Matthew 28:16-20
“I believe in one God” who is Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Monotheism goes back to Abraham. However, the belief that Three Divine Persons exist as one God came to be revealed by Jesus Christ.
The Gospels are filled with statements made by Jesus that give evidence to the fact that although God is One, the Father, Son and Holy Spirit form a Trinity of one substance, equal in majesty. The Gospel of St. John gives testimony that Jesus said, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God and the Word was God.” “When you see me, you see the Father because the Father and I are One.” “No one comes to the Father except through me.” Took years of discernment, pondering the words of Christ, after many heresies, the Church declared definitively, dogmatically that God is a Triune God. However, no doctrinal statement means much unless we have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ. We can never understand an all-powerful—almighty—eternal deity. But we can understand a human like ourselves. That’s the reason that Jesus took flesh from the Virgen Mary, became one of us in all things except sin. That means that He got tired; got sick; had to go to the restroom. Jesus allowed Himself to be tempted by the devil, but remained faithful to His humanity. Temptations are not sins as long as we do not act upon them. The Lord wanted to pave the way to true happiness. True happiness comes from doing what God wants, even if when there is pain. Not that God the Father wanted His Son to suffer. He knew that there was no other way for us to understand unconditional love. “No grater love has someone than to lay down one’s life for one’s friends.” That’s what Jesus did for us. To reveal what was present from the start, but we could not see.
The reason we could not see God’s unconditional love was because we knew that we were guilty of the sin of disobedience. When our ancestors ate from the tree of knowledge of good and evil they lost original innocence. So they hid. An instinctive reaction—when a children do something wrong, they hide. Where can we hide from God? Why even try? God will always come looking for us. Our first parents were smart enough to allow themselves to be found. “We realized that we are naked.” “Who told you?” “Who told you that you are naked?” Evil is always the accuser, not God.
We lost the Garden. We lost original innocence. We had to face the inevitable reality of death. We were incapable of saving ourselves for believing the lie that God could not possibly love us. All who do not believe in their self-worth are going to lash out at others. Wars, plots to depose kings, suspicions of those who are different—nothing new—goes back to the Garden. Human sacrifice, animal sacrifice, purifications rituals were a common practice until Jesus came to tell us that humanity had the wrong idea. He gave us permission to call God “Daddy” “Our Father”. Jesus stopped the guilty from being killed. He turned the world upside down when He said, “It is mercy I desire, not sacrifice.” “You want to be first, get to the back of line.” “Be like a child—be powerless.” The way to heaven is not earned. The way to heaven is a gift and all we can do is say, “Thank You.” “And behold, I am with you always…” Even in our sin—God never leaves us. We worry when we forget to pray or when we are not nice or when we do bad things. God does not change His mind about us.
We celebrate the great love of God in the mystery of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit and try to appreciate how all of humanity is bound together in the unity of our Creator. We are all related, whether we like it or not.
“I believe in one God” who is Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Monotheism goes back to Abraham. However, the belief that Three Divine Persons exist as one God came to be revealed by Jesus Christ.
The Gospels are filled with statements made by Jesus that give evidence to the fact that although God is One, the Father, Son and Holy Spirit form a Trinity of one substance, equal in majesty. The Gospel of St. John gives testimony that Jesus said, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God and the Word was God.” “When you see me, you see the Father because the Father and I are One.” “No one comes to the Father except through me.” Took years of discernment, pondering the words of Christ, after many heresies, the Church declared definitively, dogmatically that God is a Triune God. However, no doctrinal statement means much unless we have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ. We can never understand an all-powerful—almighty—eternal deity. But we can understand a human like ourselves. That’s the reason that Jesus took flesh from the Virgen Mary, became one of us in all things except sin. That means that He got tired; got sick; had to go to the restroom. Jesus allowed Himself to be tempted by the devil, but remained faithful to His humanity. Temptations are not sins as long as we do not act upon them. The Lord wanted to pave the way to true happiness. True happiness comes from doing what God wants, even if when there is pain. Not that God the Father wanted His Son to suffer. He knew that there was no other way for us to understand unconditional love. “No grater love has someone than to lay down one’s life for one’s friends.” That’s what Jesus did for us. To reveal what was present from the start, but we could not see.
The reason we could not see God’s unconditional love was because we knew that we were guilty of the sin of disobedience. When our ancestors ate from the tree of knowledge of good and evil they lost original innocence. So they hid. An instinctive reaction—when a children do something wrong, they hide. Where can we hide from God? Why even try? God will always come looking for us. Our first parents were smart enough to allow themselves to be found. “We realized that we are naked.” “Who told you?” “Who told you that you are naked?” Evil is always the accuser, not God.
We lost the Garden. We lost original innocence. We had to face the inevitable reality of death. We were incapable of saving ourselves for believing the lie that God could not possibly love us. All who do not believe in their self-worth are going to lash out at others. Wars, plots to depose kings, suspicions of those who are different—nothing new—goes back to the Garden. Human sacrifice, animal sacrifice, purifications rituals were a common practice until Jesus came to tell us that humanity had the wrong idea. He gave us permission to call God “Daddy” “Our Father”. Jesus stopped the guilty from being killed. He turned the world upside down when He said, “It is mercy I desire, not sacrifice.” “You want to be first, get to the back of line.” “Be like a child—be powerless.” The way to heaven is not earned. The way to heaven is a gift and all we can do is say, “Thank You.” “And behold, I am with you always…” Even in our sin—God never leaves us. We worry when we forget to pray or when we are not nice or when we do bad things. God does not change His mind about us.
We celebrate the great love of God in the mystery of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit and try to appreciate how all of humanity is bound together in the unity of our Creator. We are all related, whether we like it or not.
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