“…in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit…” (NRSV, Matthew 28:19)

One of the great mistakes we all make at one time or another is that we expect to understand the mystery of the Trinity.  Yet if our minds could really grasp the mind of God they would have to be on a level with God’s mind – which is an obvious absurdity.  So it is that the more we explain the doctrine of the Trinity, the more we explain it away.  But we should always remember that God has revealed to us the mystery of the Trinity, not for the sake of satisfying our curiosity, but rather that, by the knowledge he gives us about himself, we may be drawn closer to him and be enabled to worship and obey him with greater understanding.

Contrary to popular belief, the doctrine of the Holy Trinity was discovered, not by bookworms in their studies, but through the daily experience of ordinary Christian folk in the world.  To begin with the Apostles, like ourselves, grew up with the knowledge that there is but one God, the Maker of all things visible and invisible.  As strict Jews they recited twice a day the verse from Deuteronomy called the Shema, beginning, “Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God is one Lord…” (6:4).  While the heathen world might believe in a whole gallery of gods and goddesses, or in a vague energy of life, the Jews prided themselves on the fact that to them alone was revealed the truth of the living God, that he is personal and is one.

 It was the personal side which Our Lord stressed by referring to God, as he so often did, as “your Heavenly Father”.  The Apostles spent three years in the closest association with Our Lord and in that time they discovered that he was completely different from anyone else they had ever known or heard about.  There was his perfect manner of life, his lack of any personal sin, his assumption of absolute authority over the souls of human beings, his power over the forces of Nature, his repeated statement that at the end of the world it was he who would judge the whole human race, and finally his Resurrection – these factors and others besides led the Apostles to the only conclusion which fitted the facts, that he was, as St Thomas put it, their Lord and their God.  On the other hand, they were equally aware that he was distinct from God the Father who had sent him and whom he spoke of as being in a special sense, “My Father”.

 As regards the early Christians who had never known Our Lord in the flesh, their experience was similar to that of devout Christians today: they discovered that he was divine because he answered their need and gave to them his Presence and support.

When we experience a profound conviction of sin and realise our utter unworthiness in the sight of God, our dilemma becomes apparent.  We are in no state to approach the all-holy God dwelling in light unapproachable by sinful man.  No, only God himself can bring us to his Throne; if left to ourselves we must perforce remain for ever in the outer darkness.

It is just here that Our Lord answers our need and satisfies our longing.  As God the Son he has entered the dark night of this world to restore us to his Father.  It is God the Son who has solved our dilemma, by bridging for us the yawning gulf between us sinners and the all-holy God which would otherwise be unbridgeable.  Therefore, in our approach to God now, and in our hope of eternal life hereafter, we rely not on our own righteousness – that wouldn’t get us very far – but entirely on what Our Lord, God the Son, has done and suffered for us in coming to this world to seek and to save us when we were lost (Luke 19:10).  To the converted Christian this restoration to God by Jesus Christ is a personal experience so vivid and powerful that it cannot be denied; and the same is true of the consciousness of Our Lord’s Presence in the Blessed Sacrament in fulfilment of his promise, “I am with you always”.

 Before his Resurrection and again before his Ascension, Our Lord promised his Apostles that he would send them from the Father, the Holy Spirit: and he spoke of the Holy Spirit not as something but as someone who would teach them and lead them into all truth.

When the Holy Spirit came to the Apostles on the Day of Pentecost and to their converts at their Baptism and Confirmation, the effect was remarkable.  They became new people.  Peter who had quailed at the voice of a maidservant in the high priest’s house now openly rebuked the high priest himself before his own Council.  Saul, the brutal persecutor, became Paul the Saint and the same thing happened in different ways and varying degrees in the lives of countless Christians all over the Roman Empire.

It was clear that a new Power had come to them which was forming in them the character of God and that this Power, the Holy Spirit, must be personal to do this.  So their own experience day by day proved the truth of Our Lord’s promise.

 We also should be conscious of exactly the same experience as we review our lives.  We should observe the workings of the Holy Spirit in ourselves too, as we listen to his voice speaking to us through our conscience, as we see the gradual conquest of temptations in spite of many falls, as we compare the power of our most besetting sin now with what it was two or twenty years ago or more.  But it is when we compare what we have been and still are, with that perfect holiness of character which life with the all-holy God demands from all without exception, it is then that we are aware of our imperative need for God to transform our souls from within if we are ever to share his life.

So though we have been restored to the Father by God the Son, it is as repentant sinners that we have been restored and we still need God the Holy Spirit within our souls to complete the work by changing us into Saints.

 But while we recognise the Three distinct Persons of the Trinity we do not forget their Unity in one God for where One is, there all Three are.

Thus speaking of the indwelling of the Holy Spirit Our Lord said, “…he abides with you, and he will be in you”, and then he went on to say, “Those who love me will keep my word, and my Father will love them, and we will come to them and make our home with them” (NRSV, John 14:17, 23).

Does this pass our understanding?  Of course, but then we are not expected to understand but to adore.  It is enough if we, like those early Christians, by our penitence and faith and love, experience the Blessed Trinity in our lives, for without that experience understanding is worthless.