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May the true God be glorified for His goodness

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Sermon for Trinity Sunday

Romans 11:33-36  +  John 3:1-15

Last week, on American Idol, there was a performance of a song entitled, “The Goodness of God.” It received high praise from Christians around the country. They were so astounded that ABC would allow such a “powerful worship song” to be broadcast. “God was truly glorified” by this performance, they said.

But, which god was glorified by it? If you listen to the song, it’s a lot of repetition about the goodness of “god,” without ever narrowing down which god they were singing about, and without mentioning anything that this god has done that was so “good.” The fact is, any believer in any god could sway and sing along to that song. Any listeners in the audience could imagine that they’ve had a real encounter with God, while having learned nothing about the true God. They can go on living in their sins, believing that God is so “good” that He supports their sinful lifestyle.

Now, some will object, “There is only one God.” That’s a true statement. But what some people mean by that is that anyone who claims to worship any God is worshiping the one God. They think all paths of worship lead to the true God, no matter which beliefs about Him a person holds. Each religion, in their opinion, is just as good as the next. But they’re dead wrong. As we confessed today in the Athanasian Creed, together with the catholic, that is, the common Christian Church: “Whoever desires to be saved must, above all, hold to the catholic faith; anyone who does not hold to it whole and undefiled will, without any doubt, perish eternally.” And then we went on, in the same Creed, to explain what the catholic faith is. To summarize, we worship the one God in “threeness,” that is, in Trinity. And we worship the Trinity of God in unity. The Trinity is a reference to the three Persons whom we worship—not three Gods, but three Persons (Father, Son, and Holy Spirit). We worship Father, Son, and Holy Spirit as one God. And we worship the one God as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. That’s it. And I urge you to take your Service Insert home today and read through that Creed a few times. It’s the clearest explanation of the Trinity that I can think of. We don’t have to fully understand our God, but this is how we have to know Him, because, if we know God differently than this, then we don’t actually know the one true God at all.

Now, long before Jesus spelled out the threeness of the one God as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, the Old Testament Scriptures also revealed it. In Psalm 110, for example, “The Lord said to” David’s “Lord.” That is, the Lord who is the Father said to the Lord who is the Son. And the Son said about Himself in Isaiah 61, “The Spirit, of the Lord God, is upon Me.” Did Israel notice it? Apparently not. But it was there. It was there to be more fully revealed by Jesus, the One who came down from heaven, who came from the Father’s bosom to reveal God to us.

Jesus reveals the one God who is three Persons to us perfectly well in today’s Gospel from John 3, where all three Persons are mentioned. And they’re mentioned as having, each one, a vital role in our salvation. We’re told that Nicodemus, one of the Jewish rulers, came to Jesus at night (as quietly as possible) with his question. Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher who has come from God, for no one can do these signs that you are doing, unless God is with him. Nicodemus isn’t yet a believer, but he’s heard some of Jesus’ teaching and seen some of Jesus’ miracles. And so he concludes that Jesus must have come from God. He doesn’t realize just how right he is. He thinks Jesus has come from God like the prophets came from God, as men who were sent by God. The truth is much deeper. The rest of us human beings only begin to exist when we’re conceived in our mothers’ wombs. But the Person of the Son of God existed already in the beginning with God the Father. He is the “only begotten” of the Father, born of the Father in eternity as light is born of the sun, and then, later, in time, sent by the Father into the world as a man. As Jesus says later on, No one has ascended into heaven, except for the one who came down from heaven, namely, the Son of Man, who is in heaven. Or possibly, “who was in heaven,” that is, before He became flesh. Either way, Jesus “came from God” into the world, a reference to His relationship to the Holy Trinity.

But notice what Jesus does next. As the Son who has come from God the Father, Jesus immediately points Nicodemus to the work of the Holy Spirit.

Truly, truly I tell you, unless a person is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. Nicodemus thought he knew God. And, to the extent that he believed in the God of the Old Testament, he did know God. But he needed to know God better than that. He needed to know God as the Father, and as the Son whom the Father sent into the world to save the world from sin, and also as the Holy Spirit who gives new life to those who have been born in sin. Truly, truly I tell you, unless a man is born of water and Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.

The only way to see, to enter the kingdom of God, Jesus says, is to be born again. Because your first birth was only a birth into the world, not a birth into God’s heavenly family. The flesh that we’ve inherited from our parents, and they from theirs, isn’t clean, isn’t pretty, isn’t innocent. It’s wicked, twisted, corrupt, and devoid of the Spirit of God. By nature, all people are hostile to God—to the true God, I mean. Most people love the idea of “god.” Man has always sought to worship and to curry the favor of a god or gods, but not the one true God who is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. But worshiping a generic god isn’t good enough. You have to be remade, become an entirely new person, and that new life can’t come from you, as little as a baby can give life to him or herself. It has to come from above. It has to come from God the Holy Spirit.

