Trinity Sunday
“When he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, “Receive the Holy Spirit.”
Overview
Trinity Sunday
Trinity Sunday can seem a bit dry after the excitement of Pentecost but it helps us to explore how we live out the gift of the Spirit which invites us into deeper union with both God and one another. Our first reading assures us of our relationship with God whilst the gospel reading focuses on what this means for our relationship with others.
Isaiah 40:12-17, 27-31 describes a God who is both transcendent, unknowable and unlike us:
“who has measured the waters of the sea in the hollow of his hand and marked off the heavens with a span”.
A God who is more powerful and greater than any human power:
“all nations are as nothing to him”.
Yet also a God who is intimate and personal, who knows our ways and our fears, who longs to care for us: strengthening the weary and raising up the powerless.
In Matthew 28:16-20 Jesus opens this relationship with God to all humanity: we, who are now bearers of the Spirit, are sent into unite “all nations” bringing them into communion with both God and one another:
“baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.”
We are no longer mere guests at God’s table, we are also hosts who welcome those God sends.
FIRST READING
Isaiah 40:12-17, 27-31
Who has measured the waters of the sea in the hollow of his hand
and marked off the heavens with a span,
enclosed the dust of the earth in a measure
and weighed the mountains in scales
and the hills in a balance?
Who has directed the spirit of the Lord
or as his counselor has instructed him?
Whom did he consult for his enlightenment,
and who taught him the path of justice?
Who taught him knowledge
and showed him the way of understanding?
Even the nations are like a drop from a bucket
and are accounted as dust on the scales;
see, he takes up the isles like fine dust.
Lebanon would not provide fuel enough,
nor are its animals enough for a burnt offering.
All the nations are as nothing before him;
they are accounted by him as less than nothing and emptiness.
Why do you say, O Jacob,
and assert, O Israel,
“My way is hidden from the Lord,
and my right is disregarded by my God”?
Have you not known? Have you not heard?
The Lord is the everlasting God,
the Creator of the ends of the earth.
He does not faint or grow weary;
his understanding is unsearchable.
He gives power to the faint
and strengthens the powerless.
Even youths will faint and be weary,
and the young will fall exhausted,
but those who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength;
they shall mount up with wings like eagles;
they shall run and not be weary;
they shall walk and not faint.
GOSPEL
Matthew 28:16-20
Now the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain to which Jesus had directed them. When they saw him, they worshiped him, but they doubted. And Jesus came and said to them, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit and teaching them to obey everything that I have commanded you. And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age.
