By the Way: Created for community
By ROLAND WEISBROT on June 10, 2023.
This past Sunday, many churches celebrated the Feast of the Holy Trinity. As you can likely tell by the name, the focus of the Feast was upon the mystery and glory of the Holy Trinity that we as Christians worship. As anyone who has studied even a little bit of theology can tell you, the Trinity is a very complicated doctrine which defies perfect explanation and undoubtedly requires faith in the mathematical quagmire created by a God Who is both three – Father, Son, and Holy Spirit – and yet also One. Instead of focusing on the nuances of Trinitarian dogma, however, I wish to draw your attention to what we can learn from the relationship between the Persons of the Trinity. God from all eternity has existed as Father, Son and Holy Spirit. This is something we confess in our Ecumenical Creeds on the basis of the testimony of Scripture. What this means is God, within His own Divine Being, has always experienced relationship and community. Amongst the Persons of our One Triune God, other-oriented love flows ceaselessly. As beings made in God’s image, it should therefore come as no surprise that we too have an innate need and desire for relationship and community (cf. Genesis 1:26-27). As the theologian Stanley Grenz often liked to say, we were created for community! Thus, the problems wrought by the epidemic of isolation in our community and in our wider society should come as no surprise. I do not believe it is any exaggeration to state that prolonged isolation will quite literally kill you – if not in body, certainly in mind and soul. Therefore, we must encourage and cultivate relationships in our community, taking our cue from the Trinity to pour out love toward others and foster the community in which we were created to thrive. Pastor Roland Weisbrot is Lead Pastor at Victory Lutheran Church 8-7
