06/03/2026
Park Pulaski United Methodist Church
Sermon for May 31, 2026 Pastor Missy McCarthy
Getting Into the Word -
Genesis 1-2:4a
Matthew 28:16-20
Young People’s Time: Trinity
Good morning, friends, do you know what the word Trinity means? It means three. This is the Sunday that we talk about God being three in one. That is hard to understand. I am going to try to explain, but it will only be close, because no one can truly explain all of the Trinity. It is a relationship and represents how God is in relationship with us.
One of the ways I have come to understand this is that God is everywhere, creating and in relationship with all things and people. Jesus was fully human and God who came in a body so that we could understand God better and understand what was most important. The Holy Spirit is the gift that lives with us, directing us and helping us. It is like the small voice that tells us to take another way, so we can work alongside God. Yet they are not separate; they are all the same. That is the confusing part.
Let us imagine God as water, a sponge could represent Jesus - the yellow part is the fully human part, and the water is the fully God part, and the Holy Spirit would be the Water V***r. So God is with us and around us all the time. Jesus was a person, but when he rose, he joined God and is now available to us. The Holy Spirit lives in and with us all the time. This is why God said we created the world. All these parts are in relationship with one another all the time.
This week, how do you develop relationships with people around you? To really listen and get to know people? That is why Jesus came. God created us so that we could love one another - how can we love one another this week?
Reflection
Sometimes we get so busy trying to explain something that we lose focus on the why. Why did God come in three forms? Why is this important? Whenever I do a book study, a Bible study, or a small group, I always encourage people to ask why. If we forget to ask the questions or get scared of the questions, then we miss our opportunity to be in relationship with God.
God is all about relationships. That is why community is so important. We see that right from the beginning in our creation stories. Please remember, dear friends, this a poem to help us understand God’s relationship with us and the world, and us to the world - they are not meant to be a scientific outline - our science was not invented until the 1700’s. It was not meant to be a history as we know it - that was not curated until the late Middle Ages. At this time, stories and poems were the way of transmitting the big truths in life, a way for us to understand the deeper meanings of the world. The folks understood metaphor and symbolism much more than many of us do today because it was in their everyday lives.
So what do we learn from this story? God calls God’s self, we, and us. That God considers Godself to be more than what one of us is. That God created all things, not as binary - meaning one or the other, but from one to the other and everything in between, even people. Notice that even male and female are made in our image. Think about the diversity of human beings, color, facial features, size, height, hair color, gender, identity, and ALL of that is God’s image!
The wind from God - Ruach, also known as the Holy Spirit, swept over the chaos at the very beginning, calling light into being, calling the world into being, calling life forward. Chaos doesn’t mean nothingness; it means wildness. It means that there was no order and that this would not be a great place for human beings to survive in. God created the light and called into being and the darkness, as we need both to grow - the time of growing deep roots and the time to bloom. The Holy Spirit helped order a world into which we can thrive.
God not only created all the things needed for us to thrive, but also ways that we would need to work together in community to truly thrive. Not only that, but then God tells us to care for the creation. We really have not done a fabulous job of that part. Then God took a day to rest and told us to do likewise.
So here at the very beginning of the story, we see God and the Holy Spirit creating, changing chaos into order so that God’s light and love can shine. We see humanity being the light bearers in the world and charged with the care of that world, and invited into the creativity of that. To be partners with God in ordering the chaos in a fruitful way for the world and all of the things, plants, and animals to be fruitful.
On the other end of the story, we get the third part of the trinity, Jesus in Matthew, right before the ascension. I love this part, because some doubted and Jesus still tells them that he is given authority and he gives it to them to go and make disciples, baptising them in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, and teaching them with a promise to be with us until the end of the age.
This journey with the trinity is not an all-or-nothing sort of thing. We struggled, so we were sent Jesus. We were given stories to hand down of God’s divine promises, and where God keeps showing up, and were invited into the creativity of that to work with God. Even with seeing Jesus in front of them, some doubted. We will all have our moments of doubt. Heck, my entire generation doubts every institution we have come into contact with until it proves itself repeatedly, and Jesus has done that for me.
So how can you be in a relationship with God? How can you be in community with one another? Who can you invite to know more about this loving God who has room for everyone because God has made a difference in your life and others?
Want more? Suggested daily devotionals for this week:
Monday - Acts 13:44-52 Thursday - Isaiah 46:3-5
Tuesday - Psalm 23:1-6 Friday - 2 Timothy 3:10-17
Wednesday - Ecclesiastes 3:1-8 Saturday - Exodus 15:1-6
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