Holy Trinity—Pentecost 1
Romans 5:1-5 and John 16:12-15
AH-HA’S: FINGERPRINTS OF THE SOUL May 29 and 30, 2010

What’s your favorite way of talking about the Trinity? Father, Son, and Holy Spirit? …Creator, Redeemer, Sustainer? …Almighty God, Incarnate Word, Holy Comforter? Just in case you couldn’t tell from all those phrases, when we refer to the Trinity, we’re talking about God.

Have you ever tried to explain the Trinity? Or how do you understand it? God is one and yet three? …One or three what? …Persons? …Spirits? …Beings? …Things? Do you explain "it" using a triangle, a pretzel, or the three forms of H2O...frozen—liquid—steam? Talking about the Trinity is not easy. Perhaps making the concept more elusive is the fact that the word “Trinity” is not in the Bible, though the doctrine took shape out of the testimony of the Scriptures beginning with their witness to Jesus Christ.

Most of the writers of the New Testament were originally Jews who believed in one God: “Hear O Israel, the Lord our God is one Lord” (Deut. 6:4). But when the Apostles and Disciples encountered Jesus of Nazareth and witnessed His life, death, and resurrection, they became convinced that He was fully “Emmanuel, God with them,” the Person of God incarnated in human flesh. After Christ’s Resurrection and Ascension the Apostles and Disciples also found that God in Christ continued fully to be with them in the Person of the Holy Spirit, as Christ had promised. Thus, the one God of the Old Testament was fully present in the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. He was One, in three Persons—each wholly divine.
This doctrine was formalized in the 4th Century, 300 years after Jesus, at the Council of Nicaea in 325. The result? The Nicene Creed. Then some more Christian leaders in the 5th Century wrote another creed trying once again to clarify the Trinity for folks, coming up with the Apostles’ Creed.

Have you ever experienced difficulty in grasping something, just couldn’t make sense of it; or couldn’t figure out how to get from A to B to C ?… maybe in geometry or computer use, saying “I’ll never get it!” And then suddenly it made sense. It was obvious. It was easy, ridiculously simple! And then you couldn’t figure out why it was so difficult, such a challenge?

We’ve all had those “Aha” experiences when an unexpected, out-of-the-blue, gift-of-grace has dropped right into our lap, or even better right into our head. Whether its figuring out how to finish a geometry proof or as complicated as operating a computer, the “Aha’s” are watershed events that stay with us and transform us.

Unlike “fingerprints,” which everyone is born with, we die with soulprints--Fingerprints of the Soul. The unexpectedly startling nature of the “Aha” imprints itself on our mind and spirit in a way no plodding logical deduction could. “Aha’s” strike a spark in the soul and fire up the imagination. In one shimmering moment they can transport us from frustration to fulfillment, from dead-end despair to open-ended possibilities.

"Aha's" need not be revolutionary to be revealing. In the mythology of scientific discoveries, Galileo's exuberant trips up and down the Tower of Pisa dropping various-sized objects and Newton's interrupted reverie caused by an apple whacking him upon the head, resulted in huge scientific insights into the fields of physics.

For most of us our “aha's” don't radically change the world. But they do change us.
• Aha…When you suddenly figured out how to shift a standard transmission . . . and gained your freedom on wheels.
• Aha…When you suddenly read and understood your Spanish assignment in Spanish... and heard the heartbeat and felt the rhythm of another culture.
• Aha…When you held your newborn child and discovered parenthood . . . and never slept soundly again.
• Aha…When you suddenly could transpose from the key of C to the key of F-sharp without writing a note... and felt the music in your soul.

The very nature of "aha's" can leave you with some long dry spells. Life has droughts of little delights. We easily fall into daily routines, grinding ruts, which keep us wedged into the pre-recorded and predictable.

This is not just a postmodern problem. In fact in the eighteenth century some road designers and path-way providers took it upon themselves to inject a little diversity, a little spice, into the daily drudgery of getting form Point A to Point B. Along common walk-ways, built along the fields and hedge-rows of busy village-to-village paths, it became popular to construct what were then known as "ha-ha's". A seemingly straightforward path would suddenly disappear behind a camouflaged hedge-way. The walker would have to stop and carefully look around to find where the path re-emerged. Sunken fences were also used to startle walkers out of mindlessness and into mindfulness.

Eventually boundary ditches, unexpected steps over a fence or wall with benches for resting and reflecting, and other gently startling divergences were added along these busy roadways. These "ha-ha's" were really "aha's" requiring the walker to raise his or her eyes from their step-by-step single-minded progression and instead to look up, look around, take stock of their surroundings, and really see where they were going.

That is the power of the "Aha"—to make us see the same things, and hear the same words, but with a completely new understanding. These "aha" moments are what Jesus was promising His disciples in today's Gospel text.

The Holy Spirit, the Spirit of truth, would come to them in the post-resurrection age and would reveal to disciples things they could not "bear," could not take in or understand, during their time with the earthly Jesus. They couldn't yet digest the entirety of the salvation that He was about to offer the world. The full weight of genuine discipleship would crush their fledgling faith. So Jesus promises them in this new age that the Holy Spirit would make known to the disciples things that had previously been obscured, shrouded from their insight, and guide them into all truth (v.13).

