Receiving the Fire of Pentecost
Pentecost is about noise, a deafening frightening strange noise that stopped people in their tracks and compelled them to come running and asking, “What was that?”
Pentecost is about fire. Fire is a spiritual connector between the physical and the spiritual. Fire is the agent that releases energy from matter. Fire is about passion. Red is to put us in touch with fire and passion and the deep meaning of this day. Thank you, all of you who wore red today.
Pentecost is about the Creator directly physically connecting with the Created. God with humankind.
Three Stories
I want to weave three stories together this morning. They are all about receiving. A personal one and two about the foundations of the Jewish nation and the worldwide Christian community.
Three years ago, I set out on an ambitious 6 weeks cross country camping, sightseeing and visiting trip with grandchildren. It started in Portland with my sister and her two grandchildren. We drove to Denver in her Ford Falcon compact RV – the kind with a bed space over the top of the front seats that gets used for storage. It is the kind that’s great for two people and takes really careful planning and use of space for more than that.
Marzenda and her husband had spent many days thoroughly cleaning and tuning and preparing the RV for our use. I had been planning the trip for months. I was taking four of my Jewish grandchildren to Long Island, New York for the wedding of a dear family friend. After the wedding, Aviva and I would have two weeks for her 10-year trip. We would drive to New England and then Washington DC for the 4th of July. We have a four-generation tradition in the family. When a grandchild is 10, he or she gets a special trip with grandparents.
From Washington DC, it was back to NY to pick up her 9-year-old brother for a 2 week trip back to Denver via visits with friends in Mass., NY, Niagara Falls and Iowa.
Having the RV made such a difference for the trip. In Denver, we “koshered” the kitchen, packed in lots of kosher food, dishes and cookware, camping equipment, clothes, games, and a skate board. We put a bike rack and 3 bicycles on the front.
I like to have a theme or intention for my time with my grandchildren. That summer, my intention was to have us all practice doing acts of loving kindness to each other and to people we didn’t even know. I hoped my grandchildren would buy it if I could make it a game. We could look for clever ways to be kind to someone.
I set the example by the way I had set up the RV. There was a CD player, tape player and radio with earphones for each person. I had books on tape, music, my laptop with computer games. Everyone could listen to what they wanted. No fights. I put books, games, crafts and scrapbook supplies in a cupboard. Of course, I let them know these were acts of loving kindness – just in case they missed it.
It all went great. All my planning paid off – for the first 24 hours. I hoped to be in Kansas City by lunch time. It was a hot HOT day. Steam started coming out of the engine. Then I noticed smoke behind us. We pulled over and stopped in the shade of an overpass, the only shade for miles.
“Everyone out!” I said with such authority they all responded immediately.
We saw a flame drop from under the engine and soon flames were coming out of the top of the engine. Construction workers on the overpass ran down with big fire extinguishers. It didn’t help. Soon the whole vehicle was in flames. Thick black smoke filled the air under the overpass. The bicycles melted off the front. The fiberglass top portion sank into the seating area.
We had moved into the hot sun and huddled together as we watched the fire consume it all.
The Power of Fire
Fire! Fire is transforming. It shows up many places in the Bible. Moses had a different experience with fire. In Exodus 3:2, “And the angel of the Lord appeared to him in a flame of fire out of the midst of a bush; and he looked, and lo, the bush was burning, yet it was not consumed.” Oh, for that Moses experience.
Moses was sent on a mission. “Bring the sons of Israel out of Egypt,” God told him. “Who am I that I should do this job,” he replied. We know the events that followed. Fire showed up in their journey through the desert. In Exodus 13:21, “And the Lord went before them by day in a pillar of cloud to lead them along the way, and by night in a pillar of fire to give them light, that they might travel by day and by night; the pillar of cloud by day and the pillar of fire by night did not depart from before the people.”
They traveled for some time and came to the base of Mt Sinai where they camped and prepared for an encounter with God. Exodus 19:18-19, “And Mt Sinai was wrapped in smoke because the Lord descended upon it in fire; and the smoke of it went up like the smoke of a kiln, and the whole mountain quaked greatly. And as the sound of the trumpet grew louder and louder, Moses spoke, and God answered him in thunder.”
Great noise and fire. This was the prelude to receiving the 10 Commandments, to receiving the whole Torah, to making the covenant with God to be his people. This was the beginning of the Jewish nation.
Shavous, the Festival of Weeks
That event is a holiday in the Jewish year. It is called Shavous or the Festival of Weeks and it is exactly 50 days after Passover. In the Greek speaking world during the time of Jesus, it was called Pentecost, Greek for fiftieth. It was one of three pilgrimage holidays. Jews from all over traveled to Jerusalem for it. This explains why in our scripture reading in Acts this morning, we read about Jews from so many places with so many different languages.
