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Sermon Illustrations for Trinity Sunday (2022)

Illustration
Proverbs 8:1-4, 22-31
Early African theologian Caius Marius Victorinus offers an intriguing image for understanding the relation between the Father and wisdom (the logos). Victorinus claims that the logos is the exterior knowing of God (what divine knowledge is revealed to us). The Father is then understood as the interior knowledge of God, what God himself only knows. Thus, Father and Son are identical in substance. As we distinguish between what a person is and what he does (yet know they are the same thing), so it is with Father and Son. The logos is just the activating of God’s creative power (The Fathers of the Church, Vol.69, pp. 266-267, 315). Or as Victorinus puts it in a hymn, the Father is the giver, the logos is the minister, and the Son is the d istributor (The Fathers of the Church, Vol. 69, p. 324). Another helpful image for understanding the Trinity is offered in a paraphrase of St. Augustine:

In eternity, the Son loves the Father and the Father loves Son. The Holy Ghost is the love who makes them one. (Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, First Series, Vol. 3, p.100)

As two become one in a Christian marriage, so God loves himself into one.
Mark E.               

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Psalm 8
We can never know God in full. John Calvin made that clear one time when commenting on this psalm. He wrote:

David implies that when all the faculties of the human mind are exerted to the utmost in meditation on this subject, they yet come far short of it. (Calvin’s Commentaries, Vol. IV/2, p. 94)

Though God is great, he is still mindful of human beings. Indeed, he fills us and saturates us with his goodness. Augustine speaks of our being drunk on his glory, so inebriated that we have forgotten our sinful ways:

Through the multiplication of mercy then he is mindful of man, as of beasts; for that multiplied mercy reacheth even to them that are afar off... He extendeth mercy, and in his light giveth light, and maketh him drink of his pleasures, and inebraiteth him with the richness of his house, to forget the sorrows and the wanderings of his former conversation. (Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, First Series, Vol. 8, p. 30)
Mark E.

* * *

Romans 5:1-5
We sometimes think of character as something we’re born with, that’s ingrained. You either have it or you don’t. One of the distinguishing characteristics of the New Testament is that there is an assumption we can change, in contrast to many ancient philosophies (and modern misinterpretations of genetics) that we cannot. We don’t have to go out looking for trouble in order to suffer in this world, but suffering happens. And here the apostle Paul makes this astounding assertion that suffering leads to character and hope! Suffering creates character. Now there is an intermediate stage – endurance. Anyone who sets out to lose weight, or to exercise, or to read through the Bible in a year, or to go back to school, knows that these are hard things. They involve suffering at some level – but once we discover that we can make it walking ten minutes on the treadmill, it becomes easier to do it again because we develop our powers of endurance. And once we know we can endure, we will endure. And that in turn creates a different person, one with character, and how at last we hope is not some vain wish, but a way of living not only in the present, but with the future in mind, because we know from past experience we’ll make it through the next time of trial. It is in this condition of hope that we are changed, especially because now we are better able to recognize and receive the gift of God’s love which the Holy Spirit has given to us.

Step by step. Step by step.
Frank R.

* * *

Romans 5:1-5
Vernon Grounds, in a Christianity Today article “Radical Commitment,” wrote of the Trinity, “Explain the Trinity? We can’t even begin. We can only accept it—a mystery, disclosed in scripture. It should be no surprise that the Triune Being of God baffles our finite minds. We should be surprised, rather, if we could understand the nature of our Creator. He would be a two-bit deity, not the fathomless source of all reality.”

It is hard to capture the essence of the three persons of God. Many of our best illustrations fall short and lapse into modalism (the example of water), or venture into Arianism (the example of the egg). The fact is, as I see it, that it is simply hard to explain, but infinitely true. We see the Trinity in this passage. We have peace with God through Jesus Christ and note that God’s love is poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit that has been given to us. Each of the distinct persons of God, fully God themselves, work in our hearts and lives to make us what we need to be. The line from Reginald Heber’s hymn, “Holy, Holy, Holy” resonates today. “God in three persons, blessed Trinity.”
Bill T.

