“Together in the Holy Trinity”
June 15, 2014
FEAST
OF
יהוה אֱלֹהִים
YHWH ELOHIM
Genesis 1: 1 - 2: 3/Psalm 150/2 Corinthians 13:
11 – 14/Matthew 28: 16 – 20
His Excellency
The Most Reverend Ariel Cornelio P.
Santos D.D.
of the
Archdiocese of Manila
the
National Church in the Philippines
and the
Territorial Church of Asia
International Communion of the
Charismatic Episcopal Church
Happy Father’s Day to all Fathers! It is not just your day,
but the Son's day and the Holy Spirit’s Day because this is Trinity Sunday
also. I am not here to bore you with the doctrine of the Trinity. We have
to learn from the Trinity because They are our model for being.
In the movement in the 1800’s called Age of Enlightenment, the
spirit of that age is defined as: man’s exodus from self-incurred inability to
use his own understanding without guidance of another. Enlightenment
means learning, understanding on your own without the help of a teacher or an
instructor. This age resulted in today’s reason for our division and our
disagreement on the subject of the Trinity. Even today, there are the
ancient rehashed heresies because people think that they can learn from their
own without the benefit of a teacher, parent or instructor.
In Deuteronomy, Moses' commandment is for the father to instruct
his son in the ways of God. Psalm 78:1-7 talks about the responsibility of the
fathers in preparing and teaching and instructing the next generation. Proverbs
says, "My son, listen, heed my word and give ear to my instruction.”
The word “instruction” by definition is something that comes from another
person in authority over another. In the case of Christianity, it is whom
God appoints – like parents, teachers, elders and the Church leaders. It takes
humility on the part of the student or the receiver of instruction to be
instructed. It is the exact opposite of the arrogance of the Age of
Enlightenment. It takes humility and the fear of God to submit to God's
representative authority. If all Christians just submitted to the
teachings of the Church, we would not have the problem today with the doctrine
of the Trinity. Today, the reason some Christian circles still don’t
believe in the Trinity, having their own understanding of who God is, is
because of this departure from instruction.
The word Catholic in Latin is ubique, semper, ab omnibus;
in English, it means everywhere, always, and by all. Believe everywhere,
all the time, and by all. The Great Commission was designed to accomplish
that so that there would be one faith. Because of the spirit of
enlightenment, some, at a certain point, invoke the Sola Scriptura, the
Bible only teaching or principle.
The Bible contains all things necessary for life and salvation,
but it doesn’t contain everything else. Not everything is there.
Read John 21:25; John 20:30-31. John himself said, “Many other things
Jesus did which are not written in the gospel.” He said, “If we put them
all in writing, it is impossible.” The whole Word cannot contain the
books if we write about God exhaustingly. The Bible is like a summary of what
we need to know in order for us to live salvation life. In fact, I
challenge you to look for the word “Trinity” in the Bible. There is none
because it is a teaching of the Church which preceded the Bible. The teaching
has always been proclaimed but not necessarily written.
Does it mean that it is not biblical? It is; it is
consistent with the Bible but not everything is written there. The
New Covenant (Testament) is not a document. It is a gospel that was to be
passed as Jesus instructed. For some reason, the New Covenant has been
reduced to a written document. This is not Catholic teaching because
Catholic means everywhere, by all and always.
Jesus said, "Take this all of you and drink from it.
This is My blood of the new and everlasting Covenant. It would be shed for you
and for many for the remission of sins and do this (not
write this) in remembrance of Me.” Do it! Proclaim it! The
New Covenant is more than just something we write about. It is something
you do, you practice and live out. It is a life! It is not a
literary achievement, but a life. In fact and I dare say this that you cannot
write about it and convince somebody about it only by reading it.
You have to live it out, show it, and have them experience the power of it.
God can use the written Word. Many of us have been led to
God by just reading something, but the power of God is more than that.
The gospel is more than that. Jesus’ command was: do this;
proclaim this. It is not necessarily to write. Some were called to
write, but the faith message even pre-dates the compiled document by centuries.
They have been proclaiming the gospel before this compilation of books called
the New Testament was in circulation. The gospel, the New Covenant,
is a message. It is a gospel that was to be proclaimed. This
compilation of books was in support of, not in place of the New Covenant.
