To Reveal the Face of God

On the Trinity

(Delivered over the weekend of May 25th-26th, 2024)

Readings: Dt 4:32-34, 39-40, Mt 28:16-20

“When they saw him, they worshipped, but they doubted.”

They … doubted?

Think about what these men have seen. Water turned to wine. Food multiplied. All manner of healings, probably thousands of them. They saw this rabbi walk on water and calm a storm. They saw Jesus summon Lazarus from the tomb. They heard Jesus take the sacred name of God--the name revealed to Moses--I AM--and use it for himself. They have seen this man die, and rise from the dead.

And they still don’t realize who is standing in front of them.

We tend to be hard on the apostles and rightly so, because they can be a little slow. But we have to remember that in this moment reflected in today’s reading, something is missing. The third and final piece.

That final piece reveals the true nature of God for all humanity, the thing hidden from the very foundations of the earth, but hinted at and foreshadowed in the Old Testament.

That piece?

The Holy Spirit.

And the revelation that brings it all together?

God is three, and yet one.

Today is Trinity Sunday, which is why we’re taking a break from reading Mark’s Gospel in order to read the conclusion of Matthew's Gospel. In this passage, we hear the great commission, Jesus’s final orders for us: “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit”

The Holy Spirit? The apostles certainly had heard of the Spirit. Jesus has spoken of the Spirit. But even though we celebrated pentecost last week, at this point the apostles had not yet received the Holy Spirit. And so, perhaps, they can't really know, the way we do, and that is why they doubt.

But Jesus is preparing them to know, as he prepares us to encounter the God in the trinity.

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God was preparing humanity from the very beginning for this, and humanity has been thirsting for it.

In the Book of Deuteronomy, Moses reminds the Jews that no other people have heard the voice of God and lived. And even though they heard his voice, they did not see his face, although they sought it.

The quest for the face of God is mentioned almost 100 times in the Old Testament. The Psalms, for example, tell us “about the generation of those who seek him, who seek the face of the God of Jacob." And "Let your face shine on us, that we may be saved."

But what did it mean to seek God's face?

It meant that God had not withdrawn, but could be encountered.

This face could not be depicted, as other gods of the ancient world were, because it hadn't been revealed. No graven image could ever capture the glory of God. No one could say, "this is the face of God," until Jesus showed it to us.

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The apostles have seen God veiled in the flesh of man, but they could not really see. They needed other eyes. The eyes of the heart. The eyes of faith. And those are only opened when we receive the Holy Spirit, who is the hidden agent of this revelation.

When the apostles encounter Jesus at the very end of Matthew’s gospel, they are about to pass from the time of seeing to the time of knowing. Up until now they have seen without understanding. Soon, very soon, they will know, because they will receive the third person of the trinity.

And so our quest to see the face of God is entangled with God's final revelation of himself as a trinity. The trinity, reveals the face of God in Christ.

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We are here because, like the apostles, we worship. But also, like the apostles, we can doubt. How many of us, in a crisis of faith, have said, If only God could make himself known, just a whisper, just a brush of his hand, anything but this great and deafening silence.

But he has revealed himself, a thousand times, and we didn't notice. His coming is in his scripture and his church. In his eucharistic body and blood. His coming is in the Holy Spirit, animating the lives of those who believe. In us, as members of the body of Christ. In every sacrifice we make. In every act of love.

In the words of Pope Benedict the XVI, "Seeking the face of God is an attitude that embraces all of life; in order for a man to see God’s face at last, he must himself be entirely illuminated by God."

We are brought to the father who created us, through the son who redeems us and feeds us with his eucharistic body, and by the holy spirit who dwells within us.

Seeing happens in our faith, in our love, in our worship, in our very lives. We will only truly see God when we pass beyond this world. But we are all created in the image and likeness of God, and so we see Christ every day and don't recognize him.

We may be the face of Christ for another, as another may be for us. As we seek the face of Christ, we need to also be the face of Christ, and then we will know God.