© 2026 The Rev. Seth Olson
This sermon was delivered at the Episcopal Church of the Holy Apostles in Hoover, AL on Trinity Sunday. A video of the message may be found here.
Holy God, may my words be your words, and when my words are not your words, may your people be wise enough to know the same. Amen.
Today is Trinity Sunday, which means this is the Sunday when preachers everywhere are either coming up with some terribly inaccurate analogies, being tempted to explain too much, or feeling like they must apologize for not being able to explain enough.
Because the Trinity is not easy.
One God in three persons.
Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
Not three gods.
Not one God wearing three different masks.
Not a math problem where one plus one plus one somehow equals one.
And honestly, if we try to make the Trinity small enough to fit neatly inside our minds, we usually end up making God too small. So today, instead of trying to solve the Trinity like a riddle, I want us to begin where the Gospel begins: with eleven disciples on a mountain in Galilee.
Matthew tells us that the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain where Jesus had directed them. And when they saw him, they worshiped him. But some doubted. That may be one of the most honest lines in all of Scripture.
They saw the risen Jesus.
They worshiped him.
And some doubted.
Their faith and their uncertainty were standing on the same mountain.
And Jesus does not shame them for it. He does not divide them into the good disciples and the questionable disciples. He does not say, “Those of you with complete confidence may come forward, and the rest of you can take some time to work on yourselves.”
He gives the same commission to the whole imperfect group. “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations.”
In other words: you do not have to be completely certain before you can be sent.You do not have to have everything figured out before you can participate in the life and mission of God.
You do not have to be perfect before Christ can use you as a witness to grace. That is good news for the Church. It is good news for Holy Apostles. And it is good news for anyone who has ever loved Jesus and still had questions. Anyone who has ever worshiped and still wondered. Anyone who has ever shown up carrying both faith and doubt, both devotion and exhaustion, both hope and fear.
The risen Christ meets the disciples as they are. And then he sends them. But notice what Jesus sends them to do. He does not say, “Go win arguments.” He does not say, “Go build an institution.” He does not say, “Go protect your own comfort.”
He says, “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything that I have commanded you.”
This is what we in the Church call the Great Commission. But sometimes I think we have heard it too narrowly.
To make disciples is not simply to get people to join our side. It is not merely to increase religious market share. It is not to pressure people into agreement. A disciple is a learner. An apprentice. Someone whose life is slowly being shaped by the way of Jesus.
So when Jesus sends the disciples, he sends them to invite others into a way of life: the way of mercy, forgiveness, courage, humility, justice, welcome, peace, and self-giving love.
He sends them to baptize in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. And that is where Trinity Sunday and the Great Commission kiss.
The Trinity is not first an abstract doctrine to be explained. The Trinity is the life of God into which we are baptized.
We are baptized into the name of the God who creates the heavens and the earth and calls them good.
We are baptized into the name of the Son who takes on flesh, touches the untouchable, welcomes the sinner, forgives the enemy, washes feet, and lays down his life in love.
We are baptized into the name of the Holy Spirit, who breathes courage into frightened disciples, gathers divided people into communion, and sends ordinary human beings into the world as bearers of divine love.
The Trinity tells us that at the heart of all things is not loneliness. Not domination. Not fear. Not violence. Not isolation. At the heart of all things is communion. Relationship. Self-giving love.
God is not a solitary monarch sitting far away from the world. God is living love. Love given, love received, love shared. Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. And Jesus invites us into that life.
That is the point. Not that we would be able to define God perfectly, but that we would be swept up into the life of God and then sent out to live that divine life in the world. And that is where today’s Good News becomes very particular for us, Holy Apostles.
We bear the name “Apostles.” We are not only Holy People Gathered in a Church Building. We are Holy Apostles. Set apart and sent.
That does not mean we are impressive. The first apostles were not impressive in the way the world usually measures impressiveness. They were incomplete. They were uncertain. They were still carrying failure and grief. Some worshiped and some doubted, and maybe some did both at the same time.
And still Jesus sent them. So perhaps being Holy Apostles does not mean being the people who have everything figured out. Perhaps it means being a community willing to be drawn into the self-giving love of God and then sent back into Hoover, Shelby County, Birmingham, our homes, our schools, our workplaces, our neighborhoods, our friendships, our families, and all the ordinary places where human beings are aching to know that they are loved.
This is what we are sent to live. The grace of Jesus Christ. The love of God. The communion of the Holy Spirit.
That is how Paul says it in Second Corinthians. And it is more than a beautiful blessing at the end of a letter. It is a pattern for the Church. Grace. Love. Communion.
What if those became the marks of Holy Apostles? What if people encountered this parish and said, “That is a community where grace is real”?
What if people came among us and discovered not a perfect church, but a loving one?
What if our life together became an invitation into communion in a lonely and fragmented world?
That is the divine life. And that is the mission.
And today, we hear this Gospel on a day when we are also saying thank you and farewell to Derek Kluz, who has helped lead this community in song for the last ten years. There is something deeply fitting about this.
Because music has a way of doing what doctrine alone cannot always do. Music can carry us into communion. Music can teach us how to breathe together. It can gather many voices into one song without making every voice the same.
For a decade, Derek has helped us sing the faith. He has helped us pray when words alone were not enough. He has helped us praise, grieve, rejoice, remember, and hope.
And now, on the Sunday of the Great Commission, we bless him as he is sent into a new chapter. That does not mean the communion ends. It means love moves outward. That is how the life of God works. The love of God is never stagnant. It creates. It gathers. It blesses. It sends.
Derek is being sent. And so are we.
Not in the same way, perhaps. Not to the same place. But every one of us who has been baptized into the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit has been drawn into the life of God and sent to make that life visible.
And Jesus gives one final promise. “Remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”
Matthew’s Gospel account begins with the promise of Emmanuel, God with us. And his Good News ends with the risen Christ saying, “I am with you always.”
That means we are not sent alone. Derek does not go alone. Holy Apostles does not continue alone. You do not step into your own calling alone. The crucified and risen Christ goes with us.
So, beloved Holy Apostles, on this Trinity Sunday, do not worry first about whether you can explain the Trinity.
Live the Trinity.
Live as people created in love.
Live as people gathered in grace.
Live as people sent in communion.
Go into the world as disciples of Jesus. Teach mercy by practicing mercy. Teach forgiveness by forgiving. Teach welcome by welcoming. Teach love by loving.
And invite others—not merely with your words, but with your lives—into the self-giving love of God: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
Because that is who God is. And we are called to live and move and have our being in the Divine Life of the Trinity.
Amen.
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