One of the blessings of living in an interfaith marriage is coming to know and appreciate the customs and traditions of Judaism. In turn, I can take the things that I see in our "faith parent" and connect them for purposes of deepening the understanding of Jesus for my congregation. It is also good to have been a public radio reporter in my former work life. I still listen to the news, and read news headlines, and follow news podcasts. It helps me to then point to the ways things in Scripture are still speaking to us even here in the 21st Century. Proof positive that the Holy Spirit is still with us, and poking us in the rib cage with sharp elbows, as one of my spiritual directors once said.
Text: Acts 2:1-21
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Take a moment and imagine this scene.
The city of Jerusalem was full of
people.
Jewish pilgrims from every region had
come bearing sheaves of wheat for Shavuot…this agricultural festival.
They were bringing the gifts of the
first fruits of their harvest to the temple in thanks to God and celebrating
the moment when God gave Moses the Torah on stone tablets at Mount Sinai.
Despite the frightening and terrible
killing of Jesus two months earlier…the city’s residents had lived with and
become accustomed to the brutality of the Roman government.
Shavuot was a chance to carry on with their holiday rituals as normal.
In the home of Jesus’s disciples…they
also had gathered with a lot of people.
They entered this celebration with that
glimmer of hope that they’d received.
Jesus…who they had thought was dead…had
been resurrected.
Their sorrow had been turned to joy.
They’d experienced that God’s Love is
more powerful than a Roman cross…and had seen Jesus ascend into heaven.
He’d blessed them and told them that
another comforter would be with them soon.
So they huddled together…they prayed and
talked.
Maybe another rabbi would show up in
this crowded room…another one who would keep them moving in the way of Jesus.
A strong wind suddenly blows through the
whole building.
Over each disciple’s head is a flame…a
fiery tongue.
And as they feel this rush of air…the
disciples find that they’re speaking in a new languages.
They’re using foreign phrases…as they
talk about the amazing works of God.
But this wasn’t some incoherent
babbling.
The strangest thing happened: people
were hearing clear as day one message: “God is love let the whole earth rejoice
in it!”
No need for interpreters or universal
translators.
Everyone was hearing with the ears of
their hearts…the same message in the way they could comprehend and understand
it.
As people looked on at this
scene…listening to these Galileans speaking so plainly in other languages…the
crowd was a mix of wonder …and cynicism.
Naturally there were skeptics who were
scoffing at the whole thing:
“Obviously, these guys have been
drinking alcohol!”
That’s when Peter jumps to his feet.
“No we aren’t drunk! It’s the middle of
the morning and we haven’t been doing shots at 9am!”
They might not have been lit in that
way…but they were lit.
Lit up with the knowledge…and the wisdom
that had been with Jesus.
They were filled with the same juice
that fueled the passion of the prophets.
And they’d been reveling in same the
wind that blew over the waters and existed with God from the beginning of time.
If they were drunk on anything…it was
the Spirit of God.
And Peter…the guy who had retreated in
fear at the time of Jesus’s arrest…was so intoxicated that he was now standing
up and speaking with authority.
He told these pessimists that what they
were witnessing was the fulfilment of God’s promise as spoken by the prophet
Joel:
The spirit has come…and a new promising
future is possible for all people.
Even in a time of uncertainty…and living
under a Roman government that killed with impunity…God’s Holy Spirit has come
and will surround them always.
The Spirit that arrived in the Upper
Room continues to be that powerful wind that gives breath to those who need
some more encouragement to be bold…and to dream…and have visions of a future
not yet realized but is still possible.
It’s the energy that keeps us from
sinking into complacency and depression and holds us up when others try to drag
us down.
And it’s that force that challenges us
to get out of our comfort zone and give us that proverbial kick in the pants to
do our part to make a difference.
That’s the spirit of Pentecost.
And there is no time greater than now
for us to start showing up…and speaking up.
I was listening to an interview with
Bishop Deon Johnson…the Episcopal Bishop for the diocese of Missouri. Some of
you might be familiar with Bishop Deon from Facebook. He frequently publishes
prayers and intercessions that get shared on social media.
The bishop and his husband…who is
Mexican by birth… became unwilling participants in the brokenness of our
immigration policy.
They were in Mexico in 2024…at a routine
interview for green card holders…when the immigration officer told them that
Bishop Deon’s husband was being detained.
They were told that he needed to stay in
Mexico for a year…even though he hadn’t lived in the country since he was a
child.
As we might imagine…this caused a lot of
fear and stress for everyone in the family…the bishop…his husband…and their two
children.
They complied…finding an apartment for
him in Mexico…and finding ways to keep the family in touch via Facetime.
They lived through the trauma…only to
find out at the end of it all that everything they’d just been through had been
unnecessary.
After nearly a year…a different
immigration official looked at the husband’s record…and said there’d been
nothing wrong with his green card status in the first place.
Needless to say… Bishop Deon was
understandably angry about the whole thing.
And yet…out of that hardship…not only
had the Spirit kept the family together…it had started to do other work beyond
their immediate struggle.
Their experience raised the awareness
among Missouri Episcopalians to the fears and concerns felt by all their black
and brown neighbors…especially those who aren’t native English speakers.
Some congregations moved to organize
ways to help immigrants.
It also opened up important
conversations with Bishop Deon.
There had been some church members who
weren’t happy to have a bishop who is black… gay and a naturalized U.S.
citizen.
Hearing that he was solo parenting at
this time and needed to get home to his kids….and that’s why he couldn’t do all
the typical activities when he would visit a congregation struck a nerve.
It helped soften some people’s hearts as
they now saw him not as some scary “other” and fictionalized version of a black
gay man…but as an incarnation of God’s beloved…a fellow sibling in Christ.
And the experience…as terrible as it was
for their kids… turned their older daughter into an outspoken activist for her
St. Louis high school classmates who worried that ICE was coming for them and
their families.
The interviewer asked if this
immigration trauma had made the bishop question his faith and naturally, he
said no, it had not.
Sitting on this side of the
experience…Bishop Deon spoke confidently of how his faith was so grounded in
hope that it once more showed that resurrection and Easter follows those Good
Friday moments.
As he put it…”There will always be those
who are more in love with power over others than being in love with God’s
Love.” But God’s love…and God’s spirit will have the final say.
And that’s the key thing for us.
When we stick close to that source of
Love…and drink from the living waters of God…we not only become the witnesses
of Love…but water bearers to those who are thirsty for a church that embodies
mercy…compassion…and justice.
And with the power of the Holy Spirit…we
are given the strength and the ability and the joy to do our part in making
this a better place for everyone.
In the name of our One Holy and
Undivided Trinity.
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