Moments of the Spirit
Text: Acts 2:1-21
Today is one of the most important and yet overlooked days in the Christian calendar: Pentecost Sunday. Today is the day that we celebrate God’s gift of the Holy Spirit, kindling fires in the disciples to go out and change the world. It bridges the gap between remembering what God has done through us through both the gift of Christmas and the miracle of Easter. It brings us into the longest Season of the Christian calendar, and is a reminder that God calls each and every one of us to make a difference in the world. However, Pentecost has no real commercial appeal. Even though we talk about the gift of the Holy Spirit, there are no traditions of gift giving that create the frenetic shopping seasons at Christmas, or the surprises at Easter that somehow lead to increased sales in chocolate. s
Because Pentecost doesn’t appear on the radar of society at large, it isn’t surprising that we have a scheduling conflict with the Mississauga Marathon today. The chance of having such an event held on Christmas or Easter Sunday is rather unlikely. The day of Pentecost remains as one of the few celebrations that has not been hijacked by commercial interests. But in many ways, this is a good thing.
Instead, we have the story from Acts: Fifty days after Easter, the disciples are gathered together on the day of Pentecost: the Jewish festival of the spring harvest. Ten days after the ascension of Jesus, all of them are gathered together in Jerusalem with friends, supporters and relatives. On the day of Pentecost, there comes the sound of a mighty rushing wind… combined with visions of fire resting on each of them. In the wind, it evokes the image of creation… the mighty wind from God sweeping across the face of the deep. In the fire, it recalls Moses and the burning bush. Clearly, something big is happening.
Luke is just getting warmed up. He evokes all kinds of images throughout scripture. Wind and fire are images are used to evoke the most powerful images of God throughout the Old Testament. In both Greek and Hebrew, the words for “wind” can also be translated as “Spirit.” So in these brief few words we have images of not only creation and Moses, but also of the Exodus, Elijah’s mountaintop experiences, Isaiah, Ezekiel… the list goes on.
All of them are filled with the Holy Spirit, and they began to speak in other languages. This wasn’t the nonsensical kind of speaking in tongues that we often hear about, but each of them began speaking in a way that people began to hear and understand in their own language. It was as if everything that happened at the Tower of Babel was reversed… another image from scripture… languages were no longer confused… and God’s gift was something that everyone could understand… It is something for all people, in all places, in all time.
Wow. The idea is certainly overwhelming… God is doing something here… it is the beginning of something new. No longer are the disciples these seemingly lunkheaded followers of Jesus who don’t really get the point. No longer are they backwater hicks from Galilee… In this story we see the disciples make that transformation into apostles… great teachers in faith who set about living out God’s mission in the world. Wow…
There is an awe and wonder that is part of Pentecost that I think we miss. Luke is drawing in all of those great, epic images from Hebrew scripture. He draws all of these great cosmic threads that speak of God together, reminding us that God is not “out there” but continues to be with us always, in a way more profound and more intimate than we can possible imagine. God entrusts us and empowers us to live out Christ’s love in our lives. God does this through the Holy Spirit. Maybe the least concrete, least tangible, least visible, and yet most profoundly present way in which God interacts with us and sustains us.
It’s this intangible part of Pentecost that we struggle with. There’s no manger to look in, no cross to kneel at… only wind and fire swirling about… and people speaking in a way that all understand. There is nothing about this that can wrapped inside of a nice, neat package.
The only way we can get a handle on it is through our own experience… but as Presbyterians, Pentecost is really not something that we can get our heads around. In fact, we can be downright suspicious of it.
Just over a month ago, approximately thirty of you filled out a survey that gives us a snapshot of the congregation’s health. We’ll be doing these once per year as a way for us to be able to focus on those areas that will allow us to become healthier as a congregation, and hopefully see us grow over the long term. Not surprisingly when the results of our first survey came back, the area as a congregation that we need to work on, at least for the immediate future, is “passionate Spirituality.” –specifically the key word being “passionate.” Typical of the Presbyterian stereotype, we’re not really an excitable lot. We’re pretty low key, and if anything, we tend to view such outbursts with a bit of skepticism. We’re not great about talking about our experiences of God. When Sarah was here two weeks ago, she spoke about “preaching at Starbucks” in terms of how we talk about our faith… but at the same time, we also have trouble actually expressing those personal experiences of God… those “moments of the Spirit.”
So if we’re going to work on this, here’s a question for us. Have we ever had an experience that something actually worked out far better than you ever expected? Have we ever had something go right, in spite of the fact that there is no reason it should have? That’s the Holy Spirit blowing through us… Have we ever had those moments where the light comes on, a moment of realization where a series of coincidences click into place and we finally “get it?” That’s the Holy Spirit… maybe what we need to do is try to be aware of these moments more often… and when they do happen, of trying to share it with one another.
