pentecost

Acts 2:1-21; Psalm 104: 25-35,37; Romans 8:22-27; John 15:26-27, 16:4b-15

Given by the Rev. Penelope Duckworth, May 31, 2009

Come Holy Spirit.

Come as the wind and cleanse us.

Come as the fire and purge us.

Come as the dove and lift our hearts.

Convict, convert, consecrate us

that we may claim and use your Pentecostal gifts.  Amen.

Have you ever had a time when you felt lifted out of time, as if time itself had slowed or almost stopped, as if it had ceased to measure its minutes, or they had ceased to matter?  The poet, Philip Larkin wrote of such a moment with his beloved:

Shine out, my sudden angel,

Break fear with breast and brow,

I take you now and always,

for always is always now.[1]

Have you ever felt an eternal moment; that "always is always now."  Sometimes loving family times feel that way, or quiet evenings at home,  maybe with a fire and the dog, a good book and a long twilight.  Sometimes looking at a beloved face; a child asleep, an aged parent, an old friend, can stop the clock.  It has been my experience that such moments have to do with a sense of belonging to the universe, of the rightness of my existence, and the reality of love.

T. S. Eliot, another poet, said, "Redeem the time,"[2] and on a beautiful spring day in this year of our Lord, as we sit in church, we may not see time as in need of redemption.

Time may seem to be no problem.  Yet if we pause and reflect on time, we realize that it is one of the great problems for philosophers in particular and human beings in general.  We realize that the battle against time and the erosions time brings fill much of our daily lives.  We note the signs of aging on ourselves, our loved ones.  We see things deteriorate-- our houses, cars, roads, savings accounts,  resolutions, relationships.   We struggle to maintain them but things fall apart.  Entropy seems the rule.  We take security measures against time and transience, death and disease.  As Malcolm Forbes said, "By the time we've made it, we've had it."[3]

And we live in history.  If we read the daily newspapers, we see what a sorry cavalcade of life history is.  There is war and rumor of war, crime and cruelty, disease and catastrophe, scandal and degeneration.  Good news is infrequent and seldom on the front page.  Our lives fit into this larger history and at times are absorbed by it.

"Redeem the time," the poet cries.  "With what are we to change, redeem, convert the time?" we ask.  To which we are answered: "The conversion of time by the Holy Ghost is ...the grand activity of the Church."[4]   And that brings us to today, to this great anniversary of the birth of the Church when the Holy Spirit came to seize its ragtag membership with power and authority.  I have no doubt but that the first Pentecost was a time out of time for those first Christians.  They were so suffused with joy, purpose, and belonging to the universe that they were mistaken by some as drunk.

They had been promised the Holy Spirit and, in our Gospel lesson from John, Jesus had spoken clearly that he would send the Spirit and that the Spirit would lead them into all truth.  Still, the experience of the first Pentecost was unexpected.  It was the Jewish Feast of Weeks, one of the three most important Jewish festivals, and it focused on thanksgiving for the harvest and the giving of the law.  It came seven weeks after Passover, and so came to be known as Pentecost (a Greek word meaning fiftieth) because it was celebrated fifty days after the Sabbath on which Passover began.

The disciples were gathered in Jerusalem when suddenly there was a sound like a mighty wind and flames like tongues of fire appeared over each of them.  Then they began to speak in many languages about the wonders of God.  Jews from the far-flung regions of the diaspora gathered around them and could suddenly hear what was being said in their individual languages and they marvelled at what was happening.

What was happening was that the Holy Spirit, the third person of the Trinity, God at work in the Church and in the world, had entered the disciples.  Now this was not the first appearance of the Holy Spirit in history.  It was the Holy Spirit that brooded over creation in the beginning of the world.  It was the Holy Spirit that spoke through the prophets.  It was the Holy Spirit by which Jesus was conceived in Mary.  And the Holy Spirit is still acting today in the Church and in the process by each of us is drawn closer and closer to God.

