Eternal Life Is… Love that God Is
God is Love
1 John 4:7-21
Rev. Tim Callow
Preached Sun. April 28th, 2024
One of the more difficult doctrines of the Church is the doctrine of the Holy Trinity. That is, the doctrine that God is eternally three persons: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. As easy as that may be to say it is difficult because it eludes easy explanation and is best thought of as a mystery. There are many analogies of the Trinity, but they tend to run aground somehow.
There is St. Patrick’s famous analogy of the shamrock, that as the shamrock has three leaves but is one, so the Trinity has three persons but is one. But the image makes you think of God having parts, there’s the Jesus part and the Father part and the Holy Spirit part, and they’re all connected somehow. But that is not the doctrine of the Trinity! It is not that if you were to see God you’d have Jesus over here and the Father over here. God is truly one.
I’ve also heard the analogy that the Trinity is like water that exists in three states: liquid, solid, and gas. But while that gets right that there is only one essence to God, it would make us think God is sometimes the Father, or sometimes Jesus. But there is no sometimes to God. God is eternal. God is not being Jesus here and being the Father over there. It is not one God putting on a show across the veil of eternity. How then do we make sense of a scene like Gethsemane where Jesus is earnestly praying to his Father? Is it a divine pantomime? Jesus really prays, and is really God, and is really one in being with the Father. But that one being is not putting on a show.
The doctrine of the Trinity eludes any image. When you try to conceive it it slips through your grasp. When you try to render it concrete in your mind you’ve already lost it. It’s a tricky thing. Which is why it’s best received as a mystery. We know God is one because Moses says so. “Behold, O Israel, the Lord your God, the Lord is one.” Yet we also know that God is three because Jesus prays to the Father and sends the Holy Spirit. And we pray to the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Yet the witness of scripture and our own experience points to a great mystery beyond us.
You may wonder, then, well, what’s the point? It reminds me of the quote from Ferris Bueller’s Day Off talking about a test he didn’t take, “what’s the point? I'm not European. I don't plan on being European, so who gives a crap if they're socialists? They could be fascist anarchists - that still wouldn't change the fact that I don't own a car.” Is the Trinity a vestigial doctrine? Like we have an appendix that doesn’t do us any good but perhaps inflame itself, has the Trinity become that? A doctrine that once meant something in the course of the history of the Church but is now a trivia question and not a living aspect of our faith?
In his letter, this morning, John brings us close to the heart of the mystery of the Trinity. “Whoever does not love does not know God, for God is love.” John can say God is love because God is Trinity. God is the perfect eternal union of three persons. God is pure, self-sufficient love for all eternity. God does not create because God needs us. God creates because God is overflowing in love and desires others to join in that love. And God’s love is so abundant that it results in Jesus joining the human family that we may join the divine family. And though Jesus is put to death, “love is as strong as death, its jealousy unyielding as the grave. It burns like blazing fire, like a mighty flame. Many waters cannot quench love; rivers cannot sweep it away. If one were to give all the wealth of one’s house for love, it would be utterly scorned.” (Song of Songs 8:6-7) Out of love for us he overcomes the grave so that nothing would stand in the way of God’s love for us.
God desires fellowship with us out of love for us. God grants eternal life for us that we might love eternally. That we would join in the love that God is. This is what it means to love in truth. To join in God’s love, and let that love overflow in others. When we share in love, when we worship, rejoice, forgive, show mercy, act generously, we experience the eternal love that God is. We experience the life eternal that God is.