The Day of Pentecost (Whitsunday), 8 June 2014
Acts 2:1-21 or Numbers
11:24-30
Psalm 104:25-35,37
I Corinthians 12:3b-13 or
Acts 2:1-21
St. John 20:19-23 or St.
John 7:37-39
Background: Pentecost
Pentecost and the Sunday that follows it (Trinity) lie on
either side of a cusp that divides The Easter Cycle from Ordinary Time.
Pentecost has its roots in a Jewish feast day that celebrated the giving of the
Law on Mr. Sinai, called Shavout. It is the reason so many were gathered in
Jerusalem on the day that the Holy Spirit was poured out upon the
disciples. In the Christian tradition,
Pentecost is that fiftieth day following Easter (Ascension is the
fortieth). It is oftentimes called “the
Birthday of the Church”, a remembrance not only of the gift of the Holy Spirit,
but also of Saint Peter’s sermon and its extraordinary results where many were
baptized and received into the Church.
In remembrance of Baptism, as is traditional on this day; it is good to
observe the Renewal of Baptismal Vows.
Acts 2:1-21
When the day of
Pentecost had come, the disciples were all together in one place. 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. Divided tongues, as of fire, appeared
among them, and a tongue rested on each of them. All of them were filled with
the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other languages, as the Spirit gave them
ability.
Now there were devout
Jews from every nation under heaven living in Jerusalem. And at this sound the
crowd gathered and was bewildered, because each one heard them speaking in the
native language of each. Amazed and astonished, they asked, "Are not all these
who are speaking Galileans? And how is it that we hear, each of us, in our own
native language? Parthians, Medes, Elamites, and residents of Mesopotamia,
Judea and Cappadocia, Pontus and Asia, Phrygia and Pamphylia, Egypt and the
parts of Libya belonging to Cyrene, and visitors from Rome, both Jews and
proselytes, Cretans and Arabs-- in our own languages we hear them speaking
about God's deeds of power." All were amazed and perplexed, saying to one
another, "What does this mean?" But others sneered and said,
"They are filled with new wine."
But 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.
Indeed, these are not drunk, as you suppose, for it is only nine o'clock in the
morning. No, 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 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.
Even upon my slaves,
both men and women,
in those days I will
pour out my Spirit;
and they shall
prophesy.
And I will show
portents in the heaven above
and signs on the earth
below, blood, and fire, and smoky mist.
The sun shall be turned
to darkness
and the moon to blood,
before the coming of
the Lord's great and glorious day.
Then everyone who calls
on the name of the Lord shall be saved.' "
Just prior to the account of the Ascension in Luke’s gospel, Jesus
make’s the following promise, “And behold I am sending the promise
of my Father* upon you; but stay in the city
until you are clothed with power from on high.” (Luke 24:49) and the promise is
fulfilled in this pericope. What had
been an agrarian festival had now become, by Jesus’ time, a recollection of the
giving of the Law – the central theme that drew many from the diaspora back to
Jerusalem. For Christians, the event was
to have an even deeper and formative meaning.
In some early sources the Day of Pentecost is deeply associated with the
Ascension, both being celebrated on the fiftieth day. And if the Jewish celebration was indeed a
remembrance and celebration of the giving of the Law (the Word, hence the Ru'ah – the Spirit) then the association
makes even greater sense, as the Spirit remains to guide the new community in
its life together. Unlike John and Matthew who saw the gift of the Spirit in
the encounter of the believer with the Risen One, but rather a Spirit given for
mission.
What follows then is the beginning of Peter’s sermon and
its quotation of the prophet Joel. In
Peter’s sermon we hear a recounting (although for the original readers/hearers
an initial revelation) of the apostolic kerygma. Although not in this pericope, Peter goes
on to recount exactly what the Good News was for Christians, and the quote from
Joel underscores the Pentecost-Ascension-Pentecost connection. From Luke’s
point of view, the ancient trajectory of Salvation History continues with this
event (as Peter discloses in his sermon) which is indicated by the initial
introduction: “When the time for
Pentecost was fulfilled.” The
translation above is deficient in pointing out this aspect to the event. The quotation from Joel gives a sense of
universality, not only among peoples, but also amongst ages and genders as
well. This is grist for Luke’s mill as
he, like the author of Genesis 1, sees the Spirit hovering over a nascent earth
and Church.
Breaking open Acts:
- As you read the quotation from Joel what hopes spring up in you?
- Have you had a Pentecost moment?
What was it like?
- What are your dreams?
Or
Numbers 11:24-30
Moses went out and told
the people the words of the LORD; and he gathered seventy elders of the people,
and placed them all around the tent. Then the LORD came down in the cloud and
spoke to him, and took some of the spirit that was on him and put it on the
seventy elders; and when the spirit rested upon them, they prophesied. But they
did not do so again.
