Holy Trinity

The Most Holy Trinity 2017 – Cycle A Exodus 34:4b-6, 8-9; Daniel 3; 2 Corinthians 13:11-13; John 3:16-18

Are there times or situations where you just want someone to be there with you? Like…

Going to the dentist. Walking into a wake of a parent or spouse. Sharing the experience of a concert,…a sunset. Having to put down a pet. Taking a day trip. Sitting in a hospital waiting room while a loved one is in surgery. Visiting a friend or family member in jail. Taking an evening walk. Quietly sitting in the room with you when you are not feeling well or are sad.

In most of these circumstances it’s not that you want the person to fix the situation or make it better, as if they could, but to simply be present.  In fact, it’s probably best if they don’t say anything.  Being present to another person is a very graced and intimate gift we can give to each other.

The conversation between Moses and God today takes place just between the two of them.  No one else is in attendance in what is intriguingly called, the Tent of Presence.  And God speaks to Moses in a manner that God speaks to no one else, face to face, as one person speaks to another [See Exodus 33:12ff].  There is here expressed a close tenderness.  Moses reminds God that God has called Moses an intimate friend.  We might be reminded of Jesus on the night before he died speaking with his disciples, “I no longer call you slaves… I have called you friends, because I have told you everything I have heard from my Father.”  [John 15:15]

So is it any wonder that Moses invites this God; this God with whom he has fought, coaxed when angry against the people for their rebellious and stiff-necked behaviour; this God whom he has trusted and feared, pleaded and wrestled with …is it any wonder that Moses urges, “If I find favour with you, O God, do come along in our company.”  The gentleness is palpable.  Are we not reminded of Easter Sunday afternoon when Jesus saddles up to the two deeply saddened disciples going home to Emmaus and walks and listens to them in their grief and confusion?  Jesus just walks in their company.  He fixes nothing.

As we contemplate the great mystery of God revealed to us Christians as Trinity: Father, Son and Spirit, to be present to another person is within the being of God.  The Father present to the Son, the Son present to the Father, the Spirit binding the two in tenderness.  All three accompanying and being present to each other in all eternity.

In this mystery, are we not invited to see our walking with each other as a share in divine life?

Do we ever consider and conceive of God as our friend?

Do we invite God to walk with us, sit with us, and accompany us in life’s situations?

Moses urged, “If I find favour with you, O God, do come along in our company.”