The Spirit, the Advocate, the Presence Among Us
Pentecost 2019 • Sermon • Submitted
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The New Revised Standard Version The Coming of the Holy Spirit
When the day of Pentecost had come, they were all together in one place. 2 And suddenly from heaven there came a sound like the rush of a violent wind, and it filled the entire house where they were sitting. 3 Divided tongues, as of fire, appeared among them, and a tongue rested on each of them. 4 All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other languages, as the Spirit gave them ability.
5 Now there were devout Jews from every nation under heaven living in Jerusalem. 6 And at this sound the crowd gathered and was bewildered, because each one heard them speaking in the native language of each. 7 Amazed and astonished, they asked, “Are not all these who are speaking Galileans? 8 And how is it that we hear, each of us, in our own native language? 9 Parthians, Medes, Elamites, and residents of Mesopotamia, Judea and Cappadocia, Pontus and Asia, 10 Phrygia and Pamphylia, Egypt and the parts of Libya belonging to Cyrene, and visitors from Rome, both Jews and proselytes, 11 Cretans and Arabs—in our own languages we hear them speaking about God’s deeds of power.” 12 All were amazed and perplexed, saying to one another, “What does this mean?” 13 But others sneered and said, “They are filled with new wine.”
Did they leap and wave and dance together
before that rushing mighty wind;
conflagrate, perhaps,
above those wild astonished heads,
like one enormous fourth of July bonfire?
Or were they solemn,
solitary, isolate,
hovering in mid-air austere,
remote as chancel candles,
radiating still-as-crystal holiness?
Those glad tidings, as they gave them voice,
did they wear the sober garb of reason, developing
point-on-point the history, background, rationale,
all the reasonable explanations, implications
of what had come to pass?
Or was it more like one great shout of joy,
the agony-born bliss of bursting from the womb,
a life-embracing cry that even visitors
from the remotest island archipelago
beneath the fiery Southern Cross
might recognize and claim
and then be claimed by?
—J. Barrie Shepherd
Grace and peace this Pentecost Sunday! Pentecost — which derives its name from its traditional celebration marking 50 days since Jesus rose from the grave on Easter — is a commonly explosive and loud day of celebration!
We mark Pentecost with red — red clothing, tongues of fire on our banners, invoking firelight that danced upon those who gathered together in Jesus’ name in the aftermath of his ascension.
A sound. A crackle. A spark. A hum.
The celebration of Pentecost is also one of embracing opposites. The opening verse of our text today intends to let the reader know that the people were gathered all together, in one place. This is a moment of unity, a gathering in solidarity in the aftermath of Jesus’ departure. They were one, united, hopeful and fearful and expectant and downtrodden — but in all they were united.
And yet, as we see, where we would expect unity to bring understanding through their shared conversation and insight, a common language spoken and shared — instead this is a moment of opposites — their language and unity are expanded, distinguished, broken apart.
Out of their unity, we find diversity. My friends, this is a principle at the core of the Christian faith. We witness in the devout Jews from every nation under heaven living in Jerusalem a beautiful tension of multiple languages raising up and speaking in a cacophony, a mixed ensemble of sound. And the beautiful way of God they illuminate for us is that God’s people speak diverse words, live diverse lives, speak and tell the story of God in myriad ways, and yet, we hold the tension of living in unity nonetheless.
As I say, the Pentecost story is one of opposites. It harkens back and serves as a bookend to the origin stories of the Hebrew people, where at the Tower of Babel, their united language expanded, and the peoples of the world are scattered, speaking new tongues and dialects. Pentecost is a reunifying of understanding emerging from a world of Babel.
Today, I wanted invite us to entertain another potential opposite that we encounter in this story. Think for a moment of the word - Pentecost. Pentecostal. Pentecostalism.
Other words come to mind with that — Holy Rollers, Charismatic. Or maybe you hear upbeat, exciting music, people waving banners and singing praises loudly with the spiritual gift of tongues.
What I’m getting at here is that Pentecost — is loud!
Look at the text once more — It’s filled phrases like “from heaven there came a sound like a rush of a violent wind.” and “all of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak.” and “in our own languages we hear them speaking about God’s deeds of power.”
The kicker verse, from the end, makes me chuckle: “But others sneered and said, ‘they are filled with new wine.’” Hah. What do people who have been drinking sound like? They can get pretty loud! :)
We sense that the outpowering of the Holy Spirit is a raucous affair. It has to be loud, to be passionate, to be up-out-of-your-seat and dancing! And it certainly is.
But the opposite I want to propose to us today is this: There are other words in this text that lead me to consider another way to encounter the Spirit, one that I’ve grown to know more intimately as my faith has developed, a way that seeks to encounter the Spirit, the Advocate, the Presence among us, but not through noise or song or passionate words. Rather, there is something in this story for us today about encountering the Holy Spirit and celebrating Pentecost through Silence.
[pause]
Silence.
Now, the text is filled with sound imagery, clues that lead us to a practice of Pentecost that is loud and joyous and word-filled. However, sometimes it is what is not said in the text that can also illuminate something of God’s presence for us.
