Acts 2:1-21
“Word Power”
June 5, 2022 Pentecost Sunday
Think of it as the United Nations experience on that Pentecost day in that big house where people from all over the place and all different backgrounds hear from these guys from Galilee who couldn’t possibly know their respective languages.
The work of the Holy Spirit was entering into their ears and very beings, arriving in the language of their homelands.
If any of you have ever traveled abroad or even to parts of this country where another language is the norm and you spend days or weeks trying to make sense through gestures or pointing or facial expressions what you don’t understand in words, you know what a relief it is to hear even a few words of English.
Suddenly a person you don’t even know feels like a long-lost family member.
You want them to keep on going as you treasure every single word they say.
We yearn to understand and be understood, and language is how that process often begins and we don’t know how much we appreciate it, until it is missing.
These past couple of weeks my thoughts keep returning with tremendous joy and a heaping dose of anxiety to the wedding of my niece and her fiancé this September. They recently asked me to officiate which is such an honor.
The thing is, I will be officiating in the Provence region of France, and I don’t speak French.
Assurances abound that I need only speak English in what will be a fairly large bilingual wedding ceremony. I’m truly counting on the beautiful love story between the couple as well as the power of the Holy Spirit to bridge any divide between those of us who only know English and those guests who only speak French.
This gathering of disciples as told here in Acts have come together to celebrate also.
The Jewish Festival of Weeks known as Shavuot (sha-voo-OAT) was a harvest festival and eventually became a time to note the Torah being received on Mount Sinai.
Imagine the chaos, with the wind and imagery of divided tongues of fire and all those people excitedly looking around and realizing that everyone there was hearing their own native language and are left stunned. They all want to know:
Why is this happening?
What does it all mean?
Peter gets up and explains using the ancient words from the Book of Joel to give meaning to what is happening then and there.
When Jesus was at the beginning of his ministry and was in the synagogue, he proclaimed that the Spirit was upon him with a mission to bring good news to the poor, release to the captive, make the blind see and set the oppressed free and to proclaim the Lord’s favor or Jubilee – and right there in all that excitement it is happening – the church has been born.
And what were they to do with the words they heard and this new entity that was church?
It was not intended to be kept to themselves, hoarded like treasure as if they had a secret key to salvation.
No, this good news was meant to be shared.
This very diverse first incarnation of the church demonstrated how inclusive we are meant to be.
Peter here is talking to a bunch of immigrants who now call Jerusalem home.
Very soon the movement will be opened up to Gentiles. In lifting up the passage from the book of Joel, Peter is making sure that they all understand that the church is meant to be a place for all – that includes males and females, slaves and free people.
A little later in this chapter of Acts, this inclusiveness will take an economic turn when they “sell their possessions and goods and distribute the proceeds to all, as any had need.” (Acts 2:45)
What a great day today is to celebrate the birth of the church!
We do that by welcoming Ann and David as new members with whom we share the awesome responsibility of being church to the world.
We get to celebrate this fact outside the walls of the church under this tent which is so fitting today because to be church means we are to look outward to the world.
Just as those awe-struck followers who heard in their own tongue were being sent out to not just use words of salvation but carry out acts of love, so, too are we intended to find those who are struggling, hurting, grieving, hungry, or lost and it is with them that our faith turns into action.
The church is not a building or a bunch of denominations or a group of people.
Our identity lies in God’s mission of hearing and understanding and making connections with those who may never step foot in our building or any church for that matter.
In this time of such hate-filled speech and violence here in our country, to breathe in the power of the Holy Spirit, recognizing that change is possible and that we must each strive to the change we see in the world may be the only thing that saves us.
It most likely won’t happen with powerful wind or flames surrounding us.
It will happen in on-going acts of peace and grace and mercy.
That begins by hearing each other’s pain and responding in love.
That is the work of the church whose birthday we celebrate today.
May the church, our church, be a blessing to the world in the year to come.
With the wind rustling through the trees and the fire of the Holy Spirit guiding us, let us hear then this prayer from Garth House:
We remember that your church
Was born in wind and fire,
Not to sweep us heavenward
Like a presumptuous tower,
But to guide us down
The dusty roads of this world
So that we may lift up the downcast,
Heal the broken,
Reconcile what is lost,
And bring peace amidst unrest.
It will all begin with words and end with lives and hearts, touched by the Holy Spirit, lifted up – ever higher. Amen and amen.