5/18/08 - Holy Trinity - Matthew 28:16-20

IN THE NAME OF THE TRIUNE GOD
- We are to believe
- We have been saved

“I baptize you in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.” These words have been repeated thousands, perhaps even millions of times in the history of Christendom. These words coupled with plain water and applied to a sinner have produced faith and salvation for countless souls who are now standing among the pillars of Paradise. These words are familiar to our ears and very dear to our hearts because these words were given to us by Jesus Christ himself. “Go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.” Before Jesus ascended into heaven he stood on a hill in Galilee and spoke these words to his disciples. And he made it clear that the baptizing we are to do and the baptism that we ourselves have experienced, has received its power and authority and blessing from one thing: “the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.”
The Triune God. The Trinity. The Almighty 3 in 1. A divine composition that our minds cannot understand, that our eyes cannot see, but that our hearts believe nevertheless. The Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit: different but exactly the same. Various roles, distinct duties, and yet each person of the Triune God is all of God all at once. They are not simply three parts of one God, because each of them is God in his entirety. But one would not exist without the others. Our God is incomprehensible! He is far beyond our sinful thoughts and corrupted reasoning. But that’s OK. And actually it’s a good thing! Our God had to be well beyond us in order to save us from our sins. He has to be well beyond us in order to guide and protect each of his children every second of every day. He must be well beyond us to know what to do, when to do it, how to do it, why to do it, and where. We will never be able to wrap our minds around our God in this life. But it doesn’t really matter. Because our Triune God has revealed enough about himself to us in the pages of Scripture that we will believe and be saved.
As long-time Christians - or as Christians who have known the Lord for quite a few years now, I don’t think any one of us has much of a problem believing in the Triune God. We know we don’t fully understand how that all works, but “the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit” have become so commonplace in our services and our sermons, our hymns and our prayers, that it doesn’t really bother us too much that we will never know all the intricacies of the Holy Trinity. We fully accept that our God is somehow 3 in 1. Our problem isn’t so much with the Triune God, it’s with a quad-god. We tend to add another person to the list…
Now there are many so called “Christian” denominations that will take one of the three persons of the Trinity away. Even many individual Christians will believe that the Holy Spirit isn’t true God - he is rather a force or a power coming from the true God but not the true God himself. Many other “Christian” (and I use that term loosely here) churches teach that Jesus isn’t even true God. He was a great teacher, a wonderful leader, a social reformer, a semi-god, a man who earned godliness even, but he was not on par with the true God himself. Taking persons away from the Trinity isn’t anything new. But neither is adding a person to the Trinity. And that sin is just as bad as taking a person of the Trinity away. And we are guilty of it. We, of course, love and believe in the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, but we would like it to be and we usually act like it is: the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit… and me! We elevate ourselves to the same level! Because we want to think what we want to think - not what the Holy Spirit has in mind. We want to say what we want to say - not what Christ asks us to speak. We want to do what we want to do - not what the Father has commanded. We want to take control and we want to do it our own way. We want to be added to that divine Triumvirate and we keep trying to force our way in! That’s why I said before that our problem isn’t so much with the Triune God, it’s with a quad-God. We want our name attached to that holy title. We want it to be 4 persons of the godhead. Because it’s no fun taking orders from somebody else! We want to run our own lives.
Just look at how you live your life. Some of the thoughts that seep into your mind are definitely not commanded and nowhere near approved of by the Triune God. But you are going to think them anyway - and you will keep on thinking about them because you like to do it and no one else will get hurt by them and no one else will know, so what’s the big deal? Some of the biting words you say about others are definitely not commanded and nowhere near approved of by the Triune God, but you’re going to keep telling those stories, complaining about that person’s personality traits, and degrading that person’s character anyway - because they deserve it and you need to tell somebody about it, you need to get it off your chest, right? And even many of the things you do, things that aren’t necessarily sins in and of themselves, but things that become sins when you do not consult the Word of God before doing them, when you do not base your decisions on God’s will, but on your own. When you do things because you want to do them, because you like them, because it’ll make you happy without ever thinking about what will please the Lord. A quad-god. We would like nothing better than to make it a 4 in 1 divine being instead of only three. And in fact we already act like it is at times.
