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SERMONS

Pentecost
May 30, 2004

In today's readings we are given two different accounts of the gift of the Holy Spirit to the first followers of Jesus. One account is found in John's recounting of the gospel. The other comes at the beginning of Luke's history of the early Church in the Acts of the Apostles. The exact time and circumstances of the two accounts are different, but they relate the same event.

John's account occurs in the evening of the day of Jesus' resurrection. The disciples have heard that the tomb has been found empty. They have even heard that Jesus has been seen alive. But they remain frightened and in hiding. They are gathered together behind locked doors when suddenly Jesus is standing among them. "Peace be with you," he says. Then he goes on to say, "As the Father has sent me, so I send you. Receive the Holy Spirit." And he breathes on them.

In Luke's account the disciples are also gathered together. But in this account they are together on the day of Pentecost, the feast fifty days after Passover. Suddenly there is a sound like a rush of wind and tongues as of fire resting on each of them. They begin to speak, and people of many different nationalities and languages hear them and each can understand what is said. Luke goes on to say that as a consequence of that speaking, three thousand people welcome the message and are baptized on that day. This is the event that we recognize as the birth of the Church.

What I want to call your attention to is the difference in the two depictions of the disciples. John describes them before the Spirit comes upon them, and Luke describes them after the Spirit comes. Look at the change. In John's account they are fearful, in hiding, afraid for their lives. They speak in whispers. Some of them have seen the empty tomb, some have even seen Jesus. But it makes no difference. All they want to do is to protect what little they have. They are running scared.

Luke describes the consequences of the coming of the Spirit. They are changed. Now they can't stop talking. And crowds begin to gather to hear what they have to say; large crowds. And the message that the crowds hear -the proclamation of Jesus as Lord -this message has the power to change lives. Not only the lives of those crowds on that first day of Pentecost, but lives today, two thousand years later.

Through the waters of baptism we have each been brought into the community of the Holy Spirit, the Church. We have been marked as servants of Christ. Through the power of the Spirit we were changed. And through that same power we continue to be changed.

We cannot predict now what these changes will look like. God is a God of surprise. When we give our lives over to him we may find ourselves following strange paths into surprising futures. We are likely to discover unexpected gifts to meet unanticipated demands.

Saul of Tarsus had a promising religious career ahead of him. He was young, he was energetic, he was enthusiastic. He had it made. But then he met the Lord. As a consequence of that meeting he spent the remainder of his life being beaten, being cursed, being run out of towns. And ultimately he died a prisoner in Rome.

But in the face of all of that he was able to write: "whatever gains I had, these I have come to regard as loss because of Christ. More than that, I regard everything as loss because of the unsurpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things, and I regard them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ, and be found in him.... Forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the heavenly call of God in Christ Jesus."

God is a God of surprise. When we give our lives over to him we will be surprised. We will be changed. And the world around us will be changed. There will be a difference. The difference, ultimately, between death and life.

David Christian
The Chapel of the Cross
Madison, Mississippi

Acts 2.1-11
1 Corinthians 12.4-13
John 20.19-23