Two men remained in the
camp, one named Eldad, and the other named Medad, and the spirit rested on
them; they were among those registered, but they had not gone out to the tent,
and so they prophesied in the camp. And a young man ran and told Moses,
"Eldad and Medad are prophesying in the camp." And Joshua son of Nun,
the assistant of Moses, one of his chosen men, said, "My lord Moses, stop
them!" But Moses said to him, "Are you jealous for my sake? Would
that all the LORD's people were prophets, and that the LORD would put his
spirit on them!" And Moses and the elders of Israel returned to the camp.
In some sense this lesson has one great point to make, that being that
it is God who decides who shall be invested with the Spirit, and the necessity
of giving place to that Spirit. It is
not as dazzling as the material from Joel or from Luke, and so this reading
almost serves as a footnote to the one who is decoding the day and its meaning
for us. The real dilemma is not one of
“who has the spirit and who does not”, but rather one of seeing what really
commands our attention – our bellies or the breath of the spirit that fills
us. That conundrum really does speak to
our time – perhaps both readings ought to be proclaimed and expounded upon.
Breaking open Numbers:
- Who are the spirit-filled in your congregation?
- Are you one of them or not?
- What do you have to say that comes from the heart of the Spirit?
Psalm 104:25-35, 37 Benedic, anima mea
O LORD, how manifold
are your works! *
in wisdom you have made
them all;
the earth is full of
your creatures.
Yonder is the great and
wide sea
with its living things
too many to number, *
creatures both small
and great.
There move the ships,
and there is that
Leviathan, *
which you have made for
the sport of it.
All of them look to you
*
to give them their food
in due season.
You give it to them;
they gather it; *
you open your hand, and
they are filled with good things.
You hide your face, and
they are terrified; *
you take away their
breath,
and they die and return
to their dust.
You send forth your
Spirit, and they are created; *
and so you renew the
face of the earth.
May the glory of the
LORD endure for ever; *
may the LORD rejoice in
all his works.
He looks at the earth
and it trembles; *
he touches the
mountains and they smoke.
I will sing to the LORD
as long as I live; *
I will praise my God
while I have my being.
May these words of mine
please him; *
I will rejoice in the
LORD.
Bless the LORD, O my
soul, *
Hallelujah!
In this hymn that celebrates God as creator, we once again get a glimpse
of the Spirit as an actor as well. What
our translation relates as, “you take
away their breath, and they die and return to the dust. You send forth your Spirit, and they are
created,” is perhaps better rendered as “You
withdraw their breath and they perish and to the dust they return. When you send forth your breath, they are
created.” Here there is the
connection of Spirit, breath, and life.
It is a connection that forms a necessary understanding of the elements
of this day. The initial creation
depends on the creator, and continues depend on the Spirit that hovered over
the earth. I like the phrase, May these words of mine please God.” In a way, what God spoke to bring us into
being now resides in our own mouths as well – a breath that returns the favor,
if you will.
Breaking open Psalm 104:
- How is the Spirit like breath?
- How are your words (breath) to others like Spirit?
- How does God breathe new life into you?
1 Corinthians 12:3b-13
No one can say
"Jesus is Lord" except by the Holy Spirit. Now there are varieties of
gifts, but the same Spirit; and there are varieties of services, but the same
Lord; and there are varieties of activities, but it is the same God who
activates all of them in everyone. To each is given the manifestation of the Spirit
for the common good. To one is given through the Spirit the utterance of
wisdom, and to another the utterance of knowledge according to the same Spirit,
to another faith by the same Spirit, to another gifts of healing by the one
Spirit, to another the working of miracles, to another prophecy, to another the
discernment of spirits, to another various kinds of tongues, to another the
interpretation of tongues. All these are activated by one and the same Spirit,
who allots to each one individually just as the Spirit chooses.
For just as the body is
one and has many members, and all the members of the body, though many, are one
body, so it is with Christ. For in the one Spirit we were all baptized into one
body-- Jews or Greeks, slaves or free-- and we were all made to drink of one
Spirit.
One of the commentators I read in preparing these materials saw the
exercise of discrimination when observing the gifts of the Spirit as a contrast
to the ecstatic nature of the mystery religions that surrounded the early
Church. Odd, that this should be the
point of comparison. One only has to
delve into the reading from numbers to understand what was the sign of the
Spirit upon the elders – ecstasy! The
problem comes in seeing the difference.
