The Day of Pentecost Acts 2:1 – 21
The Rev. Bambi Willis John 15: 26 - 27; 16: 4b – 15
And suddenly from heaven there
came a sound like the rush of a violent wind, and it filled the entire house
where they were sitting.
Acts 2: 2
Today is the feast of Pentecost and on this day we give thanks to God for the gift of the Holy Spirit, the very Spirit of God now poured out upon all flesh. In our reading from Acts, the disciples are baptized by the Holy Spirit with “the rush of a violent wind” and tongues of fire. “Filled with the Holy Spirit,” they begin to speak in languages other than their own, so that peoples from all over the known world could hear about “God’s deeds of power.” Fifty days after Easter, God lets the Spirit loose, giving us the power to proclaim the wonder and glory of God.
“In the last days, it will be, God declares, that I will pour out my Spirit upon all flesh, and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, and your young men shall see visions, and your old men shall dream dreams.” Peter quotes from the prophet Joel this morning, seeing in the events of Pentecost the beginning of the last days, the inauguration of a new age, an age that will come to a close when “God is all in all.”
In the beginning, the spirit of God “brooded” over the primeval waters, hovering above the formless lifeless earth, like a power waiting to be unleashed, a dam about to be broken. And then God spoke, and this Spirit, this life giving power, brought forth the moon and the sun and the whale and the aardvark and the daffodil and you and me. From nothing, God brought forth everything that is, by the power of God’s Spirit, the power of God to bring forth life. And when life went awry, when human beings thought they had the power to bring forth life without God’s help, the Spirit of God was given to Noah and then Abraham and then Isaac and then Jacob and then Moses and then to a holy host of prophets who all were graced by the Spirit of God to do what God had done – bring life to the world.
And now, in an amazing and wholly unexpected act, God lets the Spirit loose, giving God’s Spirit to the disciples, sending them out into the world to bring life to the world, anointing them all without exception with the gift of God’s Spirit, the same Spirit that was given by God to Christ at his baptism. You and I, dear friends, have the power to bring life to this world, the same life giving power that set the stars in the sky.
Now I’m not sure how you all feel about that, but I for one, am a bit unnerved. And when I met with our Sunday School class last Sunday, one of our young people said she wasn’t so sure she wanted the Holy Spirit. “Violent winds” and “tongues of fire” sound a bit unsettling, like being swept away by a hurricane rather than soothed by the waters of a Calgon bath. She was right to be wary of the power of the Holy Spirit.
In the gospels, the first thing that the Spirit of God does is to send Jesus out into the desert. No sooner do we read that the Spirit, like a dove, descended upon Christ, then we hear that this very same Spirit, “drives” or “leads” Jesus into the desert (in the gospel of Mark the Spirit “drives” Jesus into the desert; in the gospels of Matthew and Luke, the Spirit “leads” Jesus into the desert.) The first act of the Spirit landed Jesus in the desert, a place where Jesus had to discern who he was, what he was sent by God to do, and which spirits were of God.
We don’t, though, for the most part identify the work of the Spirit as a push into the desert. We, more often, see the Spirit at work when we feel “lifted up,” when our worship is heartfelt and joyous, when, in the moment, we know in our bones, this is the way God meant for the world to be. We, like Paul, know that the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control, and this fruit is hard to miss. We want to get up and dance when the glory of God breaks through into our world awash as our world is in doom and gloom, lovelessness and joylessness. When the Spirit breaks in upon us, we, like our more charismatic brothers and sisters, want to lift our hands in praise and thanksgiving.
But the Spirit of God hovers among us not just some of the time but all of the time. God is faithful and does not withdraw his Spirit from us. We, on the hand, are often reluctant to get in touch with the Spirit of God. Maybe intuitively we fear the power of this Spirit which drove Jesus into the wilderness and the early church to face persecution. We would prefer that the Spirit baptize our plans and projects rather than admit that it is we who are baptized by the Spirit into God’s plans and projects.
This morning Kelsey Haas and Miranda Ball will be baptized by water and the Holy Spirit. They will be baptized in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. And they will be marked with the oil of chrism, “sealed by the Holy Spirit,” an ancient ritual signifying that God has given to them the gift of the Holy Spirit. And we will pray: “Sustain them, O Lord, in your Holy Spirit. Give them an inquiring and discerning heart, the courage to will and to persevere, a spirit to know and to love you, and the gift of joy and wonder in all your works.” This morning Kelsey and Randi will begin a life long journey of living in the Spirit. And while I pray this morning’s service is joyous and wondrous, not only for Kelsey and Randi but for all of us, we all know, most days will not be like this one.
In our reading from Paul’s letter to the Romans which we hear this morning, Paul tells us that “God, who searches the heart, knows what is the mind of the Spirit.” God knows our deepest longings, even if we do not or cannot name them. God longs for us to know the fullness of joy, to know we have a place in God’s kingdom and to be witnesses in all the world that no one is beyond the reach of God’s love. The Holy Spirit is God’s desire to be with us and for us, so that we can be with and for others.
But having your heart searched can seem a little like major surgery. The Spirit will never force itself upon us. The Spirit will never “make” us do anything. But we do not have power to get rid of the Spirit. And that Spirit will nudge us and goad us and sometimes trouble us, bidding us this way rather than that way, to do one thing rather than another, inviting us to do and to be what God would have us do and be.
And sometimes, just like those in
our reading from Acts who thought the disciples were drunk at
I like to think that the principal work of the church is discernment, the seeking out of the Holy Spirit, distinguishing between the Spirit of God and all the other spirits that keep us from following this God who loves us. Both individually and collectively, the church should be that place where we seek to follow the will of God. Individually, our worth ought not be measured by our bank accounts or the number of degrees that we hold. Collectively, our success as a parish ought not be measured by how many members we have or how big our budget is. Individually and collectively, our highest calling is to be faithful and to follow the Spirit of God wherever God, in God’s wisdom, deems to lead us.
In the last days it will be, God declares, that I will pour out my Spirit upon all flesh, and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, and your young men shall see visions, and your old men shall dream dreams. Could we possibly want for anything more?