* * *

John 16:12-15
Commenting on this text, Martin Luther spoke of the Trinity in terms of an internal conversation in God with the Father as speaking, the Son as the word, and the Spirit as the listener (Luther’s Works, Vol. 24, pp. 364-365). This talkative God is wonderfully compassionate. Father and Son are said to be bound so closely together in Luther’s view that “we should learn to think of God only as Christ.” In fact, the Triune God is said to be so loving that we can cuddle like children in his lap, as if we were in our mother’s arms (Luther’s Works, Vol. 24, p. 64). The meaning of the Trinity is a comforting word, as Luther puts it:

This teaching produces hearts that are stout, courageous in affliction and the temptation to sin, confident and fearless hearts. (Complete Sermons, Vol. 6, pp.101-102)
Mark E.
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John Jamison
Object: You may present this message as a simple story, or have the children act it out as a role-play. I will show the role-play version, but you can ignore the acting pieces and just tell the story if you prefer.

Note: For the role-play version, you will need to select two girls and one boy to play the roles. You might also have a broom and a dust rag if you want to.

* * *

Hello, everyone! (Let them respond.) Are you ready for our story today? (Let them respond.) Great! Let’s get started.

The Immediate Word

Mary Austin
Dean Feldmeyer
Christopher Keating
Thomas Willadsen
George Reed
Katy Stenta
For July 20, 2025:

Emphasis Preaching Journal

Mark Ellingsen
Bill Thomas
Frank Ramirez
Bonnie Bates
Amos 8:1-12, Psalm 52
Amos proclaims the word from God that punishes the people. The people are to be punished for their lack of faith, for their focus on practicing deceit, betraying honesty to their neighbors, and being impatient for the time after the Sabbath when they can focus on profit and selling their crops and wares. Oh, my! What a terrible message for people. You have been unfaithful so I will punish you. And then in the psalm, God is proclaimed to be the olive tree, that which brings blessing.
David Kalas
I have tried to find different ways of saying it so that my children don’t tire of hearing it. But the basic principle remains the same, and my kids have heard it a ton. “First things first.” They ask if they can do this or they start to do that, and I will endeavor to redirect them, saying, “Why don’t we make sure we’re doing first things first!”

StoryShare

John E. Sumwalt
I am now rejoicing in my sufferings for your sake, and in my flesh I am completing what is lacking in Christ’s afflictions for the sake of his body, that is, the church. (v. 24)

The Village Shepherd

Janice B. Scott
One of Martha's earliest memories was of her little sister Mary singing and dancing in the middle of an admiring crowd of friends. Mary had always been a dancer, from the time she could walk. Privately, Martha thought she'd always been something of a show-off and ought to go on the stage, for Mary loved an audience.

SermonStudio

John E. Sumwalt
Jeanne Jones
Several years ago, before we moved to Wisconsin, I was an honorary nanny for our pastor's son, Jonathan. I took care of him from the time he was able to walk until our pastor moved, when Jonathan was about five. We had wonderful times together. One time, when I was at their house, and we had been doing some spiritual direction together, Pastor Michael asked me if I knew the name of my guardian angel.
James Evans
We are not surprised when we learn about crooks and robbers boasting about "mischief done against the godly" or "plotting destruction" all day long. The image we have in our minds about who "bad" people are, and how they conduct themselves, make such accusations completely plausible. We are less inclined to believe such things about leaders, especially respected leaders among us. We have difficulty believing someone with wealth and power would deliberately plot to do someone else harm.
Arley K. Fadness
Today's gospel from Luke 10 follows the parable of the good Samaritan. Luke positions the good Samaritan and the Mary-Martha story back to back for good reason. The parable and the story are examples of the Great Commandment "to love the Lord your God with all your heart and your neighbor as yourself." The good Samaritan parable illustrates "love to neighbor," whereas the Mary-Martha story illustrates "love to God."
Kirk R. Webster
In the early 1990s, Wesley Nunley of Dallas completed a project he had dreamed of for decades. "I tell you, this could be a big thing," he explained. Wes then walked out to a concrete octagon in the middle of his backyard. With a beaming smile, arms raised up in excitement, the energetic retiree said, "This welcomes the UFO to land, which has never been done before."
John W. Wurster
It was the best of times. A time of prosperity and confidence, a time of relative peace, a time when most everything looked pretty good, a time when most everyone felt pretty good. It was a time maybe not unlike our own time.
H. Burnham Kirkland
Words Of Assurance
Our God is both wise and caring: afflicting the comfortable and comforting the afflicted.

Pastoral Prayer
God, we bow before you this morning, knowing that you hear every prayer. We know that in all of Creation, you are the source of life. You are the one who set the light swirling between the galaxies. The breath of your Spirit pulses through all life. You have even become flesh among us. We praise you, Lord, that in all your wonder, you have not forgotten us.

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