Grace and peace to you from God the Father, our Lord Jesus Christ, and the Holy Spirit. AMEN.

If we left for the airport right now, we could catch a flight that would get us to the island nation of Trinidad and Tobago in about nine and a half hours’ time. The southern-most country in the Caribbean, the two islands of Trinidad and Tobago are located off the coast of Venezuela and were given half their distinctive name by Christopher Columbus back in 1498.

Now, why would we want to travel there? Imagine a country where the foods and customs of native peoples and slaves and indentured servants from West Africa and East India, blend together with the imported culture of the Spanish, the British, and the French. Imagine cool ocean breezes washing over an early evening concert as a traditional steel drum band serenades the crowd and locals reach out a hand to teach visitors the playful delights of limbo dancing. Imagine a land where God’s good creation is green and fruitful year-round and everyday life occurs under the name of the Holy Trinity.

For when Columbus left Spain on his third voyage in 1498, he pledged to Ferdinand and Isabella that whatever new land he would encounter – whatever rich resources he would find in that new territory – all these would be dedicated to the God they worshipped as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Since that time, this island nation has borne a name that reflects that religious conviction – Trinidad. Trinidad and Tobago.

Holy Trinity Sunday is often an occasion to review one of the chief doctrines of the Christian Church. I’ll bet many of you recall sermon illustrations of twisted pretzels or ice-water-and-steam that have been used by preachers – used by me – to help explain this sacred mystery.

Following the lead of Jurgen Moltmann, for thirty years now contemporary theologians have carried on a conversation about the mutual indwelling of Father, Son, and Spirit and its implications for the mission of the church. Fellow believers in the Orthodox tradition have helped many in western cultures see God afresh through iconography and prayer that reveres God in this dynamic and mysterious, this Trinitarian, way.

But there is a difference between debating doctrine and living a life that reflects a doctrinal understanding of God. And I’ll confess, I’d rather catch a flight to an island in the Caribbean this weekend than spend time in a doctrinal disputation. So instead of a debate, let us imagine a way of life sustained by the fresh breezes of a God, who calls us to life within the living embrace of the Holy Trinity.

Now, when it comes to God, some people want a God for the good and joyful times in life. For them God is an add-on to insure that all goes well. Other people want assurance of God’s presence in bad times, when the bottom drops out, when the worst we can imagine happens.

The doctrine of the Holy Trinity, however, teaches us why God is present all the time. It’s not really about whether or not we want or need God to be here. God is with us all the time because God is God. The scriptures teach us that in grace this God reaches out to us. In fact, the desire to be in relationship with us and the whole creation is part of the very identity of God even as Father, Son and Spirit are in community with one another.

At every Baptism we are reminded that God’s grace calls us into community as part of God’s extended family. As Ian and Scott and Aidan are baptized today – as we were once baptized ourselves – the arms of the Triune God extend to welcome us into the richness of this new way of life.

The hymnody of the Psalms reminds us that God deserves our daily praise. Creation is good because it is God’s handiwork. And our human lives are blessed – and meant to be a blessing to others – because God has given us oversight of this fragile and complex planet. A Trinitarian lifestyle calls us to care deeply about the creation and the welfare of all, because God is in all working out a divine history that will redeem all.

St. Paul caught this vision when he encountered the Risen Christ. When Paul wrote in his Letter to the Romans that we may “boast in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not disappoint us” (Romans 5:3-5) he was writing about those of us at Gloria Dei. Look around at who is here. //

We are not good times or bad times only Christians; we are those who know that our whole lives are held in God’s gracious embrace. Whether we are giving thanks for a new job offer or preparing for retirement; packing for a move across country or settling into this neighborhood; whether we are celebrating a 40^th anniversary or struggling in a marriage; burying a beloved grandparent or holding a new-born child. All these are parts of our collective life at Gloria Dei.  And in that life we are all held within the embrace of the Holy Trinity.

Yes, God holds us close in all seasons, but we can trust that most assuredly when we face the find of challenges St. Paul had in mind. Hardship, calamity, persecution, loss. When our own hearts are empty and forlorn, we do not stand alone.

Henri Nouwen, the great spiritual writer who often suffered bouts of discouragement himself, has written – “You have to trust that your experience of emptiness is not the final experience, that beyond it is a place where you are being held in love.” (The Inner Voice of Love, page 26) And friends, we can think of that place as our own kind of Trinidad – an island refuge in the midst of the world in which we dwell day-by-day. It is the place with God in which we are all held in love.

Going back to Christopher Columbus and his vow to rename whatever land he encountered in honor of the Holy Trinity, there’s a little more of the story that we need to know. Six years before Columbus set sail on that voyage, back in 1492, the Spanish monarchy issued the Edict of Expulsion, banishing all Jews from their land. It is thought that at least 200,000 Sephardic Jews left to rebuild homes in other lands. Ten years later the Muslims, who had lived and thrived for centuries right alongside their Christian and Jewish neighbors in the Moorish communities of southern Spain, were also banished or required to convert. All this in the name of the Triune God.