Trinity Sunday, Year A
9-12 year olds
(Begin by reading the Gospel. Sometimes it is good to have someone read it to you. The Word is meant to be heard.)
“For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life.”
These words of Jesus tell us so much, don't they? These words speak of the plan of God to bring all the world into the full life of God. I think of it like this:
I think of the very beginning, or before the very beginning, when God had a plan and time began. God loved, and there was a spark of light containing all the energy that ever was or will be. From that spark of light, born out of Love, exploded all creation. God loved, and mother stars, supernovas, galaxies and planets whirled outwards into infinity. God loved, and our planet cooled as it spun with the other eight (seven plus poor Pluto!) around our beautiful sun. God loved, and the rains fell and the oceans filled. God loved, and there was life, microscopic and exquisite, growing and becoming more complex as each eon passed. God poured out more and more Love, until one day, finally, when all was just right, humans stood up on two legs and began to think and imagine and create along with God.
I think of the Love of God pouring into creation like pouring sugar into water. As we stir, the sugar dissolves almost before we can even see it.
We look at the water, we can touch the water and feel it, but we cannot see the sugar. God loves the world, God loves creation. We can see and touch creation, but we cannot see God's Love.
Until...
If we keep stirring sugar into water we get to a point when there is so much sugar, the water can no longer dissolve it. We say the water is saturated. No matter how much we stir, the sugar can be seen.
While they were there, the time came for her to deliver her child. And she gave birth to her firstborn son (Luke 2: 6b-7a)
God loved the world so much that it became saturated with God's Love. Jesus was born into creation--the love of God in physical form. Visible. Audible. Touchable.
Loveable.
For a time--about 33 years, we think --the Love of God dwelt among us. He grew and lived, taught and healed.
And then things really began to heat up.
On the night before he died, he took bread and wine, blessed it, and gave it to his friends, saying, "this is my body; this is my blood." He poured out his Love into that bread and wine so that they became his body and life. He gave his life, and then he poured out his Love once more, and died on the cross.
What happens to sugar when saturated water is heated up? The sugar dissolves. Even though the water is already full of sugar, it takes up more. We say that the water is super-saturated. The sugar is raised up and can no longer be seen.
On the third day, God raised Jesus from the dead. Full of the life and Love of God, he can never die again. Creation is super-saturated with the Love of God.
If we let that super-saturated water cool, the sugar remains dissolved. The water holds more sugar than it could before.
Until...
If we add even one more grain of sugar into that water, all that excess sugar crystallizes out of solution. The sugar can once more be seen.
For 40 days, in moments of God's intense Love, Jesus would appear to the apostles. God's Love crystallized. But then on the day of the Ascension, Jesus returned to God. The water was heated again, the sugar went back into solution; the Love of God could no longer be seen.
But the sugar is still there, even though it cannot be seen--more sugar than there ever was before. The water is thick with it. There is more of God's Love in our world than there has even been before because Jesus lived and died and rose to new life. Because Jesus is Risen, the Love of God surrounds us. The world is thick with it.
God pours in the Love; the Love crystallizes into Jesus; Jesus rises to new life and the Love surrounds us. Jesus told the apostles he would send the Spirit to be with them always. Could the Love of God be the Spirit of God?
Even now, in moments of intense Love, does Jesus crystallize out of solution again? Are there times when the Love of God becomes visible to us?
Jesus says,
“For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life.”
There is a goal for this plan, isn't there? For everyone who believes to have eternal life, when all the world is drawn up into that Love of God. Maybe, at that point, the water becomes dissolved in the sugar. What would we call that solution? Maybe at that point it would be more correct not to speak of the sugar and water separately, for they will have become one. One delicious syrup! The syrup of God.