But Jesus specifically tells us in Matthew 28, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. I am sending you out. You are supposed to make disciples for the Lord. You are to baptize in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit and that’s it! You are teach people what I have taught to you.” Everything that Christ says here in our text is authorized by the Triune God. Everything that we are to think, everything that we are to say, and everything that we are to do in our lives should be based on what the Triune God wants us to think, say, and do. Not just baptism, not just teaching people, not just spreading the Good News about Christ, but every little thing we produce should be checked and controlled by the Almighty Triune God. “I am God and there is no other. I am God and there is no one like me” (Isaiah 46:9) your Triune God says. And so do you think the Triune God is pleased when you put a comma after the Holy Spirit’s name and scribble your own name in to make it a Trinity plus one? He is not pleased. He is never pleased with mutiny. He is never pleased with rebellion. There is a reason why the number one commandment is: “You shall have no other gods besides me.” And that includes yourself.
Many years ago, long before you ever tried to put yourself on the same level as the Triune God, but not so long ago that he didn’t know that was going to happen, God himself came down to your level. The first person of the Trinity, God the Father, devised a plan to rid the world of its sins even though he knew that the world will always try to find ways to rid itself of God. The second person of the Trinity, God the Son, physically took on the form of a human being - God became man! for all of us who just want to be God. And the third person of the Trinity, God the Holy Spirit, worked in the hearts of those of us who wanted nothing to do with him from the very beginning. The Triune God came to us. He bent down, he picked us up, he wiped us off, washed us clean and he cradles us in his arms. We didn’t ask him to do it. We surely didn’t convince him to do it. He just did it. Because he is the Triune God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Slow to anger and abounding in love and faithfulness. And this love of our Triune God was never so clear in your lives, it was never so visible than it was at your baptism.
When you were a selfish, inconsiderate, egocentric infant - or when you were a selfish, inconsiderate, egocentric adult - the Triune God poured out his love on you at your baptism. As the water came into contact with your sinful body and as the words, “I baptize you in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit” were spoken, the three persons of the one Triune God each did their miraculous work together. God the Father saved us, the book of Titus says. “He saved us by the washing of rebirth and renewal by the Holy Spirit” (Titus 3:5). And so God the Father didn’t work alone, he worked together with God the Holy Spirit to make sure that we were born again - spiritually by faith - and also to make sure that our lives were renewed as our sins were washed away. But God the Son was not absent during this momentous event. He too worked together with the Father and the Holy Spirit: “For all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ” (Gal. 3:27). Christ is on you. He has been on you since that water touched your skin and the words that God ordained were uttered. And Christ is still on you so that all the sins you have committed and all the sins that you will ever commit will forever be covered up by Jesus’ blood and perfect righteousness. Christ is on you. The Holy Spirit is in you. And the Father is for you because of your baptism. And as you have grown in the Word of God since then, and as you continue to learn and believe the precious truths of Scripture in the future, that faith and that sure hope of salvation you received at your baptism will only grow stronger and stronger in your heart until you too reach the palaces of heaven like so many baptized Christians who have gone before you. Baptism is a grand event in the life of any man, woman, or child. Because it is the moment that the Triune God was intimately and individually involved with you personally, claiming you to be his own and inscribing his name on your heart.
There is a good reason why Jesus said that we should baptize “in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.” The Triune God gives baptism its power, it’s authority, and its blessing. Baptism would not be the baptism we know from Scripture if each person of the Trinity did not carry out his holy work. And this same authority that was present at your baptism has now been given to you as you bring this baptism to others. The Triune God came to you through baptism and now he wants to come to many more. And he asks you to spread his name to the nations so that they too can come to see their sins of mutiny and also his acts of love. And “in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit,” you have the authority to do it. You have been given the commission, the power, the blessing, and the privilege by the Triune God himself to baptize, to teach, to encourage, to invite, to make disciples! What an exciting thing for us sinners to be a part of! Especially after we have tried to usurp God’s authority for ourselves on a number of occasions by our actions, words, and thoughts! And now he actually gives his authority to us! We are representatives of God to the world! We carry his name! We carry his name in our hearts through faith and in our mouths for others to hear. There is no other name I would rather carry. There is no other name I would rather obey. There is no other name I would rather believe because there is no other name, there is no other God, who saves.
In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit you have been baptized. In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit you have been forgiven. And in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit you have been commissioned. To tell others how your Father has loved you. To tell others how the Son has died for you. And to tell others how the Holy Spirit has convinced you that it’s true. Carry this Triune name and the work of our God to the world. Not so that people can understand him, but so that they believe him, become baptized by him, and our saved.
Amen.

“May the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all.” - 2 Cor. 13:14