This was originally published as a comment on this blog on 13 June 2006.
Someone once asked me to explain the Trinity to her. I did the standard three-in-one, one-in-three stuff. Not particularly effectively perhaps, because she looked at me and asked, 'How can you believe something that doesn't make sense?'
It's a tricky one, and all the analogies in the world don't actually help someone who wants to understand what it means to say one-in-three, three-in-one. Because the point is that we are not the supreme arbiters of what makes sense and what doesn't. If we could understand God, if we could explain how it is that he is as he is, then he would be smaller than us, than our finite minds.
I wish I'd thought of it then, but my response should probably have been, 'How can you believe something that does make sense?' If I can fully understand something, why should I put my faith in it? I'm not talking petty faith, like I put in my chair, but real, life-faith, that relies on something greater than myself.
The fact that we can't understand God doesn't mean we shouldn't try. (Some of the greatest and most interesting theology I have read was written about the Trinity.) But it does act as a warning sign. Most congregations will probably not appreciate a sermon that's long enough to even begin to explain some of the ins and outs of the doctrine of the Trinity.
So what do you preach? Good question.
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