God Is Love: The Family of Trinity

In an effort to understand how the spiritual disciplines of solitude and silence can overcome loneliness, I began to think about the Trinity. I began to see how being with God is not so much like being with another person, but in a family. I began to see that I long to know that God delights in me and enjoys me, but even more, that he delights in himself as Trinity, kind of like I delight in being with my family and watching them love each other as well as me.

Then as I read from one of the gospels this morning, I realized how much God the Father wants to have company for Jesus and looks for such people, who will enjoy "the family" of the Trinity. Jesus spent most if not all his time talking about how life is with his Father in the kingdom of heaven, sort of like saying, "Here's what my dad does at my house with the family." Perhaps the kingdom of heaven is above all the "family life" of Father, Son, and Spirit and those with them.

It also helped me see how I could believe in Jesus - admire him and follow him - but miss the boat on his Father. Unless I understand the goodness and love of God the Father, none of what Jesus says will make any sense. Perhaps this is what he meant by: "That is why I told you that no one can come to me unless the Father has enabled him." (Jn. 6:65) The first step to understanding Jesus is admiring his Father and trusting him. Although I can and need to make a choice there, I cannot do it alone without God "enabling" me to see him for who he is. In order to understand Jesus as the "Beloved Son," I must accept and embrace God as his loving, all-powerful Father as well.

The reason I am so interested in this interaction is that I am suspecting that this trinitarian community is the only thing that can cure the loneliness and fear that drives human (my) sin. Jesus, knowing this, spent his time talking about the life of God in Trinity, and opened the door for my entry. He spent his time showing that the glory of God - his love, goodness, rightness, power, etc. - is what I can join him in trusting and worshiping. I can enjoy God through Jesus, but I can also enjoy the Father with Jesus.

This may me some more of the profound effect of The Shack on so many people. It was not only the truth that God can spend time with each of us, being "especially fond" of each of us, but also that we can spend time with a loving family of Father, Son, and Spirit, and enjoy their enjoyment of each other. As a father, I am pleased that my children love me, passionate about my kids loving their mom, and ecstatic when they love each other. I delight in seeing love displayed at least as much as I delight in receiving love directly. This may be what fends off loneliness and fear mostly: a shared love and admiration for each member of the family.

So I long to join the family and begin to read about how Jesus explains the goodness of being together with him and the Father and the Holy Spirit. "If anyone loves me, he will obey my teaching. My Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him." (Jn. 14:23) By following Jesus I come to find that the Father loves me because I love his Son. Where there is love for Jesus, the Father can make a home where mutual love can occur, where I receive the love of the Father and the Son and where I see the love of the Father for the Son and the love of the Son for the Father. God's love for me is that basis of my love for God, but even before that God's love within himself is what brings his love for me. So in 1 John, before the truth that "we love because he first loved us" comes "God is love" (4:16,19).

I can't say I understand this fully, but I feel hope that I might understand that "God is love" much better. I believe I can understand him better because that is what Jesus came to teach, and he is the only one who could teach about this "family life" since he came from it.

Father, you sent Jesus to me to show and teach me about your shared love and how you want me to be part of it. Jesus, you came in obedience and taught and received everyone who loved the Father. Spirit, you are the life and love that stays within my life forever, lifting me up to the place where Jesus left, pointed to, and returned: the Father's side, the Father's hearth, the Father's home. Let me be with you God, in all your love, receiving, sharing, and standing in awe of your amazing goodness. You are so good. Amen.