“He Will Guide You Into All The Truth”
John 16:12-15
I remember reading about a guy who stopped in the grocery store on the way home from work to pick up a couple of items for his wife. He wandered around aimlessly for a while searching for the groceries needed. As is often the case in the grocery store, he kept passing this same shopper in almost every aisle. It was another father trying to shop with a totally uncooperative three-year-old boy in the cart.
The first time they passed, the three-year-old was asking over and over for a candy bar. Our observer couldn’t hear the entire conversation. He just heard Dad say, “Now, Billy, this won’t take long.” As they passed in the next aisle, the three-year-olds pleas had increased several octaves. Now Dad was quietly saying, “Billy, just calm down. We will be done in a minute.”
When they passed near the dairy case, the kid was screaming uncontrollably. Dad was still keeping his cool. In a very low voice he was saying, “Billy, settle down. We are almost out of here.” The Dad and his son reached the checkout counter just ahead of our observer. He still gave no evidence of losing control. The boy was screaming and kicking. Dad was very calmly saying over and over, “Billy, we will be in the car in just a minute and then everything will be OK.”
The bystander was impressed beyond words. After paying for his groceries, he hurried to catch up with this amazing example of patience and self-control just in time to hear him say again, “Billy, we’re done. It’s going to be OK.” He tapped the patient father on the shoulder and said, “Sir, I couldn’t help but watch how you handled little Billy. You were amazing.” Dad replied, “His name is Wesley. I’m Billy!”
There are a couple of things that we celebrate today and the first is fairly obvious: Father’s Day. The most common image that Jesus used in describing God was that of “Father.”
It makes me think that Joseph must have been a very special kind of dad. We center much of our attention on His mother, Mary, but Joseph surely combined those very special qualities of strength and gentleness that we associate with Jesus.
Jesus had a very keen knowledge of the Old Testament Scriptures. In the Jewish home it was the father who had the primary responsibility for his son’s religious instruction. Of course, we know that Jesus had a unique relationship with God. Still, I must believe that Joseph, though barely mentioned in the Gospel narrative, was probably an influential role model for Jesus. Why else would Jesus have chosen the imagery of “Father” to portray God? Why would He have also taught us to address God as “Abba—Daddy”? My guess is that Jesus had a wonderful relationship with both His earthly father and His heavenly Father—the same kind of wonderful relationship He had with His mother.
I’m sure someone is going to say, “Well, Joseph was not His real father.” As far as I’m concerned, there are many dads who are not biological Dads—who function more as a real Dad than many biological Dads. Today, we are honoring all the men in our congregation who put in the time, love, and instruction to be a dadto a young person regardless of whether they have a blood relationship or not.
That great theologian Mark Twain once said: “When I was a boy of fourteen, my father was so ignorant I could hardly stand to have the old man around. But when I got to be twenty-one, I was astonished at how much the old man had learned in seven years.”
The Christian holiday that we celebrate this morning is Trinity Sunday. Trinity is possibly one of the most misunderstood topics in the church. If you scan through the Bible, you’ll never see the word “Trinity” but there are instances where you will see the Trinity. For example, when Jesus was coming up out of the water after His baptism in the Jordan River we read: “When all the people were being baptized, Jesus was baptized too. An as He was praying, heaven was opened and the Holy Spirit descended on Him in bodily form like a dove. And a voice came from heaven: ‘You are my Son, who I love; with you I am well pleased’” (Luke 3:21-22). So, in this text we have the voice of God (The Father)—we have Jesus (The Son)—and we have the dove which represents the Holy Spirit.
The Fathers of the Church used examples to explain the Trinity. They said: Look at a tree if you want to try to understand God. There is the root, the trunk and the fruit. The root is like God the Father, invisible but you know it’s there, the trunk is like God the Son, sent forth from the Father, visible and tangible, the branches and fruit is like the Holy Spirit. We are connected to Christ through the Spirit dwelling in us and by the power of the Spirit we bear fruit in the world.
Or look at a stream: the water rises from a source, but usually that source is hidden, the source of the stream is like God the Father, the stream which we can see and touch is like God the Son, visible because it flows from the One who sends Him, and the water as it flows into the fields irrigating the plants and giving them life, allow them to bring forth a harvest is like the Holy Spirit.
