“Trinity affirms that Jesus is our window into the heart of God. But where’s the Easter story in that?”

Trinity Sunday 2015 takes place on 31 May; preachers who have not been able to avoid this particular Sunday will be wondering what on earth to say, dusting off old sermons, scouring the internet and marshalling illustrations based on shamrocks. Church members will be wondering why the Christian faith appears to require a course in Greek philosophy, whether or not they actually believe in the Trinity (at least, what they understand of it) and, most importantly, what it has to do with the stories of Jesus and Easter.

Actually, Trinity has everything to do with the stories of Jesus – and none more so than the Easter accounts. We have Trinity because we had Jesus among us. Jesus changes forever how we think about, believe and relate to God.

What John tells us in 1:15 is that the disciples encountered not “a man of God” but “God as a man”. All the gospels tell us, in different ways, that Jesus is divine; this verse in John’s prologue is the most unambiguous statement that, in Jesus, God has walked among us and shared our lives. Uniquely, John tells us the story of the encounter between Thomas and the risen Jesus that culminates in Thomas worshipping Jesus as “My Lord and my God!” (John 20:28)…

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This article was published in the May 2015 edition of Reform.

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