Hi everyone,
Welcome to worship for this Holy Trinity Sunday, landing on June 15, 2025!
The bulletin for this service can be found here. You can use it to follow along with the service as the order and words of worship as well as the full sermon are included in it. Alternatively, you can follow along with the words that will appear on your screen and the sermon is on this page below the video.
If you’d like a fuller worship experience online, you are welcome to have a candle or two in your space, lit at the beginning of the service and extinguished near the end. You are also welcome to participate in communion if you are comfortable, by having something small to eat and drink prepared for the appropriate time. Further instruction will be given then.
May the love of God lead into all goodness and community, now and always!
Living God, we have much to hear from you, and may we be able to bear it by your Spirit, that we be guided into truth and right relationship with you, through Jesus Christ. Amen.
Relationships are difficult, aren’t they? Not for me, mind you, they come pretty easy for me as I’m an incredibly likeable guy, what with all this humility just dripping off me. I’m kidding of course, relationships are really difficult for me as well. And I’m not talking about just in a marriage context, which is really difficult, but I mean any kind relationship, whether they be between coworkers, friends, siblings, children, parents, basically any type of interaction with anyone who isn’t you, they just aren’t easy. I mean, learning about another person can be hard enough, but then actually starting to care about them? Letting them in? And then for whatever reason it seems like the closer you get, the higher the chance that some inadvertent and inexplicable misunderstanding or something happens that could lead to a falling out, hurt feelings, and perhaps another broken relationship. Sometimes the pieces are picked up and put back together, sometimes not. Sometimes the healing comes quick and sometimes it never comes at all. Sometimes the relationship can be salvaged, and sometimes the damage is irreparable.
See what I mean? Relationships are hard, man.
But we still yearn for them, don’t we? I mean unless you’re a complete psychopath, the longing to connect with another human is innate and at times even overpowering. And I don’t think there’s anything wrong with that, it’s just how we are. At the dawn of creation God had said that it’s not good for humans to be alone. So it is just how we are created, it’s in our DNA, in the very fiber of our being. We want to know and be known. We want to love and be loved. We want to see and be seen. We are just made for relationships.
So it’s almost like a cruel joke. It’s like these relationships are essential for who we are, but they’re also intrinsically oh so very difficult for us to maintain.
So difficult, in fact, that I personally know people who now, after being hurt a few too many times, don’t even want to bother anymore. They’ve just had it with the pain outweighing the gain. They’re tired of the whole rigmarole with so little pay off. They’ve had enough hurt, pain, and brokenness.
And to be honest, I get it. Even the best of us might have days when we’d just rather not.
Because when we love, we open ourselves up and might find ourselves on the losing end. We offer our best to others, and sometimes it isn’t seen as enough. We continue to look for that closeness and connection, but still we find ourselves left disappointed. I mean we’ve all seen communities split, friendships end, and people die.
I know, death isn’t exactly a choice that we make to end a relationship, but it happens, and it still hurts. We all have someone in our lives who have passed, and no amount of love that we show them, no level of closeness that we share, no kind of relationship we ever could have could save them from dying. And it sucks. So maybe that’s why relationship are so hard. They always end. In one way or another, they just won’t last forever.
This is what the disciples were facing in today’s gospel text and in some of the texts that we got over the past few weeks. Jesus, in what has been coined the “Farewell Discourse”, is preparing his disciples for his impending departure. He sums up his teachings of love and community and tries to reassure them with promises that his presence will continue to be with them through this new Advocate that he’ll be sending, and he reminds them that the intimacy and closeness he shares with God and then in turn with them won’t end in death.
But still, it must have hurt like heck. I mean these guys left their families, their occupations, their very identities to follow him. And now just as they were starting to believe that things were finally going to turn around, Jesus says he’s leaving. More disappointment. More heartbreak. More broken relationships.
I mean, enough is enough. Imagine this history that is weighing on their shoulders. Their ancestors were enslaved, then exiled, then exiled again, and then now they’re occupied by another foreign nation. Can they ever win? And now that finally feel the promise of hope, that Hope tells them that he’s about ready to peace on out and leave them alone… again. Come on, now.
So no wonder we struggle with relationships, it’s like not even the promised Messiah can be reliable. No wonder some of my friends don’t want to even try anymore, it doesn’t seem worth it if it’s so temporary. No wonder it’s like our world is more divided than ever as we try to satisfy our need for connection with a primitive mob mentality, some contrived sense of patriotism, this false empowerment from superiority, as they give empty promises of strength and respect. Instead, we are just pitted against each other instead of for each other.
But it might seem easier that way, right? It seems easier to point out the ways that others are different from us and thus inferior in comparison, rather than having the humility to just agree to disagree. It’s easier to deny the intrinsic value and worth of our fellow human beings than it is to admit that we too are in pain and need the support in community that will be diverse by definition. It’s just easier to exclude than to embrace, to judge than to understand, to hate than to love.
It seems easier, but that’s not the life we were made for.
See, today on Holy Trinity Sunday, we’re reminded of the relationship that is modelled for us by God. We see the closeness that is shared between God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. We see oneness in the Creator, Christ, and Counsellor. We see the love between God our Parent, Jesus our Priest, and the Spirit as the Paraclete.
And that love, that love that had existed before the world began, is not closed off. It’s not exclusive. It’s not reserved only for the holy. But that love reaches out to you. To me. To all people. We are invited into the love of the Holy Trinity.
Can you imagine that?
We are invited, not just as a guest, but as family. We are welcomed into community not just as a visitor but as a part of this body. We are made to be God’s people, called by name, seen and known, and declared to have relationship with God and each other.
This is the core of our gospel.
That we aren’t just taught about love and destined to only dream about it, but it is breathed into us by God, embodied by Jesus, and drawn to flow in and through us by the Spirit. This is what Jesus meant when he said earlier in his Farewell Discourse that just as he is loved so he loves us, and that we should abide in his love.
Abide in his love.
Stay. Dwell. Live in it.
This isn’t a temporary relationship. It isn’t a fair-weather friend or a fleeting connection. This isn’t something that will end even in death. But it is an eternal communion. A divine intimacy. A holy relationship that doesn’t abandon or betray or forget, but is rooted in love.
And it is for you.
So on this Trinity Sunday, may we see the closeness of God with the saints and the love that is given to all people and be empowered by the eternal relationship to which we all belong. Thanks be to God. Amen.