June 5, 2022 Sermon
Sermon title: "Pentecost!"
Scripture: Acts 2:1-21
(Other lectionary choices include Psalm 104:24-34, Romans 8:14-17, and John 14:8-17.)
Acts 2:1-21
The Coming of the Holy Spirit
1When the day of Pentecost had come, they were all together in one place. 2And suddenly from heaven there came a sound like the rush of a violent wind, and it filled the entire house where they were sitting. 3Divided tongues, as of fire, appeared among them, and a tongue rested on each of them. 4All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other languages, as the Spirit gave them ability. 5Now there were devout Jews from every nation under heaven living in Jerusalem. 6And at this sound the crowd gathered and was bewildered, because each one heard them speaking in the native language of each. 7Amazed and astonished, they asked, "Are not all these who are speaking Galileans? 8And how is it that we hear, each of us, in our own native language? 9Parthians, Medes, Elamites, and residents of Mesopotamia, Judea and Cappadocia, Pontus and Asia, 10Phrygia and Pamphylia, Egypt and the parts of Libya belonging to Cyrene, and visitors from Rome, both Jews and proselytes, 11Cretans and Arabs—in our own languages we hear them speaking about God's deeds of power." 12All were amazed and perplexed, saying to one another, "What does this mean?" 13But others sneered and said, "They are filled with new wine."
Peter Addressed the Crowd
14But Peter, standing with the eleven, raised his voice and addressed them, "Men of Judea and all who live in Jerusalem, let this be known to you, and listen to what I say. 15Indeed, these are not drunk, as you suppose, for it is only nine o'clock in the morning. 16No, this is what was spoken through the prophet Joel: 17‘In the last days it will be, God declares, that I will pour out my Spirit upon all flesh, and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, and your young men shall see visions, and your old men shall dream dreams. 18Even upon my slaves, both men and women, in those days I will pour out my Spirit; and they shall prophesy. 19And I will show portents in the heaven above and signs on the earth below, blood, and fire, and smoky mist. 20The sun shall be turned to darkness and the moon to blood, before the coming of the Lord's great and glorious day. 21Then everyone who calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved.'
The sermon title is "Pentecost!", but it could just as easily be, "The Birth of the Church". What we heard today in the Scripture reading is - finally! - the Holy Spirit descending on those believers in Jerusalem, and when I say "those believers", I mean a lot of various people. We are told that there were Jews and proselytes there. A proselyte was a person not born a Jew, but a person who CHOSE Judaism, for whatever reason. As I have said before, a lot of people were drawn to Judaism because of its high ethical standards. Morals in the Greco-Roman world were not particularly high!
There is something else in today's Scripture reading that bears mentioning. The author of Acts at this point may have been trying to compare what happened here with what happened in the Tower of Babel story in Genesis. In the Genesis account, it is as if God made people speak different languages so they could not understand each other. If you recall, mankind was trying to build a tower up to God, and God didn't like that! So, God sowed confusion by making the people speak different languages, and the Tower of Babel project did NOT succeed! But today in Acts, the OPPOSITE is true: all those people who spoke different languages DID understand each other by the power of the Holy Spirit. Also, keep in mind that WIND and BREATH and SPIRIT are all related. We are told that a "violent wind" descended upon the group. It could have said a "violent BREATH". In Hebrew, the word for breath is RUACH. In Latin, it's SPIRITUS. And from SPIRITUS, of course, we get the English word "spirit". I love the way the author of this part of the Book of Acts, possibly Luke, puts it: "And suddenly from heaven there came a sound like the rush of a violent wind....." Did you notice what he DIDN'T say? He didn't say a violent wind. He said, There came a sound LIKE the rush of a violent wind! Why do I like that? Because it says you can't limit God or God's Spirit in any way. What was experienced was LIKE a such-and-such. It wasn't a such-and-such, but LIKE a such-and-such. If that makes no sense to you, I understand. But it reminds me so much of the Old Testament prophet Ezekiel when he saw the Wheel. Remember that black spiritual? "Ezekiel saw the wheel, Way up in the middle of the air." {Read from Ezekiel 1:15-28. 15As I looked at the living creatures, I saw a wheel on the earth beside the living creatures, one for each of the four of them. 16As for the appearance of the wheels and their construction: their appearance was like the gleaming of beryl; and the four had the same form, their construction being something like a wheel within a wheel. 