The Holy Spirit was there from the beginning.  In Hebrew and Aramaic, Jesus' native language, the word is ruach which means breath or wind and it is feminine in gender.  The Greek word pneuma also means wind and is neuter in gender.  Most often in the English-speaking church, we have referred to the Holy Spirit as "he", but "she" may be more appropriate and certainly would be historically correct.  In any case, it is the Holy Spirit who redeems the time.

And she does this by dispensing gifts to us, making us the agents of redemption.  In our Epistle for this morning, Paul’s letter to the Christians in Rome, Paul speaks of how the Holy Spirit helps us in our spiritual weakness, teaching us how to pray, and when we fail, interceding for us in sighs too deep for words.  Paul also acknowledges that we have been given the first fruits of the Spirit and in his first letter to the Christians at Corinth, he speaks more concretely of the gifts of the spirit and the fruit those gifts bear.   Paul discusses nine manifestations, or ways in which the Spirit is made known among us.  They are dispensed as generously as a mother is eager to give good things to her children.

These are the gifts that are given for the building up of the common good and I would like for you to listen this morning as I name them.  I would like for you to listen for the one gift that calls out for you.  I would ask you to take that gift this morning; take it down off the shelf, out of the box, so to speak, and put it on.   And as the Spirit is most generous, you are not limited to one.  You may take as many as you like.

You are warranted to do this because Paul says elsewhere to put on the new nature of Christ.  It is a choice, this putting on of the Christ nature, and the choice is yours.  The gifts are there for your taking.  Take the one or more you need, that which has called your name.  With them you can create eternal moments out of the march of time.

The first manifestation of the Spirit is wisdom, another name by which the Holy Spirit has been known.  It is an ability to synthesize information and experience to the benefit of others.  It is a mystery comprised of God, human conscience and human experience.  It often comes with age but not necessarily.

Akin to it is the second gift, that of knowledge, the accumulation and distillation of information which enriches the Church and the world.  As we see in this technological age, it can both create and solve many of the world's problems.

Third is faith, one of the three theological virtues, and that quality in his followers by which Jesus claimed most of his miracles were wrought.  You recall he often said, "Your faith has made you well."  It is also the light by which the Church is guided.

Fourth is the gift of healing, of caring for the well-being of the body and mind and spirit of another.  This vital gift, often demonstrated in his ministry by our Lord, helps us understand why we call the Holy Spirit the Comforter.

Fifth is the gift of miraculous powers, of moving beyond our natural capacity.  Such powers may be supernatural or within the natural order.  Those who survive against great odds; those who prevail against great odds; those who maintain their humanity when inhumanity is all around them.  Nelson Mandela is an example that comes to mind and you may know others.

Sixth is the capacity for prophecy; for seeing the hand and direction of God in history, not only in the future but in the present.  The Holy Spirit has spoken through the prophets and that voice is among us still, directing the Church to where it  needs to go.

Seventh is the ability to distinguish between spirits; the gift of discernment.  This is the gift of seeing into the heart of things; of people, movements, times.  It is the ability to know the source behind words and actions, so that the Church chooses well.

Eighth is the gift of speaking in tongues; the same gift that the disciples received on the first Pentecost.  It is that which communicates to another in his or her own tongue; that which conveys the message of God's good news.  It can be through language or through other means, such as the arts; music, dance, painting. 

Ninth and last is the interpretation of tongues; that which increases and enhances communication, broadening the message and the number of those who understand.  Interpretation is the means by which more can hear the good news.

AMEN

________________________________________________________________________________

[1]Philip Larkin, quoted in Into the Garden: A Wedding Anthology, edited by Robert Hass and Stephen Mitchell) (Harper Collins, New York 1993), p. 17.

[2]T. S. Eliot, The Complete Poems and Plays: 1909-1950 (Harcourt, Brace and World, Inc., New York, 1952) p.

[3]Malcolm Forbes, quoted in Expect the Worst (You Won't be Disappointed), edited by Eric Marcus, (Harper, San Francisco, 1992), p. 101.

[4]Charles Williams, The Descent of the Dove, (Eerdmans, Grand Rapids, 1939), p. 15.

Copyright © Penelope Duckworth

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