This document talks about what has been done in centuries and what
should be proclaimed continually until Christ comes again. It is like a
good cook and a recipe. You can say to your grandmother who was taught by
a great cook who was her mother that you can cook a dish better than her
because you have the recipe. You say, “I can cook Kare-kare better than
you because I have the recipe. It is all in the recipe!” The grandmother
may or may not have the recipe but she was in the kitchen with her mother
cooking the Kare-kare herself. We cannot be arrogant to say, “I
have her recipe, but the mother saw the cooking.”
This is all we have - the Scriptures – but actually not. We
also have those who received the teachings orally and is passed on to us.
Some call it tradition, but it is a teaching of the Church. According to
God’s command, not the Old or New Testament, one generation is to pass the
instructions, the teaching to another. It is good that we have the
aid of the recipe, the Bible, but the training goes beyond. You have to
cook to learn. If need be, you get burned once in a while. You
don’t learn without getting burned. Practice and experience is how you
learn the gospel. Hebrews says the mature, by practice, have trained
themselves to discern good and evil. It is not just by reading, by
googling, but by practice because classroom theory is very different form
actual experiential knowledge.
There is a story of a shepherd who was herding his flock in a
remote pasture when suddenly a brand-new Mercedes Benz advanced out of a dust
cloud towards him. The driver, a young man in an Armani suit, Gucci shoes,
Prada sunglasses and an expensive Salvatore Ferragamo tie, leans out the window
and asks him, "If I tell you exactly how many sheep you have in your
flock, will you give me one?" The shepherd looks at the man, obviously a
yuppie, then looks at his peacefully grazing flock and calmly answers,
"Sure. Why not?" The yuppie parks his car, whips out his iPad,
opens the NASA website, and logs on to a GPS satellite navigation system to get
an exact fix on his location which he then feeds to another NASA satellite that
scans the area in an ultra-high-resolution photo.
The young man then opens the digital photo in a graphics
application and exports it to an image processing facility in Hamburg, Germany.
Within seconds, he receives an email that the image has been processed and
the data stored in his iCloud. After retrieving it from there, he prints
out a full-color, 150-page report on his hi-tech, mini HP LaserJet printer and
finally turns to the shepherd and says, “You have exactly 1,586 sheep.” The
shepherd says, “That’s right. Well, I guess you can take one of my sheep.”
He watches the young man select one of the animals and looks on amused as
the young man stuffs it into the trunk of his car. Then the shepherd says to
the young man, “Hey, if I can tell you exactly what your business is, will you
give me back my sheep?“ The young man thinks about it for a second and then
says, “Okay, why not?” The shepherd says, “You’re a consultant.” The yuppie
says, “Wow! That’s correct, but how did you guess that?” “No guessing
required,” answered the shepherd. “You showed up here even though nobody called
you; you want to get paid for an answer I already knew to a question I never
asked. You are clearly a consultant.’ Then, he says, “Now, give me
back my dog!"
We think we have a diploma and you can wave it to the whole world
and say, “If you have to hire me, you have to give me this much on my first
day.” No, you are just starting to learn. In the classroom, you
learn very little. You learn the theories, but the actual experience
happens on the job. It doesn’t matter how many gadgets you use. If
we can’t even tell the difference between a dog and a sheep, then, we don’t
know much. We know by experience. Not just something, but even some one –
persons. We can read the biography of a person but still not know
him. You have to experience.
The Great Commission in the gospel commands the apostles, “Go and
make disciples of all nations and baptize them and teach them.” This was
to result in the catholizing of the earth meaning – every one, everywhere
believing the same teaching. It was to result in the obedience to all
that Christ commanded and the unity and the commonality of the faith. It
is the exact opposite of the autonomous individualism, which is, “I can learn
on my own.” It is the exact opposite of the spirit of enlightenment
and the thought that we know better than our instructors whom Jesus appointed
and sent.
If we, ourselves, are not teachable, we can’t expect others to be
teachable people. How can we fulfill the Great Commission if everyone has
the spirit of, “I don’t need you. I have the internet. I can log on to a
religious site and learn.” The New Covenant is not learned through books
or websites. It is experienced at the Table and lived out.
The Trinity is our model for unity. The Trinity is
illustrated as God the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. The Holy
Spirit is not Father; the Father is not Son; the
Son is not the Holy Spirit. The Father isGod;
the Son is God; the Holy Spirit is God.
