„All glory to the Father, to the Son and to the Holy Spirit“
We are baptised into the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. As if we are plunging into the water, we throw ourselves into the life of the Father, Son and the Holy Spirit; from the way of worldly life into Godly life. We also remember this commitment each time we take the Holy Water and make the sign of the Cross. Because the way to God is through the denial of self by giving up our selfishness in order to share the risen life of Christ. “Do you not know that all of us who have been baptised into Christ Jesus were baptised into his death? Therefore we have been buried with him by baptism into death, so that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in the newness of life” (Rom. 6,3-4).
The Holy Trinity – A. de Pereda (WGoA)
The Holy Trinity can be understood through the signs of the things in this world: The Sun gives heat and light; we cannot separate the heat and the light from the Sun, so too we cannot separate the Father either from the Son or from the Holy Spirit. The Fathers of the Church explain the Trinity with the example of a tree which has got a root, a trunk and branches with leaves and fruits. All three together comprise the tree. All three have the same life sap, but the root is not the trunk, nor the branches. So also Father, Son and the Holy Spirit are the three persons, but One God. Through our Baptism and living the Word of God and the teaching of the Church, we are entering into the life of the Son, who is one with the Father and the Holy Spirit.
Also we are created in the image of the Triune God because we are spirit, mind and body. The spirit is the deepest reality which should rule my mind and my body; and thus as the life of the Father is in the Son and the Holy Spirit, the life of the Triune God enters into all the spheres of my life and this makes it easy for us to share the Divine nature.
Christian life is a total dependence on this One God because it is He who created us and gave us life. And it is He who provides us with everything for our life’s journey and leads us to union with Him, which is our goal in this life and hereafter. There is always a choice for us to make: to live in this godless worldliness and independence, which separates us from the Divine life; or to live in total dependence on this Triune God which makes us share the Divine life.
Living in total dependence on the Triune God expresses our faith that we are created by Him – which would mean that we live, move and have our nature in Him. “For in Him we live and move and have our being” (Acts. 17.28a). Once we experience this, it is our joy to share this with others by teaching them to follow what Jesus has taught us. Jesus commissioned His believing disciples: All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptising 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” (Mt 28,19-20). Through our true repentance and conversion, we are called to a life of communion with the Triune God, which is the wholeness of life – an experience of heaven on earth. ‘The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God the Father, and the communion of the Holy Spirit be with us all’ (2 Cor. 13.13).
Fr. JMK