Sunday, July 25, 2010

Embodiment of the Trinity

It was quite by accident, since I do not normally listen to that particular radio station, that I stumbled across a particular radio interview last week as I stepped onto the treadmill. Unfortunately, I only caught the tail end of the interview. Now I wish that I had heard the entire thing. The individual was addressing how we, individually, embody the Holy Trinity in body, mind and spirit.

This is probably too complicated for my simple mind, but I’m going to give it a shot – even by extending beyond the authors discussion. Your input is solicited and would be greatly appreciated since I am only now scratching the surface with these simple words. Please add to the discussion and I will blog further if you do. Thanks for helping this old theologian out in this entirely new area of thought.

I had never thought of the parallels that he drew, but it did cause me to pause and say, “Wow.” If I understood the author correctly it went something like this:
Body, in the sense that the Holy Trinity, became flesh in Jesus Christ.
Mind, in the sense that it was the mind of God from which all life was created.
Spirit in the sense that it is via the Holy Spirit that the Holy Trinity, i.e. the power of God, is transmitted into our reality.

And so, as we fully embrace the three biblical aspects of our existences – body, mind and spirit – we embrace the full reality of the Divine as found and expressed in the Holy Trinity.

Taking it a step further, since the Trinity is the creative force in the universe and since God, in creating us in the image of the Divine created us male and female – it takes both male and female to image the Divine in God’s fullness, therefore, it is only when these two aspects of that humanly expression come together in the fullest expression of love making thus creating another human life form (bringing together body, mind and spirit in another human being) that we fulfill and embody the richness of the Trinity ... two halves come together to make a whole. The body, mind and spirit of the two halves of the created image come together as one and the miracle of life … created life … loving, caring, life giving life … sacrificing, sustaining life goes on.

Anything outside of this reality is less than what God desires for all of human life … outside of what God had in mind when creating us male and female … the expression of the Godhead itself – the Holy Trinity. It doesn’t mean that love is impossible outside of this human union (the whole) nor does it mean that the fuller sense of human fulfillment is beyond those who choose to live outside of this Divine and Holy reality, but it does mean that the complete joy of the Kingdom escapes our grasp ... we are, in some sense of the word, lesser than the whole.

It is like the positives and negative ends of a magnet … it is impossible to bring two positives together or two negatives together to make a whole magnet. It simply just doesn’t work. While it takes a positive and negative to make a whole, so it takes a male and female to make a whole – the whole meaning of the fullness of the Trinity (and no fair trying to read between the lines concerning positive/negative and male/female connection – the analogy is for illustrative purposes only).

I am very interested in your thoughts on this matter. It is a new trend in thinking for me. It has not been now or ever a part of my thinking concerning the Trinity and I believe that I need to sort it out even further. Your assistance would be appreciated. ‘

Quote for today: Take the first step in faith. You don't have to see the whole staircase, just take the first step. Martin Luther King, Jr.

1 comment:

  1. quite interesting...

    My first hesitancy is to say that body, mind, and spirit are not made of the same substance, and that might be where the analogy starts to break down.

    But I'll keep pondering this!!!!!

    I love what Augustine wrote in De Trinitatae, that the best image for understanding the Trinity is: a lover, love, and the one being loved. Again, not the same substance, but the dynamism in that relationship perhaps illuminates the perichoresis of the Trinity.

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