But maybe we’re afraid to talk about those moments, because someone might think we’re nuts. After all, in today’s society we’re suspicious of things like this… an Anglican bishop once remarked that “when we talk to God, we call it prayer, when God talks to someone, we call them insane.” I know enough people who have struggled with mental illness to also know of the unfair social stigma that goes along with this. It doesn’t help at all when it comes to realize that as human beings we really do have these encounters with the Divine. They may not be as earth-shattering as the wind and flame as described at Pentecost, but they are no less profound or powerful.
So I will share with you one of mine: approximately Fourteen years ago, my father had a heart attack. Dad survived, but was in intensive care… and while making my way from Victoria to Calgary and then to the hospital, I heard the same theme music on the radio a number of times – the Shaker hymn “Tis the gift to be simple”, better known to many of us as “Lord of the Dance”. By the time I heard it the third time, in the form of Aaron Copland’s Appalachian Spring, a tingle went up my spine… somehow this was very reassuring… comforting…
When I finally got to the hospital, Dad was sitting up in his bed watching TV. The heart attack was not as severe as we had first thought, but he would be in the hospital for at least a week. As we were talking, a commercial came on the television that had the same Shaker hymn as the background music. When I mentioned it to Dad that I had heard that piece of music a few times earlier in the day, including on the way over to the hospital, his response to me was “Really? Our choir is supposed to be singing that one on Sunday.”
I nearly fell over…
We can easily chalk this up to a series of coincidences… There was a good reason for each of these independent sources to play this piece of music when it did… but for me, it was one of these moments of the Holy Spirit… a reassurance that somehow God was there in the midst of this personal crisis, no matter what happened. It was both overwhelming and comforting at the same time. This is the first time that I’ve felt comfortable enough to share something like this from the pulpit… because I am Presbyterian, and usually, we don’t do this sort of thing.
But it doesn’t have to be that way. A “mentor-in-print” of mine, William Willimon once remarked that “The Holy Spirit is the power that enables the church to “go public” with its good news, to attract a crowd, and… to have something to say worth hearing. A new wind is set loose upon the earth, provoking a storm of wrath and confusion for some, a fresh breath of hope and empowerment for others.” (Will Willimon, Acts) It’s no longer something that is for a handful of people, but is given to all of us in the church. The Holy Spirit reminds us that the power of God resides in all of us. All of us are capable of having these Moments of the Spirit, and many of us have really had them… but not recognized them. Perhaps we need convincing that all of us have the power to proclaim God’s good news in our lives. The difference, perhaps, is that in sharing these moments we might realize that we really do have a lot more in common, recognizing these moments much more often, and realizing that we’re not alone.
Happy Pentecost! Come, O Holy Spirit, Come!
Amen.
Today is one of the most important and yet overlooked days in the Christian calendar: Pentecost Sunday. Today is the day that we celebrate God’s gift of the Holy Spirit, kindling fires in the disciples to go out and change the world. It bridges the gap between remembering what God has done through us through both the gift of Christmas and the miracle of Easter. It brings us into the longest Season of the Christian calendar, and is a reminder that God calls each and every one of us to make a difference in the world. However, Pentecost has no real commercial appeal. Even though we talk about the gift of the Holy Spirit, there are no traditions of gift giving that create the frenetic shopping seasons at Christmas, or the surprises at Easter that somehow lead to increased sales in chocolate. s
Because Pentecost doesn’t appear on the radar of society at large, it isn’t surprising that we have a scheduling conflict with the Mississauga Marathon today. The chance of having such an event held on Christmas or Easter Sunday is rather unlikely. The day of Pentecost remains as one of the few celebrations that has not been hijacked by commercial interests. But in many ways, this is a good thing.
Instead, we have the story from Acts: Fifty days after Easter, the disciples are gathered together on the day of Pentecost: the Jewish festival of the spring harvest. Ten days after the ascension of Jesus, all of them are gathered together in Jerusalem with friends, supporters and relatives. On the day of Pentecost, there comes the sound of a mighty rushing wind… combined with visions of fire resting on each of them. In the wind, it evokes the image of creation… the mighty wind from God sweeping across the face of the deep. In the fire, it recalls Moses and the burning bush. Clearly, something big is happening.
Luke is just getting warmed up. He evokes all kinds of images throughout scripture. Wind and fire are images are used to evoke the most powerful images of God throughout the Old Testament. In both Greek and Hebrew, the words for “wind” can also be translated as “Spirit.” So in these brief few words we have images of not only creation and Moses, but also of the Exodus, Elijah’s mountaintop experiences, Isaiah, Ezekiel… the list goes on.
All of them are filled with the Holy Spirit, and they began to speak in other languages. This wasn’t the nonsensical kind of speaking in tongues that we often hear about, but each of them began speaking in a way that people began to hear and understand in their own language. It was as if everything that happened at the Tower of Babel was reversed… another image from scripture… languages were no longer confused… and God’s gift was something that everyone could understand… It is something for all people, in all places, in all time.
