Trinity Sunday B
Readings: Deuteronomy 4:32-34, 39-40 Romans 8:14-17
Matthew 28:16-20
The readings for the feast of the Most Holy Trinity in the B cycle proclaim the triune God’s wonderful gifts to his people both in the Old Testament through the deliverance of his people from Egypt and the revelation of the Torah and in the New Testament through Christ who has made us heirs with him and sent us into the world to make disciples of all the nations and to baptize them “in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the holy Spirit.” Let us rejoice in our privilege as adopted children of God in Christ by singing the refrain of this Sunday’s responsorial psalm: “Happy the people the Lord has chosen to be his own” (Ps 34).
In the Deuteronomy reading Moses, who is about to die without entering the promised land, asks the Israelites who are to go into the land of Canaan to remember the Lord’s unique revelation and wonderful saving actions for them. First of all he reminds them of the Lord’s giving the Torah on Mount Horeb/Sinai. Moses asks the Israelites to recall if since the time God created humans upon earth, “did a people ever hear the voice of God speaking from the midst of fire, as you did, and live?” Secondly, he recollects the wonders the Lord worked in saving them from slavery in Egypt. “Or did any god venture to go and take a nation for himself from the midst of another nation, by testings, by signs and wonders, by war, with strong hand and outstretched arms, and by great terrors, all of which the Lord, your God did for you in Egypt before your very eyes?” Moses concludes by stating two obligations that flow from the Lord’s saving actions: the Israelites must know and fix in their hearts that the Lord alone is God and they and their children must keep his commandments so that they may prosper in the land that the Lord is giving them.
In the Epistle reading from the Letter to the Romans Paul is proclaiming the effects of Jesus’ death and resurrection on Christian believers. The passage expresses Paul’s Trinitarian theology which is closely tied to what God the Father has done in saving humanity through the death and resurrection of Christ, the Son, and the gift of the Holy Spirit. Without Christ’s victory over Sin and Death all humans were slaves to the flesh, the sinful lower instincts that turn us away from God. But now with Christ’s saving death and resurrection, the Spirit of God has been poured out on all creation and has remade believers into adopted “sons of God.” Christians now stand in a new relation to God, the Father. They are not to be slaves who live in fear of God, but adopted children who dare to cry out to God “Abba, Father!” Paul concludes by reminding his Roman Christian readers that they have the gift of God’s Spirit which bears witness that in their present condition they are children and joint heirs with Christ to God’s kingdom provided they suffer with him until Christ’s triumphant return. “The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of god, and if children, then heirs, heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ, if only we suffer with him, so that we may be glorified with him.”
The Gospel is the conclusion of Matthew which completes the main themes of the entire Gospel. As the triumphant Son of Man (Daniel 7), the risen Jesus appears to the eleven disciples who have gone to Galilee, as Mary Magdalene and the other Mary had told them (Matt 28:9-10; cf. 26:32). When the disciples see him in his glory, they worship, but also are filled with doubt. Jesus then approaches them and assures them that he has triumphed over death and is now risen as the triumphant Son of Man as he had repeatedly announced in the earlier chapters of the Gospel (Matt 16:21-28; 17:22-23; 20:17-19; 24:1-51; 25:31-46; 26:63-64). In Matthew the period between Jesus’ resurrection and his triumphant return as the Son of Man in judgment is a time for the gospel to be carried by the disciples to all the nations (24:14). They are the emissaries of Jesus; to receive them is to receive Jesus and the Father who sent him (10:40-42; 18:1-5; 25:31-46). Jesus has prepared them for this mission by his teachings in five long discourses throughout the Gospel (5:1-7:29; 10:1-11:1; 13:1-53; 18:1-35; 23:1-25:46). Now he commissions them to make disciples of all nations, by “baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit” and by teaching them to observe all he has commanded them. Jesus, who is Emmanuel, God with us (1:21-22), concludes by assuring them of his presence with them in this mission until his return in glory: “and behold, I am with you always, until the end of the age.”
As we carry on this great commission in the 21st century, let us recommit ourselves to being willing to suffer with Christ for the sake of the gospel in the assurance that we have with us the abiding presence of the Triune God: Father, Son and Spirit, who will bring his saving work to completion.
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