There is a certain pragmatism that underscores Paul’s approach. “Is there any usefulness in the gift for the
whole church?” In one of his usual
lists, Paul enumerates for us the variety that we ought to expect from the
Spirit who offers these gifts: “wisdom,
knowledge, faith, healing, miracles, prophecy, discernment, tongues, and
interpretation.” I wonder how much
of this we apprehend in our own experience of the Church and its gifts? What Paul points out is the unity of the body
that contains all of these possibilities, and what is even more exciting is
that they are not limited to spiritual distinctions but to political or
national aspects as well. “We were all made to drink of one
Spirit.” Would that this habit and
attitude described the Church.
presence.
Breaking open I
Corinthians:
- What is the spirit of our time?
- Is it good or evil, how do you determine this?
- What gifts have you been given for others?
Or
Acts 2:1-21
[See above]
St. John 20:19-23
When it was evening on
that day, the first day of the week, and the doors of the house where the
disciples had met were locked for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood among
them and said, "Peace be with you." After he said this, he showed
them his hands and his side. Then the disciples rejoiced when they saw the
Lord. Jesus said to them again, "Peace be with you. As the Father has sent
me, so I send you." When he had said this, he breathed on them and said to
them, "Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, they are
forgiven them; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained."
There is a reality about Jesus’ greeting, “Peace be with you,” that goes beyond the idea of a wish or
volition. It is rather a recognition of
something that already exists. Stated
literally it would be “Peace is with
you.” What we have waited for we already
have – the resurrection has altered the relationship of things. Into this condition, Jesus appears to the
disciples and alters the condition. He
breathes on them, and then gives them the ability to make a difference in creation
by either forgiving or retaining sin.
Such a powerful breath! Fr.
Raymond Brown gives a remarkable example of the power that this image had for
the early Church.
“The most famous example of this (practice) was the custom of filling a
skin bag with the holy breath of the Coptic Patriarch of Alexandria, tying it
up, and transporting it up river to Ethiopia where it was let loose on the one
designated to be the Abuna or head of the Ethiopian Church.”[1]
Fanciful as this example is, it is as compelling to me as is the
intentions of John’s telling of Jesus’ gift.
I think it ought to be awfully compelling to priests, and to those of us
who minister without providing the gifts of Confession and Absolution other than
the “fire hose” effects of a General Confession. Do we believe the power of these words? Guiding people into the Easter life needs to
be accompanied by not only the discernment of the spirits (Second Reading) but by
the discernment of individual lives, and the need for forgiveness.
Breaking open the Gospel:
- Have you sought forgiveness from another? When?
- Have your forgiven another?
Have you not forgiven another?
- Why does Jesus breathe on the disciples?
or
St. John 7:37-39
On the
last day of the festival, the great day, while Jesus was standing there, he
cried out, "Let anyone who is thirsty come to me, and let the one who
believes in me drink. As the scripture has said, `Out of the believer's heart
shall flow rivers of living water.'" Now he said this about the Spirit,
which believers in him were to receive; for as yet there was no Spirit, because
Jesus was not yet glorified.
This
pericope comes from several scenes that John depicts at The Feast of the
Tabernacles, here on the last day of the feast.
You may wish to take some time and consult the prophet Zechariah 9-14 (especially Zechariah 13:1) to see how
the context of the ceremonial influences and guides the understanding of Jesus’
words. The image is of a spring that
flows from Jerusalem to purify both land and nation. The immediate context is prayers in the fall
of the year calling for rain, as a promise of a fruitful harvest in the coming
year. (Perhaps we in California should
observe the prayers of the Feast of Tabernacles) Into this context, Jesus makes his statements
about living water. What comes to our
minds as we hear these comments by Jesus?
Numerous images abound in the Hebrew Scriptures, and in Christian
Scriptures as well. There is the blood
and water at the cross, the Spirit hovering over the deep, and there is
Baptism. All of these probably obtain as
we struggle to hear what Jesus is telling us.
In these words we are both recipient and source, and the Spirit not only
cleanses but also refreshes, as we end that same Spirit out to the world.
Breaking open the Gospel:
- What kinds of things flow out of you?
- Which of them are gifts of the Spirit?
- What flows out of others, that you admire and need?
After breaking open the
Word, you might want to pray the Collect for Sunday:
Almighty God, on this day you opened the way of eternal life to every
race and nation by the promised gift of your Holy Spirit: Shed abroad this gift
throughout the world by the preaching of the Gospel, that it may reach to the
ends of the earth; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with
you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.
or this
O God, who on this day taught the hearts of your faithful people by
sending to them the light of your Holy Spirit: Grant us by the same Spirit to
have a right judgment in all things, and evermore to rejoice in his holy
comfort; through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord, who lives and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.
Questions and comments copyright © 2014, Michael
T. Hiller
[1] Brown, R. 1970. The Anchor Bible The Gospel According to John (xiii – xxi), Doubleday
and Company, Inc., Garden City, New York, page 1023
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