Were there clouds in the sky, drifting aimlessly above the sheep? Was there wind? Do we know any other details of that day? Only one. There was fire ­ blazing brightly. Fire in the name of God. Fire that called Moses by name. Fire that made mere earth into sacred ground.

In a flash, neither the weather nor the wealth of Jethro was on Moses' mind. The tinder of his imagination was caught by the blazing bush. Moses stepped off the animal path he had been taking. He turned aside to face the fire. And even though he was standing still, Moses had just begun the journey that would gather a people, give birth to a nation and show forth the power of God.

Between one heartbeat and the next, Moses' place in the order of things had changed forever. Moses stood, full of fear, with divine firelight on his face,the heat of the earth under his naked feet and his heart hammering inside his chest. He could not look upon God. He hid his face, but his ears were open, even so.

"I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob," God spoke out of the fire. Moses stood rooted to the spot while the sun travelled across the sky. And the bush burned but was not consumed.

"To see the Kingdom, you must be born from above." Jesus said to Nicodemus by the small dim light of a lamp. The words were heard but not consumed. "Can one entered into the womb a second time?" Nicodemus asked. Shadows and light played across the ceiling of the house as the two men talked.

Nicodemus had come tending his questions, guarding the concerns of others. "We know that you are a teacher who has come from God." Nicodemus had begun as he gathered his thoughts. "No one can do these signs that you do apart from the presence of God."

How close Nicodemus had come. He was drawn by the light, but he did not turn aside to face the fire. He did not hear the voice of God in this man Jesus and he would leave on the same road by which he arrived. He came as a teacher of Isreal and would leave shepherding his flock the same way he had always done. One wonders where his path might have led.

"What is born of the flesh is flesh, and what is born of the spirit is spirit," Jesus said.

"Spirit is like the wind. It goes where it chooses, and you hear the sound of it, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the spirit."

"How can these things be?" Nicodemus said.It was still dark in Jerusalem. But he would leave confident that starlight and the moon were enough by which to walk.

God alighting in a bush. God incarnate in the man.
Is either one more suprising than the other?

Who would pretend to know God in God's fullness.
Our minds are too small.

But we use what we have.
We testify to what we have seen and speak of what we know.
Over the centuries we have studied scripture, looked at the world and our own experience and tried to describe concisely how God is present and active.

Today is Trinity Sunday. The doctrine of the Trinity is our best attempt to describe God from a vantage point that knows of the bush on the mountain, the carpenter from Galilee, and the light of our own spiritual experience.

Any even cursory reading of the Old Testament reveals God at work. Prophets and Patriarchs, warriors and wives hear and see God's intentions writ large."Go into this land which I shall give you." "I put before this day life and death, choose life." "I will be your God and you will be my people." Waters part and bushes burn. Mountains shake. Kingdoms rise and fall. This God is real, but there is more.

Jesus is born. He lives and dies as one of us, but rises again to bring eternal life. The disciple John articulates what he has seen and heard in his years with Jesus. At some point, many years later, a Gospel is written. "In the beginning was the Word," it says. And the gospel goes on to tell the story of who the author thinks Jesus is ­ the Son of God, the redemeer of the world. The whole story is not told. There is not room. There is not time. The author of John's Gospel supposes that if all the stories were told they would fill all the books of the world. But John's gospel makes clear that Jesus is not simply a teacher, or even a Messiah. He is God and man.This Jesus is real, but there is more.

The Gospels, the Epistles and the stories of our lives expose God at work long after Mt. Horeb and far beyond Jesus' earthly ministry. The fire on the mountain reignited in a new way when the flames danced above the disciples' heads on the day of Pentecost. It was the arrival of the spirit which Jesus had promised them, and not for them only.

Blaise Pascal, seventeenth century French scientific genius and philosopher wrote from his own experience of this spirit. Upon his death, this Memorial was found sewn into the lining of his jacket.

FIRE. God of Abraham, God of Isaac, God of Jacob,
not of the philospohers and scholars.
Certitude. Certitude. Feeling. Joy. Peace.
God of Jesus Christ.
My God and your God...

There are a hundred stories that have been uttered in this very place by the people sitting all around you. The fire still burns. The spirit is abroad in the land, moving over the face of creation, yes, but alive in the hearts of men and women and children too.This spirit is real, but there is more.

God is all three. The Creator. The Redeemer. The Sanctifier.
God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit are distinguishable but not divisible.
These are not modes of beings. These are not three beings
This is one God. One fire. One light. How can these things be?

In the early life of the church, Dionysius wrote:

"Let me here resort to examples from what we perceive and from what is familiar. In a house the light from all the lamps is completely interpenetrating, yet each is clearly distinct. There is distinction in unity and there is unity in distinction. When there are

many lamps in a house there is nevertheless a single undifferentiated light and from all of them comes the one undivided brightness"

The Trinity is a doctrine that will challenge the best of minds.

But let me suggest that while most of us may not be able to write the formula for the nuclear physics that take place in the heart of the sun, we still see its light and feel its warmth. We know that no growth comes with out the Sun

and that life itself depends upon its light.

You know the power of God.
believe in the Son, and let the spirit into your lives.
That will be more than enough illumination to start you on your way.