Pentecost 2009

     Jacob, the tailor for a small town in Europe, felt he was mistreated in his Synogogue so he left it as well as some of his friends that went there. Some three weeks later the Rabbi knocked on the door of  Jacob’s home. Amenities were exchanged but once in the house nothing more was said by either for a long while. Then the Rabbi suggested they sit in front of the fireplace and enjoy the fire. An hour passed and nothing was said by either. Then the Rabbi got up and took the fire tongs and separated out a piece of coal still burning brightly. He took the piece of coal from the fire and placed it, apart from the fire, on the hearth. Both Jacob and the Rabbi watched the piece of coal. It started to burn less brightly. It got darker and darker, losing its heat. Finally it was just a cold black rock covered with dust and ash. Jacob stared at it for a moment, turned to the Rabbi and said, “I understand. I will return to the Synogogue.” Sometimes the most powerful lessons are the unspoken ones!

     We have just celebrated Pentecost. That Easter evening when God, the Holy Spirit annointed his disciples: Church. We, in our Church, read Acts 2:1-11. There are many in our time that claim to be their own church. “I’m a good person. I do good things. I talk to God. I don’t need a Minister, Rabbi or Priest to tell me what to do or how to be a disciple.” That may be true. However, did you notice, in the Lucan Acts, that the author wrote, “they were all in one place together.” (Acts 2:1) Earlier Luke had explained that the Apostles, some women and ”Mary the mother of Jesus’ were together with some of his brothers”, that is disciples. (Acts 1:13-14)  Later (Acts 1:15) the author writes there were “about one hundred twenty persons in the one place”. It was presumably there that the successor to Judas Iscariot was selected (the Holy Spirit was already in “that place”, guiding the selection). It was in that  place and in that assembly that, when the time had come, “there came from the sky a noise like a strong driving wind filled the entire house in which they were”. (Acts 2:2) “It filled the entire house”, not individuals. It seems that there was more of that spirit than there was people. It was more than some blessing of individuals. There was more than was needed to go around! Why would an intelligent, knowledgeable and skilled author so write if not to explain that is was not just individuals being blessed, but also the assembly, the group, the community as family. The house was filled by the spirit, not just the room or the people but the whole house. It was not a building that was being blessed but the gathering within that house. That’s why later we will see the individuals being fill with that Spirit. It was Church. The whole gathering, the Church, was greater than the sum of its individuals, its parts. Thus, this event is called by some the “birthday of church”. The grace, or empowerment, was something more than the individuals had already recieved. And, that included the Apostles and the Mother of Jesus! There is a power , a grace, a blessing present greater than any individual or any group of individuals. It is the Holy Spirit, whom Jesus promised. It is the Holy Spirit who empowers the disciples of Jesus to carry out the mission He gave His disciples, then and now, and forever long as necessary. These disciples are just ordinary men and women who have committed to follow Jesus as He ask us to do.

     Then, to demonstrate the need for worldwide unity “tongues as of fire” came to rest upon each person there. (See also: John 3:8)  All understood, even though there was at least fifteen different countries represented, each limited to his or her own tongue. It was not because of the intelligence, insight, integrity or intuitiveness of these people gathered here that this occurred. It was by the power of being in this house, Church, where the Holy Spirit came to them. Indeed, the early Christians met regularly in homes, or house-churches. Lucan Acts is, I think, making it clear that grace, or divine empowerment, if you prefer, flows not just from Jesus to us as individuals, but also, and equally as significantly, from Jesus through Church to us, His disciples. Luke underlines this in Acts 2:4, “and they were all filled with the holy Spirit”, even though we know that many of those present had already been blessed by God, e.g. Mary and the Apostles. God is not just asserting a redundency here, but rather through Luke demonstrating a new and important reality, Church.

     We know that scripture was not written as history, chronicle or diary, but rather as the Evangelist John says, “that you might believe” (John 20:31) Why did Luke include this rather bazaar scene if not to emphasize the significance of Church and Jesus’s call to build Church. We’re not speaking of  majestic beautiful buildings, quaint colorful vestments or a powerful hierarchy. We’re speaking of Church: a gathering of people in one place, worshiping God, seeking to learn the truth of Jesus’s teachings and going out from that place to do something abput it. If Jesus had intended that the journey to salvation was simply through individual effort, then the whole book of Acts is an incomprehensible waste, because that book has as its keystone, Pentecost. The author builds to this event and then shows what happened after Pentecost, as the Church of Christ spread throughout the world. This Church grows from Jerusalem to Rome, from that house where they were to the whole world. We know from scripture and tradition, and we’ve heard over and over, that following thir participation in Pentecost, the Holy Spirit, through Church, emboldened the timid, encouraged the weak, empowered the marginalized and inspired the dull.

    

     But there was more to this Pentecost. Jesus, through Luke, is teaching us that it is not just a call to Church, but also, a call to unity, a call to harmony among nations, among races, among persuasions. Harmony, after all, is where different voices, or sounds, come together to make a new and deeper sound that none could manage on their own. So Jesus’s message here, where all those people who had gathered together in Church, although they were limited in understanding to their own language, was understood by all fifteen from what the Galileans said. Thus, this Church is to be worldwide, world responsive and world responsible. This Church is not mine or theirs, but ours. It’s up to us to bring all peoples  into a harmonious relationship. But the Pew Research Foundation reports that the number of people leaving the Roman Catholic Church outnumbers those joining by four to one. The Philadelphia Archdiocese’s Office of Research and Planning claims that only 24% of those registered in Philadelphia parishes actually attend Church services. And the same Office reports that the Archdiocese has lost 100,000 people over the last twelve years. Does that mean that this Church, whether you term it Catholic or not (I suspect that all of the “major religions suffer similar lost of interest), the Church born over two thousand years ago in Jerusalem, the Church that spread throughout the world, the Church that Christ founded, is no longer relevent? No, it means that we as a Church of Christians have lost sight of the significance of Pentecost. We have lost sight of the empowerment beyond the individual that comes from God to the person, through Church. We’ve lost sight of Christ’s call from scripture to bring all people into harmony with God and each other. We’ve lost sight of our need for Church not for temporal success and comfort, but for eternal membership and peace in the family of God.

     Now is the time, and wherever we are is the place to gather in harmony with all people and to turn our lives, our souls and our destiny over to the Holy Spirit. This is not easy or quick, but to harmonize all people will require that we adapt without jetissonong any of the teachings of Jesus the Christ. We will have to forgive without holding any sureriority over anyone. We will have to love (a willingness to give of self that another may be fulfilled) without limit, condition or reservation. It won’t be easy, but Jesus did it, and He called us to follow his example. (Luke 9:23; Mark 8:34) He reminded us that any burden of discipleship is a light yoke; that anydarkness will be dispelled by the light of Christ, and;  that any barrier will be overcome, in God’s good time, in the name of Jesus and by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit.

     Robert Schultz, founder of the ecumenical monastic community of Taize, in France, wisely counsels, “Never resign yourself to the scandal of the separation of Christians – all so readily professing love for their neighbor, yet remaining divided. Make the unity of  Christ’s body your passionate concern.” When Jesus comes again, if He has to search in all the churches and communities of the world to find His people, His disciples, then we will have failed in the mission He gave us – the mission to bring all peoples into one family where God is Father, Jesus is Brother and the Holy Spirit is inspiration; to bring the world into harmony, preserving the God given differences among us, but willing to be one family in spiritual harmony, a family, or a Church, if you will, that is greater, in Gods eyes, than all its parts. then we also will be “filled with the Holy Spirit”.

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