Trinity

I have been reflecting upon this now in the light of Father’s day, having come and gone. Is God the father male, of course not as the book the Shack so delightfully depicts. Albeit that in that book Jesus, the son is male, whilst father and Spirit are female. But of course there is no gender in God in the sense that we understand that distinction. And I was pondering, I like to think like Jesus’ mother Mary was wont to do, Paul’s famous dictum “Now in Christ there is neither Jew nor gentile, male nor female, slave or free, for all are one in Christ Jesus”. He suggests that in Christ there is an end to all binary distinctions by which ‘we’ gain out ID over and against 'them’. So here in Cambridge we are entering into the season of overseas visitors with all the students departed for the summer. And the distinction between us and them is never more clear than when they take to the roads on their hire bikes! And I wondered whether it was because Paul’s doctrine of the Trinity was so strong that he could see that now in Christ such binary distinctions are ended. And that was because as a result of the outpouring of God’s the Spirit upon all peoples all are enabled to imitate God. The God revealed in Jesus is not the God of a particular religion or ethnic group. The god revealed in Jesus is according to the testimony of the Apostles the God of all peoples. And the God of all peoples is capable of being imitated by all peoples not simply the religious.# And by such imitation fullness of humanity as witnessed in the person of Jesus may be the experience of all peoples. And that god is specifically not one or two but three. That God in whose image we are made is three in one. Therefore we are clearly and specifically called to become our true selves by imitating a god who is three not two. By imitating a God who is in community, who is in a community of self giving and sacrificial love. If we would be our true selves we would gradually be enabled to appreciate that all are god’s children, we are all brothers and sisters and one family. There are no 'them’ only 'us’.

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