Jesus tells us: Those who have been born of the flesh have to be born also of the Spirit. “Water and the Spirit,” a reference to one of the primary tools the Holy Spirit uses to give that new life and new birth, Holy Baptism, which is, as St. Paul calls it, a washing of rebirth and renewal in the Holy Spirit, and “the washing of water by the Word.” The Spirit is the one who works faith in our hearts through the Word, as it’s preached by itself and as it’s connected to water in Holy Baptism. The Spirit gives life; the flesh counts for nothing. But just because the Spirit also gives new life through the Word alone doesn’t mean Baptism is less important or is optional. The very Word through which the Spirit works faith calls us to Baptism, points us to Baptism, and attaches promises to Baptism: the promise of the forgiveness of sins and salvation, the promise of being clothed with Christ and made children of God, the promise of resurrection to a new spiritual life now, and the promise of a future resurrection of our bodies to eternal life.

But what is it exactly that the Spirit draws us to, turns the eyes of our hearts to, brings us to trust in? To what does Baptism connect us? Jesus explains that to Nicodemus: As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in him should not perish, but have eternal life. So Jesus pointed us to the Spirit, and now the Spirit, through the Gospel, points us to Jesus, the Son of Man, whom the Father sent to be lifted up on a cross, so that we might believe in Him and be saved. Just as Moses long ago made a bronze serpent and lifted it up on a pole, at God’s command, so that the Israelites who had been bitten by venomous snakes might look up at it and be mercifully healed by God from the venom that was killing them, so Jesus, the Son of Man, had to be lifted up on a cross, so that all the perishing people of the world might look to Him in faith and be saved—look to Him, no longer hanging on a cross, but now preached in the world as the One who gave His life on the cross and then took up His life again; preached in the world as the One whose death we are connected to in the eyes of God through the Sacrament of Holy Baptism, where the name of God—Father, Son, and Holy Spirit—is placed on the baptized, and the one who once was lost in Satan’s domain is rescued and given entrance into the kingdom of God.

And that’s the goal of our one God, of the Holy Trinity. That’s what the history of the world has been about. It’s why the world hasn’t been destroyed yet, in spite of people’s multiple attempts to bring the wrath of God down upon themselves with their godless behavior and their endless idolatry, with their refusal to believe the Word and to amend their sinful lives. God the Father knows that He has children who have yet to be born, and to be born again of water and Spirit, sinners who will become His children by the work of God the Spirit, who will bring them to the knowledge of God the Son, that they may not perish but have everlasting life.

We don’t talk about the Holy Trinity as a theological abstraction. No, when we talk about the Holy Trinity, we talk about the works of God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit on our behalf—not three gods working together, but one God devoted to saving fallen man. One day we’ll understand our God a little better, when we see Him face to face after this life. For now, rejoice in Him as He has revealed Himself to us: as a Father who loved us and gave His Son for us, as the Son who loved us and gave Himself on the cross for us, and as the Holy Spirit, who gives us new birth as children of the heavenly Father by bringing us to repentance and faith in Christ Jesus. That is the true goodness of God, of the true God. To this God alone be the glory, both now and forever. Amen.

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The Threeness of God is part His saving name

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Sermon for the Festival of the Holy Trinity

Ezekiel 18:30-32  +  Romans 11:33-36  +  John 3:1-15

We confessed those striking words again today from the Athanasian Creed: Whoever desires to be saved must, above all, hold the catholic faith. Whoever does not keep it whole and undefiled will without doubt perish eternally. And the catholic faith is this, that we worship one God in Trinity and Trinity in unity, neither confusing the persons nor dividing the substance. To be ignorant of the true God or to deny the true God is to perish eternally. But to know Him is eternal life, as Jesus once prayed to His Father in heaven: And this is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom You have sent. And as you heard last week on Pentecost in Joel’s prophecy, cited by the Apostle Peter: And it shall come to pass that whoever calls on the name of the LORD shall be saved.

God’s name is more than just what we call Him. His name is who He is, everything He’s revealed about Himself. The name of the Lord, then, includes His oneness. You know how many gods the ancient Greeks and Romans worshiped, or how many gods the other pagans around the world have worshiped. A god of this and a god of that. A god for every occasion. A god to represent every desire—and every evil—of man. In contrast, Moses declared to the people of Israel: Hear, O Israel! The LORD our God, the LORD is one…You shall fear the LORD your God and serve Him, and shall take oaths in His name. You shall not go after other gods. The one God made the heavens and the earth and all that is in them. There are not three Gods or two Gods or many Gods. There is one God. You have to know that to know Him.

But there is also a unique Threeness—a Trinity—to the one God, revealed obscurely in the Old Testament, revealed clearly in the New (as clearly as we need it to be). The one God who created all things, who revealed Himself to Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Moses, is three distinct Persons, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. You have to know that to know Him. The Threeness of God is part of His saving name.

See how Jesus reveals God to us in His Threeness in today’s Gospel from John 3.

