Go…and Remember

‘Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything that I have commanded you. And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age.’ —Matthew 28:19-20

Last Sunday was Trinity Sunday, where the Church celebrates the doctrine of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit—a doctrine that has been spoken and continues to be spoken in myriad ways: Creator, Christ, and Holy Ghost, or Mother Hen, Beloved Child, and Fiery Advocate, for example. The diverse expressions of the Trinity speak to its liberating dynamic where the Creator, Christ, and Spirit are distinct from and in relationship with one another. To abide in the blessing of relationship without the condition of conformity and with the assurance that we are never alone is the best kind of freedom—the kind of liberation our soul longs for—and it is in such holy freedom that we find salvation.

“The Great Commission,” as it’s known, in the final verses of Matthew’s gospel is assigned to Trinity Sunday, where the resurrected Jesus meets his disciples on a mountain in Galilee and commissions them to go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of what we would come to confess as the Trinity, and teaching them to obey everything Jesus had commanded them. But his final instruction is what strikes me the most, especially in relation to Trinity Sunday: “Remember.” Jesus says, “Go, and remember that I am with you always, to the end of the age.”

When we remember the empowering provisions of the Spirit, and the courageous justice of Jesus, and the amazing grace of God, and we remember how that great Three-In-One is with us always, it is an assurance that sets us free from all anxiety and fear, so that we can more fully and unabashedly love one another as Christ loves us. Remembering stokes liberation, and liberation ushers in the kingdom of God on earth as it is in heaven.

It would appear that we are living in forgetful times, then. Forgetting that Christ accepts us as we are and that Christ is always with us causes the insecure Christian to fight for Christianity out of fear that it will fade away. Anxiety and fear lead to hostility, where we feel the need to prove ourselves by force rather than to extend ourselves by grace. On the grand scale, forgetfulness leads to authoritarianism and Christian nationalism, but remembering that we are loved as we are and that we are never alone nurtures hospitality and mutual wellbeing.

In these forgetful times, then, let us remember that God does not need to be defended. God needs to be shown. Christ Jesus does not need to be protected. Christ Jesus needs to be revealed. The Holy Spirit does not need to be guarded. The Holy Spirit needs to shine. And the religion that proclaims the doctrine of the Trinity does not need to be enshrined by force. Christianity needs to be shared by love. Otherwise, this faith we claim becomes, as the apostle Paul says, nothing more than a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal.

So, go, therefore, and remember. And in that blessed assurance, be set free to do justice in the name of the Father, and to love mercy in the name of the Son, and to walk humbly with your God and your neighbor in the name of the Holy Spirit.