They were all together in one place on that day. But the text doesn’t go on to tell of someone standing up among, perhaps Peter or James or John, to share words of encouragement or a passionate sermon. In between verse 1 and verse 2, when the sound rushes into the room, what if they are silent. Waiting. Sad and longing for the Christ’s presence once more. Still, hoping that the one Jesus the Christ had promised, the Advocate or the Helper or whatever it was that he said — what if they’re sitting quietly hoping that Presence would arrive.
Or what about all the people in this text who are not speaking in other languages? Certainly, the text makes it clear that quite a few speak up. But there was a crowd gathering around them who were “bewildered…amazed…astonished…perplexed.”
How do you act when you are “bewildered…amazed…astonished…perplexed”? We might say in our own way that these people were “at a loss for words.”
Certainly, the crowd is silent because they are listening, but also, they may be silent because that is what you do when you encounter the Holy. You shut up. You quiet your heart. You pay attention. Perhaps you even close your eyes and let the sound and the presence of the moment come into greater focus. We become silent so that out of our own stillness and silence, perhaps we might hear something we did not know was there. We accept that we can be at a loss for words and perhaps this is the best place to be amongst the hope and expectation that God is somehow speaking.
I like words. I like to read words. I like to listen to words. I like to write words. I like to speak words. My title here is Minister of Word and Sacrament — my calling, my vocation, my job — is in great deal about words.
And yet, there are many moments, even right now, that I am truly at a loss for words. I have had moments in this last week when I have been struck with awe and wonder and great heartache and sorrow and experienced a true sense of being at a loss for words.
When I stand in a place like that, so much of me wants to find the words, speak the words, read new words or hopefully tune into some sort of word that will give reason, context, explanation for why the world is the way it is, why there is such pain, why there is such joy, why the moments that should feel so rich with God’s presence, the cacophony of voices praising God’s name, why those moments feel so empty.
And here’s what I think I’m discovering.
I, like those who stood by and heard the Holy Spirit speaking through the gathered people of God on that first day of Pentecost, I am invited to sit and wait in silence.
That’s the opposite that I’m exploring — on the loud day of Pentecost, I’m trying to find silence.
We live in a very noisy world. I’ve read a number of books and articles on the nature of silence and there is a common story highlighted among them: we are running out of spaces in our world that are truly silent. At least, absent of human noise. There will always be the sound of the wind (thanks be to God), but there are fewer and fewer places without the sound of cars, airplanes, trains, the hum of traffic or conversation.
We should be cautioned by this reality — we need silence. And it is not only an external struggle. Even if we are to find a place of relative silence or perhaps we have diminished capacity to hear…there is still the internal noise. All the voices, all the words from the day…internal silence is hard to come by too. At least for me…how about you?
But…and here’s the hope.
On this Pentecost, amidst all the spirited noise…we are also reminded that God arrives in us amidst the silence. And we can find that.
In closing, I want to invite us once more to this idea of opposites, which I believe can help us encounter God in the silence.
To find God in the silence is to let go of all the other noise as much as we can. It means we stop speaking. It means we find stillness with our bodies, not moving or fidgeting. It means slowly tuning out the ambient and human noises.
To do this, we embrace a great opposite of the Way of God — we find and speak the name of God. This is an opposite because God is the unnameable One. We do not speak God’s name — the ancient Hebrew name for God, the four letters Yud-Hey-Vav-Hey, what we call in our modern tongue Yahweh. We locate that unspeakable name by focusing on our breath, with the inhale of Yah and the exhale of Weh.
We enter into silence by tuning in to what is unspeakable — and speaking it. Or rather breathing it. We breathe God’s presence.
In the Hebrew and Greek testaments, the Spirit of God is named by the words ruah and pneuma, both of which translate as breath.
So we find silence by finding breath.
I don’t know about you, but I often need to encounter God from a place of silence. The words are helpful and give structure to my experience, but that outpouring of the Holy Spirit’s presence, I think I often need to find that in the silencing of all other competing voices. Like Elijah on the mountain with God — the wind, the earthquake, the fire — these are common Pentecost symbols — but what I need and what I want to invite you to as well is to find that still small voice.
We’ll spend a moment here in silence.
And what I want to invite you to do is to seek God’s silent voice. At the place of silence, we discover a hum, a foundational breath, a sound that is not a sound. A silence that is not a silence, but rather an encounter of a presence. The Presence.
This is what Jesus promises his followers — there will be a helper, an advocate, a presence that will be with you. A hum in the world all around you, a Spirit descending upon you, an Inspirer who will support you.
I want to invite us to bring ourselves into a space to possibly encounter that spirit and breath today.
Before we enter, I’d like you to pull out your hymnals and turn to #286, “Breathe on Me Breath of God.” In a moment, I’ll have Luke start playing the introduction to this and rather than searching for the page out of our moment of silence, I invite you to simply open your eyes when you’re ready and begin to sing.
Let’s enter the silence and wait upon the Presence of God’s Spirit, which is among us now.