Day of Pentecost C
Acts 2:1-21
May 30, 2004

On Pentecost, we celebrate the triumph of the Spirit. Despite all of our differences—even the differences of nationality and language, of class, race, gender, and sexual orientation—despite all of these differences, the Spirit has prevailed. Even over the hindrance of speech, the Spirit has prevailed. That is what happened on the Day of Pentecost.

There in Jerusalem were gathered many people of different nationalities and different languages, and at the descent of the Holy Spirit, those differences were overcome. The Holy Spirit prevailed at Pentecost.

Pentecost was a Jewish festival that took place not long after the Resurrection and Ascension of Jesus. Jesus had been raised. The disciples had seen him resurrected and returned to them. Yet now he had ascended, and what about them? He told them to wait in Jerusalem until he would send his Spirit to be with them. They waited. And they wondered; Was Easter something that happened to Jesus, but not to them? Many of them felt doubt and fear.

And then, on Pentecost, there was a rush of mighty wind and tongues of fire, and the Church was born! The once disheartened disciples moved out, poked, prodded, and enabled by the Holy Spirit to become bold proclaimers of the Gospel, the Church alive and at work in the world.

Who were the members of this first church?  Well, they weren’t yet Christians. All of them were Jews. That’s who would have gathered for Pentecost, because Pentecost was a Jewish festival. The promises of God in the Old Testament are clearly promises for the Jewish people. But not long after the story of Pentecost on the Book of Acts, there are other stories. Peter has a vision, a vision that we heard in the lessons just a couple of weeks ago. In that vision, a great sheet was lowered with all different kinds of animals in it—clean, and unclean. A voice said to Peter; “Don’t call anything that I made unclean.”

Peter came to see that the vision wasn’t about unclean food, but about unclean people. People who weren’t Jewish. Peter met a Gentile named Cornelius and baptized him. The Church could have become a sect within Judaism, a sanctuary for disgruntled Israelites only. But instead, the promise of God was sent even to the outsiders, to the Gentiles. The Holy Spirit prevailed.

Fifteen hundred years later, the Church that began at Pentecost languished in Medieval Europe. There was widespread corruption and abuse of power by the Church. The Church had become wealthy and complacent. Would the movement that began at Pentecost go the way of so many other organizations that mature and die?

In Germany, and Augustinian monk named Martin Luther attacked, and called the Church back to its Biblical roots. You know the rest of the story of the Reformation of the Church: the Holy Spirit prevailed.

In the Eighteenth century, England was going through the trauma of urbanization and the first industrial revolution. Disease and poverty degraded the lives of millions. The national church, established by the monarchy, seemed far removed from these tragedies—remote, privileged, and cold. A priest in the Church of England named John Wesley felt his heart “strangely warmed”. He began a dramatic revival that swept through England and transformed the hearts and minds of millions. The Wesleyan revival, like the Reformation before it, showed the resilience of the church. It also showed something else. What had strangely moved Wesley’s heart? The Holy Spirit had prevailed.

Early 20th Century America wasn’t that different from 18th Century England. Our young country’s growing cities were characterized by wretched tenements where recently arrived immigrants huddled together. There was great poverty and despair. A dedicated young man named Frank Mason North was led to minister in one of the worst areas, the neighborhood in New York known as Hell’s Kitchen. There he worked among the poor, devising new structures for uplifting the poor and giving them hope. It was in that setting that he wrote a hymn you may know, LBW #429—“Where Cross the Crowded Ways of Life.” Again, despite all, the Holy Spirit prevailed.

Like a prevailing wind, the Spirit continues to blow through the world, and through our lives. Here’s how the poet Walter Kasper describes the prevalence of the Holy Spirit:

 

Everywhere that life breaks forth and comes into being,

Everywhere that new life seethes and bubbles,

And even, in the form of hope,

Everywhere that life is violently devastated, throttled,

gagged, and slain—

Wherever true life exists, there the Spirit of God is at work.

 

Over our human boundaries, leaping over our walls, intruding, calling forth, the Holy Spirit has prevailed.

Here in our own church, in our own congregation, time and time again, when we have been cold of heart, slow to move, timid and cowering, the Holy Spirit has prevailed.

In your own life, in those moments when all seems lost, when there is no way out, no way forward—and yet, you have been surprised when a door was opened—the Holy Spirit has prevailed.

Therefore, we do not lose hope. Therefore, we are kept on tiptoe, expectant, eager—sometimes, even nervous. Because we just don’t know what the Spirit has in store for us next.

The Holy Spirit that gave birth to the Church continues to poke, prod, cajole, and call the Church forward. Just when we get all settled down, comfortable with present arrangements, our pews bolted securely to the floor, all fixed and immobile—it comes. It comes with a rush of wind, or a still small voice, a breath of fresh air, tongues of fire.

The Spirit has prevailed and will prevail! Amen! Come, Holy Spirit!

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