Lectionary Reflection
Year A, Trinity Sunday
Standard (Episcopal) Lectionary – Revised
Common Lectionary
New Testament
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2 Corinthians
13: (5-10) 11-14 (Standard [Episcopal] Lectionary)
2 Corinthians 13: 11-13 (Revised Common Lectionary)
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[BeginStandard
Lectionary] [Examine yourselves to see whether
you are living in the faith. Test yourselves. Do
you not realize that Jesus Christ is in you? --
unless, indeed, you fail to meet the test! I hope
you will find out that we have not failed. But we
pray to God that you may not do anything wrong--
not that we may appear to have met the test, but
that you may do what is right, though we may seem
to have failed. For we cannot do anything against
the truth, but only for the truth. For we rejoice
when we are weak and you are strong. This is what
we pray for, that you may become perfect. So I write
these things while I am away from you, so that when
I come, I may not have to be severe in using the
authority that the Lord has given me for building
up and not for tearing down.]
[Begin RCL] Finally,
brothers and sisters, farewell. Put things in order,
listen to my appeal, agree with one another, live
in peace; and the God of love and peace will be
with you. Greet one another with a holy kiss. All
the saints greet you.
The grace of the Lord Jesus
Christ, the love of God, and the communion of the
Holy Spirit be with all of you. [End both
Lectionaries]
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| New
Revised Standard Version Bible, copyright 1989
by the Division of Christian Education of the
National Council of the Church of Christ in the
USA, and used by permission. |
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2 Corinthians
13: (5-10) 11-14 (Standard [Episcopal] Lectionary)
and 2 Corinthians 13: 11-13 (Revised Common
Lectionary)
by John G. Gibbs, PhD
During the first
few decades of Christian existence the “threefold-ness” of God,
so to speak was a matter of experience rather than of philosophical
theology. They spoke of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit because
they had experienced God in those three ways.
The experiential
basis of Trinitarian language is especially evident in the last
verse of the epistle lesson: “The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ,
the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Spirit be with
all of you.”
Both the apostle
Paul and his Christian readers had experienced grace, love,
and communion. They also thought of the risen Lord as giving
especially grace (charis), and God the Father as giving
love (agape) from the first creation onward forever, and the
Holy Spirit as having permeated the Church and made it into
a real community (koinonia). Already in 1 Cor. 12:4-7
the apostle had spoken in practical terms (gifts, services,
activities) about the Spirit, Lord, and God who is “the same”
in all those gifts, services, activities.
In short, any
near-Trinitarian language within the New Testament arises from
everyday practical Church experience.The New Oxford Annotated
Bible NRSV (NY: Oxford Univ., 1994) annotates 2 Cor 13:14:
“The order is significant; the grace of Christ expresses
and leads one toward the love of God, and the love of
God when actualized through the Spirit, produces communion
with God and with one another.” There is no tyrannical God here,
only the God of sovereign love (cf. also 1 John 4:13-21). If
we see anything “Trinitarian” in the New Testament, we see “the
persons” of the Trinity at work for the creation and for the
People of God therein.
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John
Gibbs,
a retired theologan, attended Trinity Episcopal Church, Park
Rapids, MN, when he originally wrote this reflection in 2002.
He and we welcome your comments. Please address your comments
or additional reflections to John
Gibbs or any MEESC
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