+Imagine if someone’s first time in a church was either last week or this? Bodies visibly rising to heaven, tongues of fire, violent wind and some ramble by Jesus about he being in the Father and the Father being in Him!.
Welcome to Christianity—it’s accessible! It’s understandable! Not so much…!
So, I think I need to begin today by laying out the facts of Pentecost and then talking about the reality of it.
First of all, let’s get the Holy Spirit pronoun issue out of the way. In orthodox traditions, of which we are one, The Holy Spirit is referred to in the feminine. This tradition goes back to the time of Jesus but has just recently been resurrected by scholars. It seems some men took offense at women having any type of connection to the Godhead so they replaced the female imagery of the spirit with male.
But, to me, it makes sense that the Spirit be seen as feminine, after all, Jesus is male and God is either no specific gender or is all possible gender identities…who knows…so by referring to the Spirit in the feminine we cover all traditional gender expressions.
Now, onto the name—Pentecost---nothing fancy here, Pentecost simply means the 50th day. Jews have a holiday that predates the Christian Pentecost—it’s called the Feast of Weeks and it commemorates Moses receiving the Torah on Mt Sinai. According to Jewish tradition this commemoration, called Shavu’ot is held 50 days after the first day of Passover. On that first Christian Pentecost, Jerusalem was teeming with people, for Shavu’ot is one of three observances that required the Jews of ancient times to go to Jerusalem and worship in the temple.
So the city was packed and because a crowded city put everyone on edge and an edgy city didn’t bode well for the followers of Jesus, the disciples were hiding, caught between the traditions of their Jewish faith and the bewildering happenings of the previous few weeks—crucifixion, resurrection, ascension and now, today, crazy wind and flames falling from the sky.
As you know, Jesus NEVER does anything by happenstance, so sending the Holy Spirit on this day, at this time, was by design. It was another example of Jesus saying, “this is the new way….the Torah got us this far, but now we have farther to go, we have a different way to try.” And, just as he had promised, Jesus sends us an instrument through which His work of redemption for this world can and will continue.
But, much like the dramatic ascent into heaven of last week, the Holy Spirit, on this last day of the Easter season, on this 50th day, arrives in style, on tongues of fire and in gusts of violent wind.
OK so now we know what to call her and where the name of Pentecost came from and why the disciples were all in one place…but just what or who is the Holy Spirit?
Well she isn’t anything. Or she’s everything.
We can’t see her, but she’s everywhere, we can’t hear her, but she speaks volumes, we can’t touch her, yet we do feel her.
The reality of the Holy Spirit is this: she can’t be explained, she needs to be experienced. She can’t be defined, she needs to be felt, she can’t be corralled, she must be allowed to run free.
Oh and she’s everywhere, all the time…we just need to perceive her.
The scripture writers have tried to give us a story of the Holy Spirit being bestowed upon us, but the truth of the matter is, the Hoy Spirit’s always been here, moving among us, between us, through us.
Always.
But, as is often the case with human beings, we didn’t notice. Not because we’re bad or evil or ignorant, but because, in spite of the fire and wind, for the most part the Holy Spirit is really subtle.
The Holy Spirit is that still small voice whispering deep within us. The voice we can’t hear unless we quiet ourselves enough, still ourselves enough to notice.
The Holy Spirit is that sense of inspiration, acknowledgement or realization that comes when you’ve finally left an issue that’s been bugging you for weeks, behind, when you’ve turned to another task and in the middle of something completely different you have that “eureka” moment.
The Holy Spirit is when everything falls apart and we’re angry, lost, sad, hopeless, confused and then, days later, months later, years later, we realize that if we hadn’t experienced that loss—the loss that felt overwhelmingly painful at the moment---we never would have experienced the joy of something altogether unexpected and new.
The Holy Spirit is when a group of people decide to tackle a problem---hunger, as witnessed by your food pantry; failing schools as witnessed by the diocesan Jim Eaton Summer Reading Program; the challenges of Juvenile diabetes as witnessed by your Sunday School donating some of the proceeds of your Bake sale to JDRF and FOTOS.
The Holy Spirit moves among us and gives us the courage to do what we never thought we could. The Holy Spirit moves among us and gives us the audacity to do the things other people are shocked that we will actually do.
The gift of the Holy Spirit may not have a cute birth story or a miraculous resurrection tale attached to it like Christmas and Easter. The Holy Spirit may not be describable or definable, but the Holy Spirit can be experienced and, my friends, we must do everything in our power to experience her.
The Holy Spirit is God’s gift to us, she’s the whisper in our ear, the shout in our heart, the hope in our soul. She’¬¬s the nudge that leads us places we never thought we could go, she’s the detour that feels frightening but ends up being enlightening.
The Holy Spirit is the love we feel for one another.
The Holy Spirit is the hope we share with the world.
The Holy Spirit is the frustration we feel with the status quo, the anger we feel with injustice, the disgust we feel with evil.
The Holy Spirit is our conscience, our longing, our passion.
The Holy Spirit is here. Welcome the Spirit, and like so many who have walked before us, let the Spirit take us where we absolutely positively must go.
Amen.
No comments:
Post a Comment