On Christmas Eve forty years ago this year, three Apollo 8 astronauts became the first humans to orbit the moon. To mark the occasion, Bill Anders, Jim Lovell and Frank Borman too turns reading from space and broadcast to earth, the first ten verses from the lectionary for this morning. "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth." Picturing these men looking at the earth from the moon, hearing those words sent chills down my spine.
One other time, those same words left me stunned was in a worship service. At the beginning of the service, the lights were turned off and shades drawn, leaving the room in total darkness. Over the sound system, came the words, “In the beginning,” (pause and the single word “God”) Then a single shaft of light burst from ceiling to floor at the front of that dark room. The rest of the creation story was read in a choral reading; but nothing more needed to be said. “In the beginning, God,” had said it all.
Let us pray. God, we come before you this Trinity Sunday, and realize that you are greater than we can imagine. We try to find adequate words and concepts to describe you; we struggle to understand your intentions toward us and your expectations of us. Help us remember that our words and concepts are simply not adequate. We try to come to terms with you as the God called, Yahweh, “God is who God is.” We come to know that you will never be bent to our will, but that you are always with us; loving us and nudging us into becoming the people you created us to be. Amen.
If we study the words of the creation story, we come to realize that the words the astronauts were reading, was not the world that they were looking at. The earth they saw from the moon was round and blue, while the words of Genesis described a flat earth that sits in the middle of a three tiered universe; sandwiched between the vault of heaven; a transparent dome holding back the waters above; and Sheol, that dark, gloomy and chaotic place of the dead under the earth.
Obviously the scriptures do not provide what we would call scientific truth. It tells us that God is the creator of the universe, but scientists today think the universe was created by a Big Bang. The Big Bang starts with about an ounce of matter compressed into a space so small that it has no dimensions at all. Then in one single blinding pulse, the singularity assumes heavenly dimensions; and in less than a minute, the universe is a million billion miles across and growing fast. In three minutes, 98 percent of all the matter there is or will ever be has been produced. We have a universe and it was all done in about the time it takes to make a sandwich.1 That doesn’t sound very believable either, dos it? But I guess the math works. If that describes how it really happened, I see nothing that precludes God as the instigator, who spoke the world into being.
This creation story comes from the sixth Century BCE, when everyone knew the world was flat. It borrows some ideas from an earlier Babylonian creation story, but provides an explanation of the creation of humankind and the purpose of our existence.
Creation, the first theologians believed, was God’s doing and five times they repeated that it was good; and all together was very good. Last of all God created humankind to take care of it so that it continues to function as it was intended. We were to subdue, but that does not mean plunder, neglect or exploit.
The chief conflict between our faith and science is not about how the world was created, but where God resides. The idea of a God out there, who created the world is not consistent with our understanding of the universe. But some of that science makes God very much a part of us. Rachel Carson tells us in The Sea Around Us that "each of us carries in our veins a salty stream in which the elements sodium, potassium, and calcium are combined in almost the same propor¬tions as sea water. In fact, 98.4% of our human genetic heritage is shared with chimpanzees, 75% is shared with mice. Chief Joseph of the Nez Perce reminds us that "all things are connected, like the blood which unites one family. What-ever befalls the earth befalls the children of the earth." 2
Martin Luther spoke of God’s “ubiquity.” Our God is everywhere and at all times present. Saint Augustine saw the character of God in the flowers in the world. God didn’t stop creating flowers after one or two specimens. God kept creating all different shapes and colors and kinds. Not only are they beautiful, Augustine notes, but note the glory of how they will turn their heads toward the sun. You can see it in the Dakotas dramatically, where thousands of acres of sunflowers face the morning sun and face it through the day. There are the morning glories who don’t open until the morning and the moonflowers who don’t open until the evening. God didn’t stop with a few, because God is overflowing with love and creativity and plentitude.
We see God’s abundance in scripture. We don’t have one creation story, but two as we try to grasp our place and purpose in creation. The first is about being stewards of the earth. The Adam and Eve account repeats the stewardship job, as well as taking responsibility for your own behavior and understanding that every human being on earth is your brother or sister. Remember that before you go to war or when you hear that a quarter of the world, including me, is trying to control its weight and nearly half of the world is going hungry.
We don’t have one Gospel, we have four. There were actually more, but the early church was thought they were too confusing. These Gospels help us understand about God from what Jesus did and said.3 In the great commission, which we read this morning Jesus tells us to make disciples of all nations; and teach them to observe all the commands I gave you.” To state the obvious, we need to learn them and practice them before we can teach them.
I use that principle to try to discourage church program telemarketers from Texas. When I discover the caller is a telemarketer trying to sell me a program, I ask where they are calling from. More often than not, it is from Texas. Then I say, “Texas! You still have the death penalty down there. You kill more people than most countries. You have four guns per capita and one of the highest murder rates in the nation. You are going to have to learn how to practice Christianity, before you try to sell it to somebody.”
In spite of our shortcomings, we have a God of such abundance, that Christians came up with the idea of the Trinity to help us try to grasp the immensity of God. As the creator and the Holy Spirit, we understand that God is everywhere and in everything and in everyone. But God is also Jesus, the gentle and humble Jew who showed us how to live and what to think. He lived in such a way that his followers came to believe God was in him. He was so filled with God’s love that he even loved his enemies and said we should do the same. Father, Son and Holy Spirit; Creator, Example and Sustainer; don’t take it literally. Talking about God is more art, than science; more poetry than prose.
Saint Augustine took ten years and wrote fifteen books trying to explain the Trinity. The clearest statement he made was: The Father is God. The Son is God. The Holy Spirit is God. The Son is not the Father. The Father is not the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is not the Son. There is only one God.
All of what we think God is, is a way of telling us what we should be. The apostle Paul, concluding his letter to the much embattled Corinthian church, tells them what to do. “Finally, brothers and sisters, farewell. Put things in order, agree with one another, live in peace; and the God of love and peace will be with you. Greet one another with a holy kiss. All God’s Holy people send you their greetings; the holy Hindus and Buddhists, Moslems and Jews, naturists and humanitarians; and people of good will in every race and nation on the earth. The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all.
1. Bill Bryson, A short History of Nearly Everything, Broadway Books, New York, 2003, p. 10.
2. Kathleen Norris, Amazing Grace, Riverhead Books, New York, 1998, pp. 288-291.
3. William Willimon, http://www.chapel.duke.edu/chapel/worship/sunday/viewsermon.aspx?id=48