This is Holy Trinity Sunday.  We Christians who have orthodox beliefs are known by our belief in the Trinity.  One of the most eloquent statements of belief in the Trinity is what is called the "Athanasian Creed," parts of which go like this: "We worship one God in trinity and the Trinity in unity, neither confusing the persons nor dividing the divine being....Eternal is the Father; eternal is the Son; eternal is the Spirit: and yet there are not three eternal beings but one who is eternal; as there are not three uncreated and unlimited beings, but one who is uncreated and unlimited....Thus the Father is God; the Son is God; and the Holy Spirit is God: and yet there are not three gods but one God....The Father was neither made nor created nor begotten; the Son was neither made nor created, but was alone begotten of the Father; the Spirit was neither made nor created, but is proceeding from the Father and the Son."  Got all that?

     Now, if we were interviewing to become a professor at a seminary, we might have to "get all that" - explain the nuances of "the Trinity" - in order to "get the job." But, we're not, so we might wonder: why did, from the beginning, the early church go out on such a limb by formulating such a seemingly confusing doctrine as the Trinity? Especially amongst their fellow Jews, who were (and are) quick to cry "heresy" when anyone tries to divide up The One God into three pieces! Many times I have heard tell of people who were "put off" from being a part of the church because, among other things, they think the Trinity a bunch of gobbledygook?  Yet the early Christians would not have been true to what they experienced - what they were FORCED to experience, FORCED to undergo - if they had not confessed that God was now clearly expressing Himself as He most truly is - not some Lonely God who, a long time ago, made the world and, looking on from a distance, sometimes intervenes to remind us He is there and who, all patience finally gone, ends it all in a mighty cataclysm someday - NO! Not THAT God - but, rather, the God they had heard and felt - in fact, the God they were still hearing and feeling - the God who, over time revealed Himself to be - "The Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit!!"

     And what did those first Christians experience? Well, first they experienced not only the God of creation, the God of their fathers and mothers, but then they experienced this carpenter from Nazareth in their midst: this man who, it slowly dawned on them, was also something else.  This man who grew bigger and bigger in their estimation: from a man to a teacher and rabbi, to a healer and preacher, to one of the prophets, to THE prophet, to the Messiah of Israel, to the Messiah of the whole world, to the world's Savior, and finally to being the Lord, God who became flesh, the Alpha and the Omega, the One who was, who is, and who is to come!

     But before they could move from the One Person God to the Two Person God (Father and Son), something else quickly occurred. Just before He died, Jesus, who talked a lot of the Spirit of God, began to talk of the Spirit as a Person, a separate manifestation of God. But why, they asked?  And just a few days later, at Pentecost in that Upper Room, they received their answer. For in seeing the Holy Spirit fill the house, and hearing Him fill their ears, they began to praise God and, while praising Him, were surprised to find themselves heard and understood by others, in other languages that they had never studied: a great miracle had occurred - but a miracle with a deeper meaning. God had revealed to them that they had entered a new era in God's plan of history; God had revealed to them that the era of God's Church of the Holy Spirit had begun.

     And suddenly everything clicked for them. They were given the power to speak in foreign tongues because Jesus, before He ascended, had called them to "Make disciples" not just of the Israelite nation, but "of all nations." (Matthew 28:16-20) And it was not just one in a million who could prophesy - not anymore.  From that day onward, all - men and women, old and young could be given the power to speak God's Word; in this new time, as the prophet predicted, God was "pouring out [His] Spirit upon all flesh," so that everyone in the church could speak God's Word, in this new era. You see, first we had the era of the early creation, and then the era of God's People of Israel, then the era of God's Son on earth, Jesus, and now "The Era of God's Church of the Holy Spirit." The Trinity explains the whole of God's plan, and where we are IN that plan, today.

     And just as sin and the devil had taken the world from God through the temptations of Eden, so now is God taking the world back - not all at once, and sometimes two steps forward and one step back - but God has, since that early time, been rolling out His plan to take His world back, to reclaim us in love, in what will be a new heavens and a new earth someday, through the unraveling Mission of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. The sign of the cross reveals the once-hidden plan: God the Father, up above, sends the eternal Son down to us below to light the match of His Spirit, that, through God's people, sets off the fiery explosion of God's mission, where unselfish love, undying faith, and unending grace move to all tribes and tongues, over the face of the earth, baptizing every nation in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.

