1st Sunday after Pentecost, Year B (Trinity Sunday) 

Almighty and everlasting God, you have given to us your servants grace, by the confession of a true faith, to acknowledge the glory of the eternal Trinity, and in the power of your divine Majesty to worship the Unity: Keep us steadfast in this faith and worship, and bring us at last to see you in your one and eternal glory, O Father; who with the Son and the Holy Spirit live and reign, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

John 3:1-17

There was a Pharisee named Nicodemus, a leader of the Jews. He came to Jesus by night and said to him, “Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher who has come from God; for no one can do these signs that you do apart from the presence of God.” Jesus answered him, “Very truly, I tell you, no one can see the kingdom of God without being born from above.” Nicodemus said to him, “How can anyone be born after having grown old? Can one enter a second time into the mother’s womb and be born?” Jesus answered, “Very truly, I tell you, no one can enter the kingdom of God without being born of water and Spirit. What is born of the flesh is flesh, and what is born of the Spirit is spirit. Do not be astonished that I said to you, ‘You must be born from above.’ The wind blows where it chooses, and you hear the sound of it, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit.” Nicodemus said to him, “How can these things be?” Jesus answered him, “Are you a teacher of Israel, and yet you do not understand these things?

“Very truly, I tell you, we speak of what we know and testify to what we have seen; yet you do not receive our testimony. If I have told you about earthly things and you do not believe, how can you believe if I tell you about heavenly things? No one has ascended into heaven except the one who descended from heaven, the Son of Man. And just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in him may have eternal life.

“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.

“Indeed, God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.

A reflection from Sarah:

The week that we conducted this Faith from the Margins to the Web interview, the tape recorder malfunctioned.  I was initially thinking I would just skip the week, or try to ask the participants to remember what they had spoken about.  But, it truly isn’t possible to fully capture the beauty of these interviews in these partial ways.

The interview that didn’t get captured is perhaps a message in itself, though.  MaryAnn and Christine, with the help of Christine’s toddler son, spent a Godly hour sitting together around a play mat filled with toys in the front of the church telling stories about what they knew and testifying to what they had seen: in their own lives, in their children, in this world in which we live.  Christine was 36 weeks pregnant at the time of the interview and filled with anticipation for this new life soon to come into the world.

I don’t interfere with interviews while they are taking place, but in my mind’s eye I can see these three persons: talking, playing, listening, relating.  There are moments which are beautifully Trinitarian, and this was one of those.  The presence and mystery of a one-yet-triune God could be felt as they discussed birth and rebirth in the words exchanged between Jesus and Nicodemus.

Sometimes it isn’t in the seeing, or the hearing.  Like the Holy Trinity, we come to know the nature of relational, interactive God through engagement with each other.  Across all the margins of this world: we learn to recognize the God who is with us whenever the mystery of divine presence dwells in our midst.