, be with you.
So think what it means that this God revealed in Jesus
Christ is One God, yet Three Persons—Unity in Diversity; Diversity in Unity.
Think what this offers to a divided and polarized world and church. Think what
it offers to our divided families and conflicted selves.
It means we never have to settle with being alienated from
one another; or to nurse generations-old resentments—unless we choose to. For
then we shut out the God of peace and love who seeks to be with us. It also
means that we never have to be disarmed by the creative diversity of our
individual giftedness in God. The recognition and enjoyment of each other’s
gifts is how we work together as one in all.
For 175 years this has been your witness. The name by which
you have identified yourselves has declared the reconciling nature of God—the
God whose grace creates forgiveness and enough space for us to be forgiven and
to start over; One God whose love knows no limits as to what has to be done to
bring us back into relationship with God; One God who desires to live and work
in communion with us so that the work we do is Divine work, Divine mission and
Divine caring especially for those we would readily dismiss, neglect or
overlook.
In today’s culture we need lives shaped by the Trinity; we
need Trinitarian people. I mentioned elsewhere that I was coming home recently
from a Conference on theGospel of Peace and Reconciliation in Oklahoma.
On the plane I sat by a man who was clearly working on his sermon. I noticed he
was about to preach on the triumphal entry of Jesus into Jerusalem for Palm
Sunday. He asked me what I was going to preach on as he seemed to recognize my
own reading or work. I mumbled something about Philippians 2: 5-11,
offering the wider sweep of the liturgical path which we will follow during
Holy Week. “Just give ‘em Jesus,” was his barked reply and I was left wondering
how such words could nevertheless sound like such a slap in the face.
God did not just give us Jesus—nor did Jesus just give us
Jesus. God was in Christ through the Spirit and is always in Christ through the
Spirit—coming to us as Three yet One, and One yet Three. I always try and pray
“To the Father, in the Name of the Son through the Spirit.”
This is vital for our culture because we divide over so many
little things and as the world grows increasingly crowded and complex our
natural response is fear and self-protectiveness. In that fear we separate—divide
to conquer, or to preserve our control of our little patch of what is. In that
fear we horde—grab what we can to claim as ours regardless of the needs of all.
In that fear, we are at the mercy of the biggest and loudest among us often
blaring through the many media sources; and we lose the capacity to hear the
still small voice of the Triune God. In that same fear we can overplay one
person of the Trinity above the others—creating sectarianism rather than the
organic community of the people of God. That is probably the greatest and most
ironic tragedy of all, and so much sorrow has come from it.
Trinity people, we need you to remind us of who we are and
whose we are. We need to remember that God never presented God’s self alone,
but as Three—so that we could see that we each need to be true to ourselves
while knowing ourselves to be fully true only when in communion with each
other—and we cannot pick and choose who the “each other” happens to be!
This is how Jesus can entrust all authority to His
disciples. He never acts alone; nor is He alone acting. To that same end He
sends us to the uttermost parts of the world; that ultimately the world in all
its immense parts be one and in that oneness know its salvation and restoration
into the image upon which it was made.
Trinity people, as ones closest to the source—lead
the way. Lead us out of Muscatine, across Iowa and Illinois to the uttermost
ends of the earth which is in fact never an end but someone else’s center.
Jesus promises to be with us always, but never alone. He always is with us in
the Father and through the Spirit.
Amen
