June 12 - Pentecost, Year A (RCL)
A few weeks ago
we had two workshops
on raising our children with faith, and experienced the program called “Godly Play”. During the story time,
the children were asked a number of questions.
And one of them
kept coming into my mind as I was thinking about today,
the feast of Pentecost.
That question was,
“I wonder if there is any part we could leave out, and still have all the story we need?”
Today is the Feast of Pentecost, the celebration of the coming of the Holy Spirit among us.
It’s one of the three major feasts of the church’s year, along with Christmas and Easter. It’s not a Sunday
when people flock to church;
there are no special services;
it hasn’t become a big family event.
So why is it so important? Could we just leave it out, and still have the story we need?
Just think of the creed,
that we say each week.
We’d still have the first part:
“We believe in one God,
the Father, the Almighty,
maker of heaven and earth,
of all that is, seen and unseen.”
We’d still have the second part:
“We believe in one Lord, Jesus Christ,
the only Son of God.”
But it’s the third part that would be missing:
“We believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the giver of life,
who proceeds from the Father and the Son.
With the Father and the Son he is worshiped and glorified.
He has spoken through the Prophets.”
If you look at the length of the creed, we’d still have more than two thirds. We’d still have God the father,
we’d still have Jesus, born in Bethlehem, crucified in Jerusalem
and risen again that first Easter morning.
So what would we be missing?
Perhaps the best place to start
is at the beginning,
in Genesis chapter one.
“In the beginning when God created the heavens and the earth, the earth was a formless void and darkness covered the face of the deep, while a wind from God swept over the face of the waters.”
That’s the very first hint we get of the Spirit,
back in the beginning of the world.
A wind from God
swept over everything.
A wind,
but in Hebrew, the language of the Old Testament,
the word wind
also means Spirit.
So in the beginning
a wind from God, the Spirit of God
swept over everything.
And that Spirit of God
was essential
in bringing all things
to life,
it was in fact
the very first
breath
of life.
And that wind, that Spirit, continued to blow throughout the Old Testament,
bringing life where there is no life,
raising dry bones,
giving prophets speech.
Until the time came
when a young woman called Mary
was engaged to a man called Joseph,
and an angel called Gabriel came
and told her
that she was to have a son.
And the Holy Spirit came upon her
and she became pregnant,
and gave birth to a son
and called him Jesus.
And it was the Holy Spirit
that was in Jesus,
in a way that gave him the heart of God.
it was the Spirit
that drove him into the wilderness to pray, and the Spirit
that shaped everything that he did and everything that he said.
Remember
that first time
he spoke in the synagogue in Nazareth?
“The Spirit of the Lord is upon me,” he said,
“because he has anointed me
to bring good news to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives
and recovery of sight to the blind,
to let the oppressed go free,
to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.
Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.”
It is the Holy Spirit
that led and sustained Jesus
in everything
that he did.
But that wasn’t the end of it.
Because when Jesus spoke to his disciples
on the night before he died,
and when he appeared to them in the upper room
newly resurrected,
both times
he made a promise,
a promise
that the Holy Spirit would come, would come as comforter
and friend, would come as power and passion,
would come among them
and lead them and sustain them
as it had led and sustained him.
And he breathed on them,
and blessed them
with the Spirit.
Bt that still wasn’t the end of it.
Because Pentecost came, the feast of weeks,
one of the great pilgrimage festivals in the jewish calendar, shavuot,
And people came from all over the Mediterranean to Jerusalem,
and the disciples were still there, gathered together,
And the Spirit came, and it came not as the gentle breath
that the disciples experienced in the upper room,
or the dove that is traditionally associated with it,
it came wildly, as wind and fire,
and everything changed.
Everything changed
because this was not some quiet one time event,
a whisper in the ears
of a chosen few.
This was public, this was loud, this swept
across everyone.
Something fundamental changed
with the coming of the Spirit at Pentecost.
Because until then, the Spirit had been known,
but it had been known
only by a chosen few,
mostly prophets.
It was something
for the elite,
the leaders,
God’s chosen few.
But now
it was for everyone,
everyone who called on God’s name.
For adults
and children, young and old, single and married, men and women.
The Spirit of God
is for everyone.
And everyone gets
the presence
and the power
of God.
And that makes
a difference.
It makes a difference
because the Spirit enables us to know
the presence of God.
The Spirit is how we experience
the presence of God,
it’s how we connect with God.
The Spirit is with us now,
here in this church,
making it possible for us
to worship God.
And the Spirit of God is with us outside of this church,
the Spirit of God
helping us pray,
giving us wisdom, and strength, and courage.
Helping us to know God.
The Spirit is the missing link,
connecting God in heaven, and Jesus at his right hand,
and us on earth.
And the Spirit works in us, it is the presence of God within us.
The Spirit is the one that brings beauty to our lives,
that shapes our characters,
that give us the gifts of love and joy
and peace and patience
and gentleness
and self-control.
When things are great,
and when were struggling,
the Spirit is the one
who connects us with God.
The presence,
and the power
of God.
Because it’s the Spirit
that makes it possible
for God to work through us.
That’s the power of God
the power of God
that gives us gifts
as we read in our second reading today, from 1 Corinthians.
The Spirit
gives gifts to each and every one of us.
No exceptions.
Gifts aren’t just something for the spiritual elite.
They are for all of us.
They include generosity, compassion, encouragement, teaching,
evangelism, administration, service, mercy, hospitality, worship prayer, preaching, leadership.
We see the Spirit at work
when someone faithfully meets someone
month after month,
even when that person has drifted away from worship,
sharing with them, caring for them, encouraging them.
Or when someone writes letters to people to encourage them.
When someone decides to set aside their fears
and volunteers to work with children,
or pulls out their rusty musical skills for the worship of the church.
Because the Spirit is at work in all of us, each and every time
we do something
that builds up the church, the people of God,
every time we do something
for God’s sake.
Today we celebrate the feast of Pentecost, the celebration of the coming of the holy Spirit among us. And I wonder, I wonder,
if there is any part we could leave out, and still have all the story we need?
© Raewynne J. Whiteley 2010