The Day of Pentecost
Acts 2:1-21
May 31, 2009

Pentecost

The scene described in this morning’s first reading seems to bear little resemblance to a typical Sunday morning at First Presbyterian Church. The call to worship was not given in Mede or Parthian, and I’d be very surprised if Pamphylian turned out to be the language of the benediction. Apart from the occasional Latin anthem and the Greek of the Kyrie, worship around here tends to be monolingual and, compared to the events described in Luke’s account of the first Christian Pentecost, predictably decent and in order.

Acts 2 reminds me of the story of a traveling band of musicians who had a "gig" at a white clapboard church at the end of a country lane. The band arrived early on Sunday evening and set up their instruments in the front near the pulpit. Around dusk the worshippers arrived and the service began.

What the musicians didn’t know was that this was a congregation that took the longer ending to Mark’s Gospel very seriously – the part that promises that believers can handle poisonous serpents and not be harmed. About halfway through the service, a man who had been sitting on a front pew produced a gunnysack and from it pulled out a rattlesnake at least five feet long. Then another worshipper appeared in the door with another snake. Neither rattlesnake seemed pleased to be there.

The lead singer in the band turned to the guitarist and asked, "Where’s the back door?" The guitarist whispered back, "There is no back door."

"In that case, reckon where do they want one?"

Be honest. When you came through the font door this morning you didn’t really expect to find people upon whom "divided tongues, as of fire" had recently descended, did you? A few flaming liberals, perhaps. A couple of overenthusiastic greeters, maybe. But not a whole roomful of spirit-filled, fire-on-the-head fanatics bursting to tell you about the mighty acts of God.

For that you would go to that megachurch in the shopping center across town or to the white clapboard meeting house at the end of the country lane – the one that now has two doors.

Well, I must warn you that appearances can be deceiving. That fact is, you have landed smack in the middle of a Spirit-filled assembly just as gifted, just as powerful, and (although they don’t like to admit it) just as dangerous as the one described in Acts, Chapter 2.

No, we don’t usually speak in foreign tongues – although several are represented among us today. And no, we don’t handle snakes. (There is no such provision in the Book of Order.) But we are into that "Spirit thing." We do "do Spirit." We do it without a lot of fanfare and without calling a lot of attention to ourselves. We do it quietly and patiently and without a lot of hullabaloo. Sometimes we do it despite ourselves and sometimes we do it without even knowing that it’s the Spirit who’s at work. Nevertheless, I’d have to say that the Holy Spirit is alive and well in this plain old Presbyterian church.

This is a wonderful story, this account of the Day of Pentecost. You can’t help but to be impressed with the fireworks and drama. A hundred and twenty ordinary people suddenly gone Pentecostal. Apparently they rush out the door and into the streets of Jerusalem where they discover that their newfound fluency is not some kind of personal prayer language but a means of communication.

A few minutes ago these folks were sitting on their hands, waiting for God to do something, and now they’re walking, talking Rosetta Stones, all with the same message: Jesus Christ is alive and God is at work in the world.

Some in the crowd are amazed to hear their home tongues spoken with such fluency. Others scoff and assume these new Christians are nothing but a bunch of frat boys and sorority girls who have just come out of an all-night keg party.

Peter sets the crowd straight. "They aren’t drunk," he tells them. "They’re proof that God is keeping God’s promise." Long ago the prophet told us that our sons and daughters would prophesy. Our young folks would dream dreams and our old folk would see visions, and the whole earth will be filled with the Spirit of God.

It’s the same promise Isaiah voiced when he said that nation will not lift up sword against nation, that swords will be beaten into ploughshares and spears into pruning hooks. These ordinary, not very impressive folks you see before you this morning are God’s curious ways of getting the job done. They’re not filled with new wine. They’re filled with good news. It’s news so good that the whole world is dying to hear it.

The problem with this wonderful, colorful, pyrotechnic story is that it can leave the impression that it’s the church’s job to recreate the Day of Pentecost. Given the splash those first Christians made, we should be making an ever bigger splash every time we gather to hear the Word and share the Good News. And for that we need more stuff – better technology, bigger screens, better PowerPoint shows, and more dynamic preachers for sure. If we could just put on a better show, we’d draw more people in. If only we could reproduce Pentecost every Sunday, we’d be O.K.

If we read the story closely, however, we’ll see that events of Pentecost are as big a surprise to the church as they were to everyone else. Pentecost isn’t about careful liturgical planning or technological sophistication. It’s about the Holy Spirit working in and through very ordinary people. It’s not about superstars or even super Christians. It’s about ordinary folk made just a little bit tipsy by the intoxicating love of God in Jesus Christ.

This story is encouraging in the sense that it shows how powerfully the Spirit does work, but I wonder if it might not also be a bit discouraging. If we have to do all that just to be church, we might be asking "Where’s the back door?" or even "Reckon where do they want one?"

Don’t rush out the back door just yet. Stay a few more minutes and see what the Holy Spirit does next. In a few minutes, the Spirit willing, the Cruz family will come forward to help us celebrate the sacrament of Baptism.

José, Sr. will come. He was baptized as a child and wants to claim the vows of baptism for himself. His wife Virginia will come as well. She wants to join José in offering their children for baptism and to pass through those same waters. And then there’s José, Jr. He’s fifteen and wants to make the plunge. And don’t forget Jacqueline. She’s seven. She’s last but not least, and she’s lista.

Last Sunday afternoon, when we were discussing the possibility of baptism for this family, José, Sr. articulated a theology of baptism that comes straight out of the Book of Acts. "In this world a family must choose," he said. "We can choose God or we can choose evil. We choose God."

Shivers went down my spine when José said that. It was as though he were quoting the baptism liturgy that goes all the way back to the second century:

Some Christians claim there’s a difference between "water baptism" and "the baptism of the Holy Spirit." The fact is, baptism, by it’s very nature, is the baptism of the Holy Spirit. Without the Spirit we’re just going through the motions.

The Spirit calls us to turn from evil and to embrace the love of God. The Sprit calls us to live out the vision of God’s prophets. The Spirit leads us into fellowship with one another, for you cannot be a Christian by yourself. The Sprit draws us together into one body – Jews and Greeks, slaves and free, male and female, Anglo and Latino, Parthian and Mede and even Cretans and Arabs.

So, my friends, stick around. See what happens next. The church in this place is alive and well -- sans fireworks, sans rattlesnakes, but not sans the Holy Spirit. So long as the Spirit is blowing, transformation is taking place.

Today and every day is Pentecost.

　

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