Or look at the light. The light comes from the sun, the source of light, but we see the light most clearly when it pierces through the clouds as a sunbeam. When we are sitting in a room and the light shines in and touches us, we are warmed and can feel the light. So, the sun is like the Father, the beam like the Son and the warmth like the Holy Spirit.
What each of these illustrations has in common is that they are all analogies, God isn’t the tree or the stream or the light but like them. All our language about God can only hint at the reality but never grasp or contain God in one image.
John Wesley once said, “Show me a worm that can understand a human being, and then I will show you a human being that can understand the Triune God.” Martin Luther, the first of the great theologians that wrote of the importance of the Trinity said, “To try to comprehend the Trinity endangers your sanity.”
I tend to agree with Justo Gonzalez, a former professor at Emory and an author who said: “Trinity is a ministry, not a puzzle. You try to solve a puzzle—you stand in awe before a mystery.”
So, if you came here this morning expecting me to put to rest all of your questions about Trinity then you can go ahead and join the others who are already daydreaming about where they’re going to eat lunch today. You see, it just isn’t that easy. It’s not so simple to explain the Trinity in any meaningful way. The Trinity just isn’t one of the things we can settle in short order.
Given that the church has been around for some 2000 years and hasn’t put a handle on the Trinity I don’t think we’re going to put a wrap on it here this morning—but maybe we can at least try to point to what the doctrine of the Trinity is attempting to say about God and how we experience God.
The world’s values are often the opposite of God’s values. This can cause us to feel like misfits. But even if life seems difficult now, one day we will rejoice. So, keep your eye on the future and on God’s promises!
Our Gospel lesson this morning begins with Jesus saying, “I have much more to say to you, more than you can now bear.” I sometimes wonder if the twenty-four-hour newschannels care about how much people can bear. Granted, the distinctions of news and facts and truth are often lost on the media-overwhelmed culture. Nonetheless, journalism is marketed as truth, the bottom-line, the real story. Who are we kidding? We want the real story. We crave the facts. We desire knowledge. We find ourselves addicted to the possibility of comprehending what is actually going on in the world. We must have the truth. Phones stay charged and ready—TV’s put us to sleep and wake us up—and all this because we are afraid we will miss the truth. Jesus’ statement here isn’t intended to deny the disciples access to the truth. Instead, Jesus’ desire is for the full revelation of all truth—all that God knows—to His followers.
The Holy Spirit guides us to see the truth about Jesus Christ—who He is and what He came to do for us. The Spirit also helps us, through patient practice, to discern right from wrong.
I think we can all agree that everything must start somewhere. Our text for today tells me that there is a time for everything—and Jesus was well aware of what the disciples and His followers could handle at any point in time. Why do you think He taught so much in parables? He had things He wanted to tell them but to come right out and tell them would have not only freaked them out but would have caused many to stop following because they would have thought He had lost His mind. It’s one of the reasons why we read so often in the Scriptures where Jesus would tell someone to be quiet about who He was or something He had done.
What we need to see here is that God works in His own time and the Holy Spirit that we celebrated last Sunday is the completion of the formula. The Holy Spirit is in the business of revelation. The Holy Spirit will enable Jesus’ followers to hear afresh Jesus’ teachings after He is gone. [Me praying for healing for my Mom last week and thinking God hadn’t answered my prayer]
To glorify—as Jesus speaks of—is to make visible the presence of God—just as Jesus makes visible the presence of God—the Spirit will continue to make visible the presence of God in Jesus. We can know God only as He has made Himself known. We must start with the three—Father, Son, and Spirit—and in them we find a marvelous unity which we know as God.
What Jesus is promising to His followers is the Spirit of Truth which He promises will guide them into all truth. When a ship sails into a harbor, a person known as the Harbor Master gets on board to help the captain safely steer into the harbor. This Harbor Master knows everything there is to know about the harbor: its length—depth—etc.
When we try to sail through the seas of life we have also been given a harbor master—the Holy Spirit. He knows the currents—the tides—the hazards—and the flow. If we will let Him guide the ship of our life, He will guide us safely through the hazards of earth.
Or, as the children have learned this week at VBS, whenever we are in wonder or need we can always, TRUST JESUS!
Eastman First Methodist Church 