Sunday, March 28, 2023
/Pentecost
Acts 2:1-21; Psalm 104:25-35, 37; 1 Corinthians 12:3b-13; John 20:19-23
The Rev. Jeff Bohanski
Pray with me, A Collect for Guidance
Heavenly Father, in you we live and move and have our being: We humbly pray you so to guide and govern us by your Holy Spirit, that in all the cares and occupations of our life we may not forget you but may remember that we are ever walking in your sight; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen. Book of Common Prayer, page 100
Every family has its quirky inside the family vocabulary. In my husband’s side of the family, it’s the use of the word “Coke.” At any one of our family parties, someone will ask you “What kind of Coke do you want?” When asked that question, one needs to know you are being asked what kind of soda you would like. An appropriate response to the question would be, I would like, a Sprite, or a Dr. Pepper, or a Diet Coke, or even a Pepsi or an iced tea. Over the years, our family has changed the definition of Coke to mean soda.
We Christians have done something similar to the word “Pentecost.” We presume, perhaps in our arrogance, that we created that word. For most of my life I assumed that Pentecost was just the celebration of the day The Holy Spirit descended of the people gathered in a public space. It was more or less the Church’s birthday. For the community of the author of Acts Pentecost meant something different.
To a reader of Acts, Pentecost was a festival tied quiet closely to Passover. Passover was the celebration of the remembrance of the events of Moses leading the people out of Egypt. It was, or is, the powerful story of God’s redeeming God’s people from Egypt.
The festival of Pentecost occurred fifty days later. It was an agricultural festival where the first sheaves of wheat were brought to give thanks for the harvest that was beginning to be brought in. Prayers were also offered for bringing in the rest of the crop safely. Pentecost was also a celebration of the remembrance of the time when Moses and the people arrived at Mount Sinai, fifty days after Passover, the leaving of Egypt. It was the remembrance of when Moses went up the mountain and came down with the commandments for how God’s redeemed were to live according to God’s way, God’s purpose.
This is what was in the minds of those gathered in one place that one day of Pentecost when God decided to act again in a new way. Luke writes, “There came from heaven a sound like a rush of violent wind. Tongues as of fire appeared among them, and a tongue resisted on each of them. All were filled with the Holy Spirit.” Biblical commentator, N.T. Write suggests that Luke uses the words, all were filled with the Holy Spirit, to indicate all followers of Jesus were united. Now these united people from all over are being empowered by the Holy Spirt to carry out Jesus’ commandment to spread the Good News. The Spirit enabled Jesus’ followers then, and still does today, to share the Good News of Jesus that God loves you. God wants to give you the ability through the Holy Spirit to love others as God has loved you and to share that Good News with everyone.
For some of us this sharing The Good News, this evangelism, may be by standing in a pulpit or on a street corner announcing to people God’s abundant love through Jesus. For most of us, I suspect, it’s by showing kindness. Kindness to people we meet at the store, perhaps by helping someone reach for something on a higher shelf. Or perhaps it’s being patient. Patient with the person driving the car in front of you who is trying to merge in and get ahead of you. One could show kindness and graciousness by not honking one’s horn at them. Maybe it’s by loving your neighbor by not returning a snide comment with another snide comment. By letting their comment to simply pass unanswered. Maybe it’s by sharing God’s love by volunteering at Lord of the Streets.
For my own enrichment, each week I listen to the podcast, Working Preacher’s Sermon Brainwave. Each episode is a discussion lead by a Methodist Minister, a Presbyterian minister, and a Lutheran minister about the weekly readings for the coming Sunday. These readings come from the lectionary shared by Episcopalians, Roman Catholics, Lutherans, Methodists, and Presbyterians. The episode I heard this week was about today’s readings. In it, one of the ministers said, “Unity is not uniformity.” I took this to mean that all Christians can be united in Christ’s love that is empowered by the Holy Spirit, but it can look differently in different cultures or communities or in different parts of a community. Living in, being governed by the Holy Spirit means there is no reason for fighting between denominations about particulars of theology because we all share in the love of Christ. Listening and dialogue is important, but fighting is not. I’ve read articles about how Christianity is losing followers across the country. Perhaps if we remember how the Christians in Acts who were from all over were united in Christ’s love and lived empowered by the Holy Spirit, we can reverse this trend.
This notion that we Christians are to be united in Christ’s love and empowered by the Holy Spirit gives me hope that perhaps there is room for both high church people and low church people in the Church of Jesus. Perhaps a church can be home to both organ loving people, praise band loving people, and no music at all loving people. I have hope that even a democrat and a republican, a Yankee and a Southerner can find common ground in a church based on the love of Christ that is empowered by the Holy Spirit. I know anything is possible when we ask for help of the Holy Spirit. Come Holy Spirit, empower us to do your will, to love and serve one another. Amen