Wow. The idea is certainly overwhelming… God is doing something here… it is the beginning of something new. No longer are the disciples these seemingly lunkheaded followers of Jesus who don’t really get the point. No longer are they backwater hicks from Galilee… In this story we see the disciples make that transformation into apostles… great teachers in faith who set about living out God’s mission in the world. Wow…
There is an awe and wonder that is part of Pentecost that I think we miss. Luke is drawing in all of those great, epic images from Hebrew scripture. He draws all of these great cosmic threads that speak of God together, reminding us that God is not “out there” but continues to be with us always, in a way more profound and more intimate than we can possible imagine. God entrusts us and empowers us to live out Christ’s love in our lives. God does this through the Holy Spirit. Maybe the least concrete, least tangible, least visible, and yet most profoundly present way in which God interacts with us and sustains us.
It’s this intangible part of Pentecost that we struggle with. There’s no manger to look in, no cross to kneel at… only wind and fire swirling about… and people speaking in a way that all understand. There is nothing about this that can wrapped inside of a nice, neat package.
The only way we can get a handle on it is through our own experience… but as Presbyterians, Pentecost is really not something that we can get our heads around. In fact, we can be downright suspicious of it.
Just over a month ago, approximately thirty of you filled out a survey that gives us a snapshot of the congregation’s health. We’ll be doing these once per year as a way for us to be able to focus on those areas that will allow us to become healthier as a congregation, and hopefully see us grow over the long term. Not surprisingly when the results of our first survey came back, the area as a congregation that we need to work on, at least for the immediate future, is “passionate Spirituality.” –specifically the key word being “passionate.” Typical of the Presbyterian stereotype, we’re not really an excitable lot. We’re pretty low key, and if anything, we tend to view such outbursts with a bit of skepticism. We’re not great about talking about our experiences of God. When Sarah was here two weeks ago, she spoke about “preaching at Starbucks” in terms of how we talk about our faith… but at the same time, we also have trouble actually expressing those personal experiences of God… those “moments of the Spirit.”
So if we’re going to work on this, here’s a question for us. Have we ever had an experience that something actually worked out far better than you ever expected? Have we ever had something go right, in spite of the fact that there is no reason it should have? That’s the Holy Spirit blowing through us… Have we ever had those moments where the light comes on, a moment of realization where a series of coincidences click into place and we finally “get it?” That’s the Holy Spirit… maybe what we need to do is try to be aware of these moments more often… and when they do happen, of trying to share it with one another.
But maybe we’re afraid to talk about those moments, because someone might think we’re nuts. After all, in today’s society we’re suspicious of things like this… an Anglican bishop once remarked that “when we talk to God, we call it prayer, when God talks to someone, we call them insane.” I know enough people who have struggled with mental illness to also know of the unfair social stigma that goes along with this. It doesn’t help at all when it comes to realize that as human beings we really do have these encounters with the Divine. They may not be as earth-shattering as the wind and flame as described at Pentecost, but they are no less profound or powerful.
So I will share with you one of mine: approximately Fourteen years ago, my father had a heart attack. Dad survived, but was in intensive care… and while making my way from Victoria to Calgary and then to the hospital, I heard the same theme music on the radio a number of times – the Shaker hymn “Tis the gift to be simple”, better known to many of us as “Lord of the Dance”. By the time I heard it the third time, in the form of Aaron Copland’s Appalachian Spring, a tingle went up my spine… somehow this was very reassuring… comforting…
When I finally got to the hospital, Dad was sitting up in his bed watching TV. The heart attack was not as severe as we had first thought, but he would be in the hospital for at least a week. As we were talking, a commercial came on the television that had the same Shaker hymn as the background music. When I mentioned it to Dad that I had heard that piece of music a few times earlier in the day, including on the way over to the hospital, his response to me was “Really? Our choir is supposed to be singing that one on Sunday.”
I nearly fell over…
We can easily chalk this up to a series of coincidences… There was a good reason for each of these independent sources to play this piece of music when it did… but for me, it was one of these moments of the Holy Spirit… a reassurance that somehow God was there in the midst of this personal crisis, no matter what happened. It was both overwhelming and comforting at the same time. This is the first time that I’ve felt comfortable enough to share something like this from the pulpit… because I am Presbyterian, and usually, we don’t do this sort of thing.
But it doesn’t have to be that way. A “mentor-in-print” of mine, William Willimon once remarked that “The Holy Spirit is the power that enables the church to “go public” with its good news, to attract a crowd, and… to have something to say worth hearing. A new wind is set loose upon the earth, provoking a storm of wrath and confusion for some, a fresh breath of hope and empowerment for others.” (Will Willimon, Acts) It’s no longer something that is for a handful of people, but is given to all of us in the church. The Holy Spirit reminds us that the power of God resides in all of us. All of us are capable of having these Moments of the Spirit, and many of us have really had them… but not recognized them. Perhaps we need convincing that all of us have the power to proclaim God’s good news in our lives. The difference, perhaps, is that in sharing these moments we might realize that we really do have a lot more in common, recognizing these moments much more often, and realizing that we’re not alone.
Happy Pentecost! Come, O Holy Spirit, Come!
Amen.
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