The Holy Spirit will speak and "Aha," all the things Jesus had spoken of would begin to make sense if they were open to the gradual unfolding of knowledge, of insight, of pathways, and purposes. They must be open to the ways and wisdom of the Spirit which will gradually reveal to them the deeper purposes of the Father and the Son. These disciples who had traveled with Jesus, who had been tutored by Him, who had witnessed His works, had much more to learn. This most "in crowd," the most knowledgeable and assured were counseled to remain open to new insights and knowledge that time and the Spirit would reveal...to be open to what you don't know. In fact, when it comes to things of the Spirit, it almost seems that the more we know, the more we know we don't know.

Do you remember the “5 & 10c” stores like Woolworth’s and Newberry’s in the 1950s and 60s? They were the Wal-marts and K-marts of today where you could get everything from dishes to dresses to tools, toys, candy to cosmetics and…crocodiles. Every crocodile sold was placed in a box and a warning went with the croc-in-the-box: Never leave the crocodile outside its box. Never! Ever! Like goldfish, the crocodile would never grow any bigger than the box in which it lived. Even though there was nothing genetic to keep the baby dime-store crocs from growing to enormous sizes, so long as they remained inside their boxes, as long as they were never exposed to greater space and freedom, they would stay the same, small, kid-friendly size.
The human mind and soul is a lot like those little crocodiles. Given unlimited food, a nurturing environment, and a safe place to develop, the growth of our minds and souls is amazing. We’ve been given the capacity to grow without predetermined limits. There’s no point at which your heart becomes too tender, your mind becomes too saturated with wisdom, or your soul inhales too deeply of God’s love and power.

That is, unless we allow ourselves to be stuffed into a box. A box of callousness, a box of envy, a box of fear, a box of apathy, a box of despair, a box of self-righteousness. Most of the time these boxes are self-made. We build them about ourselves thinking we’re protecting some precious idea or conviction. The truth is we’re simply too frightened, or lazy, or angry to deal with the new information, the new situations that the Spirit is sending us.
You recall the story of the little girl returning home from her first day at school. “Did you learn anything?” her mother asked. The little girl replied, “Not enough, I guess. I have to go back tomorrow.”

We all have to go back and learn more tomorrow. Between today and tomorrow our insights and experiences will open us up to see new possibilities and new pathways if we’re only open enough to consider them and act upon them.

Jesus is telling His disciples that we must be open to the gradual unfolding of knowledge, of insight, of pathways, and purposes. We must be open to the ways and wisdom of the Spirit which will reveal and
• “Aha!” the intended outcome of Jesus' suffering, death, and resurrection, would suddenly make sense.
• "Aha," the presence of the risen Jesus would be real and eternally in their midst.

Today's text is full of "Aha's." Jesus had already spoken of the paraclete, the Advocate, which would be sent to the disciples after He was gone. But this Spirit to be revealed would not just be some holy tape recorder, reciting and reiterating Jesus' previously preached words to a post-resurrection gathering of disciples. Surprise! There will be new information, insights and understandings into "the things that are to come" that this separate entity, this Holy Spirit, will have to offer. On what basis can we claim full disclosure and complete understanding for ourselves? On what basis can we be arrogant and condescending. To be open to the future is…to be open to what you don’t know. And the testimony of Scripture is that the Spirit's words can be trusted and continues the work of revealing Christ because... ...Surprise! The Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit are a divine Trinity of one purpose even as they are three-personed.

What Jesus' words declare to His disciples is that those “ha-ha” encounters hold the potential for an "Aha" moment as the Holy Spirit comes into your presence. Are you open to the surprising advent, the startling event, and the amazing news that the Holy Spirit is bringing your way? Or are your eyes so fixed on this rutted road directly in front of your feet that you will miss the "ha-ha's" and "aha's" that are nestled like unexpected lumps and bumps in your daily grind?

Try this test-run. To what extent is yours an encapsulated, insulated, remote-controlled existence?

Doctors have suggested that one way to keep the biology of our brain from beginning to form those plague-clogged nerve paths that indicate the possible onset of Alzheimer's may be to intentionally try to fire off some different neurons.

Here are some surprisingly simple, yet revealing exercises for our mental nerve cells. • Try taking a completely different route to work.
• Shop at an unfamiliar grocery store.
• Brush your teeth with your left hand if you are right-handed, with your right hand if you are left-handed.
• Sleep on the other side of the bed.
• Re-arrange your kitchen cupboards.

In other words try to intentionally surprise yourself. Anything you can do without thinking about it—change! Think about it! Struggle with it! Pay attention to how you do it and what steps must be taken to accomplish it.

Now try and do the same thing in your spiritual life and with your spiritual nerve cells. • Find a new table grace (and mean it!).
• Read Leviticus (bet you never have!), instead of Luke.
• Go to a Greek Orthodox or a Pentecostal or a National Baptist service (whatever is least comfortable or familiar!).
• Pray outside, pray standing, pray prostrate, pray alone, pray in a group (whichever you would never do!).
• Look for God's presence in an unlikely place (the dentist's office, the recycling center, the veterinarian's clinic, the big box stores!).
God has filled your life with "ha-ha's." Look up from the "ha-ha's" and experience the "Aha's." …AMEN!