Trinity Sunday C All Cried Glory

 Trinity Sunday C All Cried Glory

May 25, 1986

By Rev. Ernest F. Campbell

A third-year music major has just finished playing a beautiful piano solo by Chopin. He then leaves the stage to take a seat in the back of the auditorium. A button is pressed and the same piano now repeats the solo with the exact interpretations played by the artist now listening to his own recital. What I am describing is a recent demonstration of the modern equipment of the player-piano through the wonder of the computer chip.

When interviewed, the young pianist said that when he heard the sounds of his own music, and could see the empty piano bench, he giggled out loud for the sheer amazing joy of it. In the future, for those of us who may own one of these computerized player-pianos, we can enjoy the worlds greatest artists right in our own living rooms, on our own pianos.

At our last clergy bible study, anticipating Trinity Sunday, I stated that there needs to be at least one Sunday when we ponder the imponderable, while at the same time, remain open to the awesomeness of God. Trouble is, I said, we are constantly ‘chipping’ away at God. It too, Diane Forsith, in light the story about the computer player-piano, to see the humor in what I had said…. yes, we are ‘chipping’ away at some of the unique attributes of God Himself, ‘computer chipping’ away that is!

God is all knowing…. But a few weeks ago, I called Sears from Spokane. I was asked for my phone number and the second I pronounced the seventh digit, the clerk said, “Mr. Campbell, what would you like to order from Sears today?” I didn’t dare ask what else it said about me on the screen, but I assume it reported something about how well I paid my bills.

Computers, as we know, store a vast amount of information, however when we began this service today, we prayed, “Almighty God unto whom all hearts are open, all desires known, and from whom no secrets are hid,” I wounder what it would be like to see that pop up on the computer screen? Our all-knowing Father knows us through and through. This same all-knowing God is also omnipresent – meaning He is present everywhere at once. 

We have learned to travel at great speeds, but while we are in supersonic flight between point ‘A’ and ‘B’ -- God is present at both points. Imagine the prayers of an astronaut’s child… “God bless Mommy in Florida, Daddy on the moon, Grandma and Grandpa Jones in Hawaii, Grandma and Grandpa Smith in Alaska and Sis in England on her study tour and brother in the Mediterranean in the Navy. Hold them all in your loving care. And because God is omnipresent, He can and will.

Our God is not only omniscient and omnipresent. Our God is Omnipotent. All powerful. We have learned the secret of releasing the awesome power packed into the atom. But it was God who packed that power in the atom to start with. The picture that popped into my head was of a mushroom cloud of an atomic blast being gathered in God’s hands to form the atom. The power of an atomic blast is awesome, but imagine the power required to pack that blast into a tiny atom.

J.B. Phillps wrote a book titled “our God is Too Small.”  And In it, he pointed out how we tend to want to understand God within the limitations of what we can grasp with our finite minds. Because our minds have no concept of all-knowing, being present everywhere at once, and all powerful, we are bound to shrink God until He fits what our minds can picture. Our Grandson Daniel is two-years-old. He wants to be six because when you are six, you are big. 

If we are amused at a little boy’s ‘too small’ idea of what it takes to be big, then we should be ready to smile at our own attempts, however profound, to reduce God to access Him our mind’s computer in terms that we can understand.

Example) The eighth-grader that did not want to be confirmed because he did not think ‘the God’ pictured in a book he owned could handle the full spectrum of the job description. God was, in this young man’s own understanding, an old man sitting on a throne. 

This leads to another attribute of God. We can only know what God has chosen to reveal to us. We could sit here and talk about God from now on, and still not know all about Him. As Paul put it, “Now, we see as through a clouded glass window. Someday we will know Him, even as we are fully known.” The God we worship is capable of far more than we can either think or imagine. 

Yes, He does reveal Himself in nature. But if we have to understand God through nature, we have to be ready to look beyond the grandeur and intricate design of our universe to the creator who speaks His word and it is!

Yes, God does reveal Himself in history… through Moses and the Prophets and the Kings…. and through Jesus Christ. But, if we are to understand God, we have to be ready to see beyond the marveling events related to these outstanding persons and personalities to the God who lived and moved with His love in our midst.

We have a wonderous God. It is only as we recognize and acknowledge a talent, love, and power greater than our own… more wonderful than we can even imagine, that the true spirit of worship is stirred. 

The author of Psalm 29 says it well, “Ascribe to the Lord the Glory due His name.” And in the temple of the Lord, all are crying, “GLORY!”