The Holy Trinity in Iconogrophy
Sermon by Father Richard Mallory
(240526) Isaiah 6:1-8, Romans 8:12-17, John 3:1-17
The copy of the Russian icon on the wall behind me
https://images.app.goo.gl/3TJssSRVT2N7jook9
is one of the most famous icons in the world. Icons are very rich in the life of Orthodoxy, the Eastern Orthodox version of Christianity. Icons are, of course, paintings, but they are so much more. Those who create them are aware that with each stroke there is a prayer, imbuing the icon with great spirituality until the final scene is arranged. This icon is from the 1400s by a man named Rublev; and, if you know Russian, you know I've just mispronounced his name. I went to Google to find out how to pronounce his name and I still can't get it right.
The artist took his cue from a story in Genesis where three angels visit Abraham. Abraham requests one of his servants to prepare a meal for them. While there, they inform Abraham that his wife Sarah will have a child.
Over time, the three visitors to Abraham have also come to represent the interpretation of the Trinity: the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit in the scene.
Now, let's consider Nicodemus. He is a seeker, even though he's supposed to be the one with all the answers. He is a man with credentials, a member of the Sanhedrin, and a Pharisee, a select group of experts. These experts are literate, manage, dictate, prescribe, and model how the law, the Torah with all its trimmings, is to be obeyed. He is a high-status individual in his society. He calls on Jesus at night, practicing reputation control. If word gets around about who he's associating with, his status might decline. It's a big risk, even under the cover of night.
Nicodemus leads with a statement: "Rabbi, we know you are a teacher who has come from God, for no one can do these signs that you do apart from the presence of God." Is there an edge to his voice? Is it a statement, clearly stated without any subterfuge? What implied message could be hidden in his statement? Nicodemus had organized his life around having superior knowledge and obeying the rules and regulations to the exact letter of the law. According to Carl Jung and Richard Rohr, Nicodemus has been very successful in the first half of life with first-half-of-life issues. He has established himself well. He has a profession and he practices it. And now something else is nibbling at the edges of his mind.
Jesus, reading and sensing Nicodemus, picks up on an emptiness and even a hidden cry for help. Jesus tells this self-striver that no one can see the kingdom of God without being born again from above. For now, at this moment in his life and at this new stage of life, something else is needed. Nicodemus hears Jesus on the most literal level: No one can climb back into their mother’s womb and be born again. Jesus contributes to further confusion to get to the essence of life: Not only must you be born in the waters of biological birth in all its holy messiness, but an additional birth is required as well. You must be born from above, which means for Nicodemus to be touched, moved, inspired, and finally changed by the Spirit. Nicodemus throws up his hands: "You've got to be kidding. Impossible."
His longing goes unmet. Perhaps he wanted a formula, a step-by-step procedure so he could do what Jesus was doing in his remarkable ministries of healing and teaching. He wanted what Jesus had. He wanted spirituality for dummies.
Back to being born of water and the Spirit: What if being born of water is not coded language for baptism? What if it is about accepting our humanness, the way we are all alike? Roman Catholic theologian James Allison says what we give up to be saved, to belong to God, is our sense of being good, strivers for good, measuring up, and staying in the rat race, trying to prove ourselves worthy. All of that must go. All of that must be relinquished. If Nicodemus wants to enter the kingdom of God, he must give up his competition with his neighbor to prove that he's more religious or a better person. Nicodemus's quandary is whether to relinquish his idol of superiority and join the human race, moving from the first half of life to the second.
Step two is being born of the Spirit. To know the essence of life involves connection to and reception of the Spirit. The third chapter of the fourth gospel is one of the few New Testament passages that includes all three persons of the Trinity. By the way, any preacher who claims total understanding of the Trinity is best avoided.
