Pentecost (Fr. Guiliano)

Jesus said, “The one who believes in me will also do the works that I do…”

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Pentecost is a great feast of the Church. I can see how many of us are marking it by wearing red, dozens of little flames carried out into the world!

Pentecost is one of our Seven Principal Feasts, along with Christmas, Epiphany, Easter, Ascension Day, Trinity Sunday, and All Saints Day. Pentecost was originally a feast of the Hebrews, but for Christians it also commemorates that moment we heard about in the Acts of the Apostles -- the moment of God’s promise -- when the Holy Spirit descended upon the disciples in tongues of flame. They were empowered to proclaim the message of Jesus, to speak of God’s deeds of power. And through their Spirit-filled words, a new community was formed. The Church grew.  

Who were its members?

According to the Acts of the Apostles, “there were [at that time] devout Jews from every nation under heaven” who had come to Jerusalem for the festival of Pentecost. “Every nation under heaven.” This is an example of narrative license, a little hyperbole on Luke’s part. It’s a metaphor. In the first century, it was not literally possible to gather people from every nation under heaven in one place. It’s hardly possible today in a modern pilgrimage. To put it bluntly: the Kaskaskia were not there; the people of Uluru or Nunavut or Kinshasa were not there. But I think we get the picture. Many people were there, they stood in for all nations, and they heard the disciples speaking in their own languages.

That day of Pentecost was a moment of universal revelation, a reminder that God’s purposes have always encompassed all people. It was a moment of prophetic fulfillment, when that purpose was more fully realized. As Peter said, ‘This is what was spoken through the prophet Joel: “in the last days, it will be, God declares, that I will pour out my Spirit on all flesh…’. That day of Pentecost was a moment in which God began again, not sweeping away the old, but renewing the world and humanity from within, calling people of every nation and language, tribe and tongue to hear the divine call and be saved in Christ’s name.

There is no person who is unimportant in God’s eyes, no nation or people. God has made us all in the divine image. We are all “one blood,” and God’s salvation and community are for all. Our differences and divisions can easily work against our common life and against our common labor, as in the story of Babel: “let us scatter them, and confuse their language,” God says. We deal with some of that confusion down to the present moment.

But Pentecost, the descent of the Spirit upon the disciples, is the undoing of all that. It is a celebration of differences among people, as a cacophony of uncoordinated languages became a well-conducted symphony of praise, a thousand tongues singing the Redeemer’s praise by Christ’s outpouring of the Holy Spirit.

God’s salvation and community are for all. As St Paul put it in his Second Letter to the Corinthians (5:9), “God was in Christ, reconciling the world to himself.”

The world! Not this person or that, not just one group, but the world. “Jews, Greeks, Romans, Parthians, Medes,” all peoples of every continent and of every time. This nation, too, this time, your family, your friends, your … annoying neighbour or colleague who makes you grind your teeth, even the people we would count as our enemies, the people we have harmed or wronged, the people we consider expendable, or treat harshly. The people who harm us. All people. “God was in Christ, reconciling the world to himself.” The world.

God has reconciled the world in Christ, and he has committed to the Church “the ministry of reconciliation.” We are called today to share in Christ’s mission.

As Jesus said, “The one who believes in me will also do the works that I do…” We have a role to play. Or as our prayer book catechism puts it: What is the mission of the Church?

The mission of the Church is to restore all people to unity with God and each other in Christ.
 
That’s a big job. “To restore all people to unity.”

We probably think it is beyond us. And we are right in one sense. After all, how many of us are restored to unity with our friends or with all of our family? Most of us find it hard these days to agree. And, so often, we just don’t talk to our neighbors or family. We retreat into comfortable silos to stare at our phones and dream of people who agree with us in cities far away. Even in the Church we are hardly reconciled; how long has it been since the Episcopal Church was at peace, let alone the various churches in this nation, or throughout the world?

It would be easy to think that we cannot do anything. But we are gathered here in this church today, celebrating a moment when the Spirit of God made community, a moment God took people of many nations and languages, and made them one. I’m sure they had their differences, their rivalries. Perhaps they had incompatible visions of the future. But they were made one, by the work of God.

Can’t that happen again? Couldn’t it start happening now? And couldn’t we here at Emmanuel do things, even small things, in this community to work toward that beautiful purpose of drawing many people together? Yes. Yes. We can make a difference.

And we can do it in part by emphasizing those things that are inherent to our faith. If the Church is to take its place in God’s purposes for the world, the purposes of universal reconciliation, it will have to do so in those ways that Christ has set down. Or as Jesus put it more simply, “If you love me, you will keep my commandments.” Think of that great commandment: Love thy neighbour as thyself.

 We could love each other, and come to know and love our neighbours. We could show that love in selfless service, blessing those who curse us, helping those in any kind of trouble, doing good, doing good together, waking up every day with this purpose in mind: to do as Christ did.

We will need many things to sustain such work. We will need to remain united around the hearing of God’s Word and around the memory of our living Lord, Jesus. For when we look to him and to his teaching, we will find the way.

We will need to pray and celebrate the sacraments. It is tempting – even for Anglicans! – to think that this does not matter.

But when we come together in this place to share the bread and drink the wine, when we receive here the Body and Blood of the Lord, it really does make a difference. The sacrament changes our hearts, it renews our minds; it draws us closer to Christ. And praying really does make a difference.

The unity of Pentecost is a gift coming down from heaven. It is the Spirit of God recreating the earth, and doing what we cannot do alone. It is the mystery of the ages; it is “Christ in you, the hope of glory.” Such a gift. Let us pray fervently for it, in the words of the song:
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Come, Holy Ghost, our souls inspire, and lighten with celestial fire.
Thou the anointing Spirit, who dost thy sevenfold gifts impart.        
Thy blessed unction from above is comfort, life, and fire of love.
Enable with perpetual light the dullness of our blinded sight.

Amen and Amen.