Yet, They are one and They are in unity. Each of us is human, but I
am not you. You are not the person beside you and he is not me. But
we, each of us, is human, a child of God. The Holy Trinity is One.
They share the same essence but They have different personalities, but They are
one. Their nature: God is love. This love is despite
differences because there is one common thing. They are model for being
because if we know how They are, who They are, then we can truly and fully be
human also because we were created in Their image and likeness.
A man and a woman are two different personalities, but when they
get married, they become one – two in one. Just like the Trinity - Three
in one. We, though many, are one Body. We cannot say that we know
God in His Trinitarian nature and being if we don't operate the way They
do. They love one another; They support one another; They are one.
Different, yes, but one. You don’t have to have this compatibility
because no one is compatible with anyone. There are different likes and
dislikes but they share one common humanity and both are children of God.
As God the Father, Son and Spirit relate to one another, They
demonstrate Their love for each other and work in concert to accomplish the
Divine will. We get our idea of our nature and our fellowship and our
mission as one Body. In the Great Commission, the apostles were
instructed with explicit instructions on what to do, their purpose, the scope
of their mission and the practices involved which was baptizing and
teaching. They got the assurance from Jesus that they did not do this
alone. The responsibility of continuity of Jesus’ life and ministry is
now turned over to the Church. We are to preach the gospel of the
Kingdom. The furtherance of the Kingdom is founded on the fact that Jesus
has received all authority in heaven and on earth.
We have no reason to fear, to doubt or to be anxious about anything
at all because we are backed by that authority. It is like it is already
done! Much like in the Old Testament, the Promised Land was already
given. They simply had to occupy. The Great Commission actually is
just waiting for us to fulfill it. Already, Jesus authority is ahead of
us. We just need to obey His commandment and His instructions to
us. We are told to make disciples of nations and baptize people.
Baptism is not just a right of initiation and a ticket to heaven. Baptism
is more than that. It is an identification with the work of God that
involved all Three expressions of the Trinity. It was always an
identification with the community of faithful followers who observed the
fellowship, the brotherhood that characterizes their common belief and
practice. It was a continual participation in this fellowship.
This is what being a disciple is and this is what we are today as
people. We are not to make converts out of people and we are certainly
not to make statistics of them or feathers for our achievement in our
ministry. Some say that we are not limited to Israel. We are
to go to the Gentiles. We are not limited to the Gentiles
either. We have responsibility to the sheep of the house of Israel,
especially when they are lost and they go astray. I would emphasize that
we are witnesses first in Jerusalem, and then in Judea, and then in Samaria and
then to the outermost part of the earth.
Let us not forget Jerusalem and Israel. My questions: have
we been, as disciples of Christ, fulfilling the Great Commission? Have we
been making disciples of nations? Have we been making disciples of our
children? In Jerusalem, have we been making disciples of our brothers and
sisters around us? Or have we just stopped at just converting them and
reading to them something and giving them a booklet that says, “Believe in
Jesus and everything will be okay.”
We are to get people to know Christ and His commandments and
observe all of those things. Not just learn of them, but observe all of them.
We are not to fear but we fulfill it in His Name and participate in the
establishment of His kingdom on earth. It is sure to happen. It
will happen one way or another. We might as well be used by God as
instruments. If we don’t fulfill, He will get some other people to fulfill it
for Him. We might as well participate in the fulfillment of this, as His
instruments. When we are, we don’t only participate in God’s work, but we
also fulfill Jesus’ prayer for us that we be one even as He and the Father and
the Holy Spirit are one. And, we become more and more what we already are
– created in the image and likeness of God and partakers of His Divine nature.
Why is the Trinity so important? This is because we are
created in Their likeness and image. If we go against that likeness and image,
then we struggle. It is like we are fish out of water. We will find
our peace, our completeness, our wholeness, our salvation in the fact that we
live according to how They live. We fellowship according to how They
fellowship. We are in unity according to Their unity.
This is the way it is in the kingdom of our God!
LET US CONTINUE OUR REFLECTION
WITH
CARDINAL OF HOLY MOTHER CHURCH
AND
VENERABLE PRIMATE
OF THE PHILIPPINES
THROUGH
THE WORD EXPOSED
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