One perspective that is new to me involves the following: To begin with, Jesus is God the Father, denoting a relationship with intimacy. God is not like the gods of the ancient world. All the gods of the ancient world around the Mediterranean basin were violent in some way. We all know about Zeus, who liked to throw lightning bolts at people. Just this past week or so, our landscape architect, Heather (for this wonderful project she has been completing) was out separating rocks into different piles and tossing them. A little girl came along and said, "No, no, we don't throw rocks at St. Albans." Any little girl with that kind of spunk would take on Zeus. "No, no, no. We don't throw lightning bolts at human beings."
As you can see in the icon, this work of art from the 1400s, each person emits harmony with the other. Jesus in the center imitates his Father. In this threesome, there is no rivalry, no jealousy, no envy. They honor each other in unity of purpose. This is the spirit of Trinity Sunday. Trinity is the interplay of three equals, with no one cast out. How do you do that? Three almost always turns into two against one, particularly when there's a hint of stress. Isn't that the rule? Yet here three are included and no one gets excluded. This is the very structure of the Godhead, the foundation of reality. The kingdom of God is where three get along without one being thrown out or marginalized.
Could it be that two against one is so deeply ingrained that we can't avoid it unless an intervention comes from outside ourselves? To be born of the Spirit is to embody the Spirit of Jesus. This icon invites us to gaze, to contemplate. An icon insists that we not just glance away too quickly, but linger and feel it, imbibe it. Let it take root for all that it means. And of course, an icon will have a meaning today that may be different from the meaning you find next week, next year, or five years from now. They are like that, just like scripture passages.
The Son at the center wears an earthen reddish-brown garment with a blue cloak. He looks to his Abba on his right, who is attired in gold with a blue undergarment. The Spirit, in life-giving green, also has a blue undergarment. The Father sends the Son. The Son sends the Spirit. Light radiates from their heads. Art historians think that a mirror once existed on that rectangular table right underneath the chalice. There's an empty space, and they think a mirror was there originally which, of course, invites you, the viewer, to join them at this table. Join the throng of prophets, martyrs, saints, and mostly folks just like us. There's room for billions of us. The Trinity tells us that God is relationship, and it is only in relationship that we experience the fullness of God.
None of us can do it alone on the journey into Christ. It is always with community. Our culture does not fully comprehend its importance as the fierceness of individualism stalks the land from generation to generation. People get isolated. They get lonely. They cut themselves off from the source which can give them life.
Debbie Thomas, a remarkable priest in Santa Barbara, reminds us that the three are not a middle school clique. The Holy Table is forever expanding with even ever greater hospitality. Each Trinity personage has a staff emphasizing that life is a journey. Our eyes moving in a counterclockwise movement, being first touched by the Spirit, led to Jesus, who shows us His… our, Abba. Along the way, we see the Tree of Life right behind Jesus' left shoulder. It is also the cross of death and shame that has been transformed. And the house behind the Father, well, that's the house of many mansions, big enough for all of his beloveds.
And what of Nicodemus? In the middle of the fourth gospel, Nicodemus appears again, and he's challenging fellow Pharisees who want Jesus arrested. He reminds them that the law requires that such a person be given a fair hearing. His risky reminder provokes sarcasm from the group. “Oh, are you also one of the followers?”
In his final appearance following the crucifixion, he joins another Jewish leader in requesting the body for a proper burial; another risky move, suggesting that he was faithful henceforth from that fateful nighttime visit.
In the terrible crisis of humanity, a cure has been offered. Recall the wandering of ex-slaves in the desert who found themselves in a social and medical crisis finding a cure by looking at a bronze serpent that was held up high on a staff? So the Son of Man, the most human and humane of everyone, allowed himself to become a victim so that we might be shamed and jolted into seeing the lengths and depths that God would go to get across the limitless compassion and forgiveness from the very heart of the divine. Then our stony hearts are softened so that we, too, might be saved; and that the world might be made whole.
For God did so love the world. The condemnation is not in the character of God. But it is so that the world might be saved, rescued, healed, salvaged through him. And we, the blessed ones, get to be a part of that mission in this day and time, our day and time, for the needs that we sense and feel all around us in our great, hurting world.
Amen.