17When they moved, they moved in any of the four directions without veering as they moved. 18Their rims were tall and awesome, for the rims of all four were full of eyes all around. 19When the living creatures moved, the wheels moved beside them; and when the living creatures rose from the earth, the wheels rose. 20Wherever the spirit would go, they went, and the wheels rose along with them; for the spirit of the living creatures was in the wheels. 21When they moved, the others moved; when they stopped, the others stopped; and when they rose from the earth, the wheels rose along with them; for the spirit of the living creatures was in the wheels. 22Over the heads of the living creatures there was something like a dome, shining like crystal, spread out above their heads. 23Under the dome their wings were stretched out straight, one toward another; and each of the creatures had two wings covering its body. 24When they moved, I heard the sound of their wings like the sound of mighty waters, like the thunder of the Almighty, a sound of tumult like the sound of an army; when they stopped, they let down their wings. 25And there came a voice from above the dome over their heads; when they stopped, they let down their wings. 26And above the dome over their heads there was something like a throne, in appearance like sapphire; and seated above the likeness of a throne was something that seemed like a human form. 27Upward from what appeared like the loins I saw something like gleaming amber, something that looked like fire enclosed all around; and downward from what looked like the loins I saw something that looked like fire, and there was a splendor all around. 28Like the bow in a cloud on a rainy day, such was the appearance of the splendor all around. This was the appearance of the likeness of the glory of the Lord. When I saw it, I fell on my face, and I heard the voice of someone speaking.} We are told that "All were amazed and perplexed, saying to one another, 'What does this mean?'" And we might say the same thing: What does this mean?
The Scottish scholar William Barclay says, "What happened at Pentecost we really do not know except that the disciples had an experience of the power of the Spirit flooding their beings such as they never had before. We must remember that for this part of Acts Luke was not an eyewitness. He tells the story as if the disciples suddenly acquired the gift of speaking in FOREIGN languages." And Barclay thinks this is not likely.
For one thing, there was a practice in the early Church - and it still goes on today in Pentecostal churches - of something called "speaking in tongues". Someone in a spiritual ecstasy would begin "to pour out a flood of unintelligible sounds in no known language. That was supposed to be directly inspired by the Spirit of God and was a gift greatly coveted." But the Apostle Paul did not particularly like the practice, which is called glossolalia. The reason Paul didn't like the practice is that it is too easy to fake. And he thought that the Gospel message should be preached in a language that the listener could understand. In fact, if you check I Corinthians 14:22, the Apostle to the Gentiles says that speaking in tongues is for UNbelievers. And, he says in verse 23, that if an outsider were to come in and everybody was speaking in tongues, wouldn't that outsider think everybody was mad? That's the reason we have Peter saying in today's Scripture reading that these people were not drunk since it was only 9 o'clock in the morning.
It just could be that the writer of this portion of Acts got it wrong! In the Greco-Roman world, most of the people knew and spoke Greek. So, they wouldn't need to understand somebody else in his/her own language. They would simply speak Greek, which the other person would probably know. I'm sure you'll recall the New Testament was written in Greek, which was the common language that everybody knew.
So.....what went on at that first Christian Pentecost? Maybe everybody really was "speaking in tongues". I am not particularly happy if that was the case, but you and I both know that God works in mysterious ways His wonders to perform.
Also, and you may have heard me say this before, I really like the Shakespeare quote (from Hamlet, I think) which says, "There is more to the universe than what is contained in your philosophy, Horatio." What that means to me is that we do not know everything, nor will we EVER know everything in THIS life. The Spirit of God is a mystery, and we will never fathom the depths of that mystery. One Latin anthem with which I am familiar is "O Magnum Mysterium", by Morton Lauridsen of the University of Southern California. The Latin title means, "O Great Mystery". There is SO much we do not know, and therefore there is SO much that we do not understand. My prayer, like the guy in Scripture whose daughter Jesus heals, is, "O Lord, I believe. Help Thou my UNbelief......and, I would add, my understanding." Amen.
Pastor Skip