The Pharisee and ruler of the Jews, Nicodemus, eventually became a believer in Jesus, but he wasn’t yet. So he came to Jesus by cover of night and said, Rabbi, we know that You are a teacher come from God; for no one can do these signs that You do unless God is with him. Nicodemus recognized that Jesus “came from God.” He had no idea just how right he was. As John’s Gospel tells us in chapter 1, Jesus was the only-begotten Son of God, begotten of the Father from eternity. God of God. Light of Light. Very God of very God, as we confess in the Nicene Creed. He literally came from God the Father in eternity, and He also came from God the Father into the world through the virgin’s womb. No one has seen God at any time. The only begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, He has declared Him. Where does the Father direct our attention? He points us to His Son. And where does the Son point? Back to the Father.

What does Jesus say in response to Nicodemus? “Yes! Good job! You’re right, I have come from God the Father. I’m the second Person of the Holy Trinity!” No. He doesn’t congratulate Nicodemus or offer a detailed explanation of the Trinity. He puts salvation itself on the line.

Jesus answered and said to him, “Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.”

The first birth, the one from our parents, counts for nothing toward a person’s salvation—toward entering the kingdom of God. The first birth, from our mothers, brings us into the world with the same sin and sinful corruption of our body and soul as our mothers and fathers were born with, back to our sin-corrupted father Adam and our sin-corrupted mother Eve. No one is born with true knowledge of God, true love for God, true trust in God, true fear of God.

Now, it’s true, everyone is born with a reflection of the knowledge of God. We call it the natural knowledge of God or natural law. Human beings know by nature that God exists, for as much as our arrogant age of pseudo-science tries to deny it. We have a general knowledge of right and wrong. We know by nature and from nature that God is good, wise, powerful and just, and that He punishes sinners, even after this earthly life is done. But that natural knowledge doesn’t make us love Him or trust in Him, nor does it reveal how we can enter the kingdom of God.

No, on the contrary, we are all born wanting to earn our own way into heaven, wanting to be God, to play God, to tell God what’s right and wrong, or to look for a God who agrees with us about what is right and wrong. That must be the true God, the one who agrees with me.

But no, the true God is the one who insists that you’re not good enough as you are, because we’re all born in sin. The true God insists that you start over from scratch, that who you are by nature must be completely put to death, and that a new man, a new person must arise from the ashes, being born again.

But being born isn’t something to strive for, isn’t something you do for yourself. You can’t remake yourself. You can’t change who you are. Someone else has to give birth to you. And Jesus explains how that happens and who it is who does it.

Unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.

The Father pointed us to His Son, to know the Father by listening to Jesus. Where does Jesus point? He points to the Spirit. The Spirit—the same Holy Spirit referred to in the Old Testament, the same Holy Spirit whose coming we celebrated last Sunday—He is the only one who brings people into the kingdom of God, and He does it through rebirth, otherwise known as “regeneration.”

Jesus ties that rebirthing or regeneration to water. Not just plain water, but the water that is connected to God’s command and included in God’s Word, the water of Holy Baptism that is applied in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit to those who have heard the Word of God and wish to be buried with Christ through Baptism into death. As Paul writes to Titus in chapter 3: But when the kindness and the love of God our Savior toward man appeared, not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to His mercy He saved us, through the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Spirit, whom He poured out on us abundantly through Jesus Christ our Savior, that having been justified by His grace we should become heirs according to the hope of eternal life. There again you see God in His perfect Threeness—”God our Savior,” that is, God the Father, “saved us through the washing of regeneration of the Holy Spirit, whom He,” the Father, “poured out on us through Jesus Christ our Savior.” The Threeness of God is part of His saving name.

But, aren’t we saved by faith alone? Yes we are. But where does faith come from? From hearing the message, the message that God the Father is willing to forgive sins for Christ’s sake, through the Spirit’s work of Baptism, which unites us to the death of God’s Son, who died for our sins. So faith clings to the promise which God Himself has attached to Holy Baptism.

The Spirit gives new birth. The Spirit gives life. But where does the Spirit point? He points to the Son. As Jesus told Nicodemus, As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life.

Go back and read Numbers 21 if you don’t remember the account of the bronze serpent. Moses put a bronze serpent up on a pole so that the snake-bitten and dying Israelites could look up at it and be miraculously healed of the venom that was killing them. So God the Father sent His Son into human flesh so that He could be lifted up on the cross, so that all of us, dying in our sins, might look to Him in faith and be saved. The Holy Spirit is the one working in that message to actually turn our eyes to Christ so that we trust in Him and receive forgiveness and eternal life from Him. Again, the Threeness of God is part of His saving name.

How can God be one and three at the same time? How can each distinct Person of the Godhead be God, without there being three Gods? Put such questions aside and focus on how the one God reveals His Threeness to us in the Holy Scriptures. The Father sent the Son and points the world to Him as the One who bore our sins and suffered for us and won us a place in His kingdom. The Son, in turn, points the world to the Father who sent Him and who desires all men to be saved. Jesus also points to the Spirit as the Sanctifier who gives us new birth and entrance into the kingdom of God. The Holy Spirit points the world back to the Son and works faith and preserves us in the faith by Word and Sacrament. Know God in His Oneness. But know Him also in His Threeness. It’s part of His saving name. And knowing Him, never stop calling upon His name for deliverance from every evil and from every trouble. For whoever calls on the name of the LORD shall be saved. Amen.

Source: Sermons