I was a bit daunted when I was invited to write a couple of lectionary reflections for the print edition of the Christian Century. One of the weeks I was asked to write about was “Trinity Sunday,” a day when preachers reflect on the Creator/Christ/Holy Spirit triad/unity.  It’s so easy to get caught up in lots of theoretical language when talking about the Trinity, and I did that in a couple of drafts of my reflection!

In the end though, I ditched all that and told a story about my baptism. I was baptized “in the name” of the Trinity, and it was very moving for me. But the moving part was about how the community came together to love and support me. Becoming a community which embodies Jesus’s love, experienced through feeling a Spiritual presence, and reflecting the wideness of God’s love is what has moved me most. We are separate, yet together. God is simple, but complicated.

To read the full reflection from the Christian Century, you have to get a copy of the magazine (email or facebook me and I’ll send you a copy), or get a web membership. But you can read the beginning on their open site here

And here’s how it ends…

As I sang, I looked up toward the vaulted ceiling of the church and thought of the openness and immensity of God. I was overcome by the magnitude of what was happening. My voice began to tremble and crack as I sang, “I have decided . . .”

The congregation was right there. The people began to hum when my voice grew weak. They came in under me, lifting me up and supporting me. I felt as if they had physically grabbed my elbows and put pillows around me to keep me from falling. I began to cry and my voice broke. Again the community was there to put words to the humming and to my crying. “We have decided to follow Jesus, we have decided to follow Jesus. No turning back. No turning back.”

They sang for me when I couldn’t sing. They sang when I felt overwhelmed by my own smallness and the vastness of God. They sang when I felt daunted by the task of following Jesus. They sang when my sense of aloneness was broken in the midst of their communal presence. They sang while I healed, and after a while I could sing again. That is what we do for each other. That is what it means to be the body of Christ and baptized into it by the Holy Spirit of a Creator God. We sing for each other.