     And the first disciples sensed that all parts of the One God were with them, always. In our reading from the book of the Acts of the Apostles we can see that. For after the first apostles were released from their first time in jail as Christians, they rejoined their brothers and sisters in the faith and praised, first (and I quote:) the "Sovereign Lord, [God the Father] who made the heavens and the earth," then re-affirmed that they would continue preaching in "the name of Your holy servant Jesus," and, finally, after asking God to allow them to continue to speak the Word "with boldness," they felt "filled with the Holy Spirit" to speak that Word. (Acts 4:17-31)  Father-Son-Holy Spirit.

     But, you know, there's a problem. Many times over the years the doctrine of the Trinity, and other doctrines, have been taught in such as way as to seem to be timeless truths, that if we just used our brain and "possessed" these truths, we'd be taken away from this heathen world, that we would be saved by this "possession" of knowledge. And the Christian church is always tempted away from its mission by simply offering head knowledge, allowing people - in what they DID - to go their own way. But you see, the Trinity is NOT a "timeless truth" - it is, a "timely truth" - timely because it helps us see that God is on a mission to change the world - every day, every hour - and that He has recruited you and me to be a part of that mission, a mission that every day, every hour challenges and changes our own hearts and minds for the better...and every hour and every day, through you and me, challenges everyone around us to follow the Jesus movement, and reclaim the world for the love of God.

     I know of a world famous theologian of the 1950s who had worked out a very sophisticated explanation of the Trinity, which he would preach in his best-selling books and classrooms. A few other theologians expressed concern that this man's theology would lead to a life free from any concern about repentance or fighting against sin; they saw it reflected in that man's total lack of concern for his many adulterous affairs with many women. You see, the Trinity - or any other Christian doctrine - is not to be made into some kind of idolatrous knowledge we possess, that we can know and control, so that we can selfishly stay in charge of our own lives, like that professor. Rather, we believe in the Trinity because we believe it describes how God the Father has broken into our lives, has come to save us from ourselves through Jesus, and is always changing our lives (and changing the lives of others) for the better through the power of His Holy Spirit.

     Do you want to be a part of that mission?  Perhaps you already are and do not know it, or do not know how much you are in it.  But together, you and I are - well, let's let the Blues Brothers say it for me:

  [see scene where the Blues Brothers say "We are on a Mission from God."]

     We don't have to wear sunglasses like they did, but we, too are on a Mission from God. Just as, in their misguided way, the Blues Brothers were on a mission to save a wonderful orphanage from destruction, just so we all, together and singly, are on a mission to save the souls of this world from destruction. It is a mission that started in Eden and went eventually to Hebron and Egypt, through 40 years in the Wilderness and back to Israel, through 50 years exiled in Babylon and back to Israel again, and from Jerusalem to Judea and Samaria, to the Jews all over the Roman Empire and then to the Gentiles there, from Antioch to Corinth and Rome, from Rome to the rest of Europe, from Europe to North and South America, Asia and Africa and Australia, and, in this secular age, back to America again, to Indiana and Indianapolis and its suburbs, to several congregations like one called King of Glory in a city called Carmel, among a people who, finding the new-old way to do mission and ministry, who are finding themselves part of the purpose in life that God always meant to give His children.

     The first part of this story was written in the Bible, in the Old Testament and the New, in Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, in the letters of Paul, James, John, and Jude, and in the book of Acts -the Acts of the Apostles. You know, the book of Acts ends rather abruptly with Paul in jail, still preaching the Gospel, as Luke says, "with all boldness." (Acts 28:31) With all boldness - that is EXACTLY what the apostles, in our text today, prayed to God that they would receive - the boldness to preach, to teach, and to minister to others without fear of rejection or death.  And, you know, our situation is not ANY different from those first apostles. We, too, call upon God to speak and act with the same boldness - for we are on the exact same mission as they were.  Great things have happened to us just as to them. We have received the same Holy Spirit. We, too, can speak -and must speak - to others about what God has done for us and for them. The book of Acts should be called the "Acts of the Church" - and the Acts of the Church are not over. No, indeed!  You and I, through our actions, can write new chapters in that book, of how God worked through us to reach others.

     Now, to dramatize this new chapter we are writing, I want you to do something. You have before you a little sheet that says, "Jesus has done great things for me. One thing He has done is" - and then there is a blank.  I want you to fill out that blank, end that sentence in a way that describes, in your own words, a particular incident or a particular way that God has helped you and saved you. A miracle in your lives, so to speak.  I will play a song of the Trinity while you are writing, and then we'll sing it. When you're done writing your anonymous piece of praise, come forward and place it in this box, and we will collect them and publish them in our next newsletter as a new chapter, so to speak, of our new "acts of the church," for you and I are still living in that Spirit-filled, Trinitarian New Day. Let us pray.

[The song:        "Father/Jesus/Spirit I adore you, Lay my life before you, How I love you."]     Amen.