Shavous was celebrated for hundreds of years before Jesus and for all of the 2000 years since then. There is a Jewish midrash, a story, that the Jews overslept on the morning that God was coming to them. So, part of the tradition is to stay up all night learning together from the Torah.
Perhaps these Jewish followers of Jesus who were waiting in Jerusalem as Jesus had told them to do had been together all-night studying Torah. Acts 2 begins, “When the day of Pentecost had come, they were all together in one place. And suddenly a sound came from heaven like the rush of a mighty wind, and it filled all the house where they were sitting. And there appeared to them tongues as of fire, distributed and resting on each one of them. And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues, as the Spirit gave them utterance.”
Peter preached to the thousands who came running to investigate the noise. He used familiar Hebrew scriptures to convince them that Jesus was Lord and Christ. Peter was passionate. He was filled with the Holy Spirit. By the time he was done, everyone was saying, “What shall we do?”
What shall we do?
“What shall we do?” That was the question that filled me as I stood there on the shoulder of Interstate 70 with four grandchildren. The four lanes of traffic that had been stopped for 20 minutes during the fire, started moving again. We were alive and safe. The fire had transformed our material goods into energy. I had no idea at that time how the energy would play out in our lives.
What shall we do? I was in survival mode. We had no vehicle, no camping gear, no food, no purses, no clothes except what we were wearing. Aviva had no shoes. She got out of the RV in socks. We were standing in the sun and it was HOT. It all happened so fast, we were still in disbelief. We held each other, crying. Doni looked at the black mass that had been the RV and said, “Well, I guess the marshmallows got roasted.” We laughed and cried.
Two policemen approached us.” We’ll take you to a hotel,” they said. A hotel? I thought. What would I do in a hotel with children that need kosher food? I need help. And I know where I will get it – from the Orthodox Jewish community. I had experienced over many years how well they care for their extended family. How will I find one? I know!
“No, not a hotel” I said. “Take us to Irv’s Market.” “Irv’s Market???” “Yes, it’s on 102nd and Metcalf in Overland Park.” That’s where I had planned to stop for lunch. Before the trip, I had told Elisheva that we would celebrate her birthday there. It is the only kosher café and grocery store between Denver and St Louis. I knew they could put us in touch with the Jewish community.
When we got to Irv’s market, we were surrounded with the love and caring of the extended Jewish family. We were totally cared for – the owner took us into his home, made a birthday dinner for Elisheva, his wife took us shopping for essentials and paid for the whole cart full. A dentist brought us his supplies, a doctor brought us prescription medicine we needed, a woman in the store asked us our sizes and brought us clothes from the synagogue rummage sale. The loving kindness goes on and on. My daughter wrote the story which was published on Aish.com. You can read it if you feel moved. It is called Kindness in Kansas.
Fire had shifted the purpose of our trip. Instead of us doing acts of loving kindness, we were on the other side, the receiving side. We continued the whole 6 weeks trip in a new form. And we continued to receive from the Jewish community and from friends and family the whole time. The transformational energy from that fire still impacts my life.
The 120 followers
What if we, in this church, were that gathering of 120 of the followers of Jesus? We would have experienced the agony of the death and then the marvel of the resurrection, 50 days ago. We were staying here together, waiting, because Jesus told us to wait “until you are clothed with power from on high.” (Luke 24:49)
We might have stayed up all night studying the Bible. We would talk about all the times Jesus showed up for us during the 40 days after his resurrection. He talked with the women; He appeared in the Koinonia House and ate the cake Patty brought. He met with Steve and Barbara on the road to Woodburn for the Habitat work. He shifted our awareness of the Kingdom of God as He taught us and revealed more of his essence to us.
We waited for 10 more days without him. Now on Pentecost, the great noise brought thousands of people from Wilsonville and the surrounding area into our church, all asking, “What was that?!” They saw the tongues of fire above each of our heads. They heard us talking in different languages. “Are these not the Frog Ponders?” they asked. “Are they drunk?”
Norman stood to quiet them. “We are not drunk, it’s too early in the morning.” Nancy spoke to the people in convincing ways about Jesus as Lord. Linda sang lullabies in Ethiopian, Truk, French, German, Spanish and English to the children gathered.
As each heard the message in ways they could individually receive it, they asked, “So now what shall we do?” Ken quoted Peter. “Change your life. Turn to God and be baptized, each of you, in the name of Jesus Christ, so your sins are forgiven. Receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. The promise is targeted to you and your children, but also to all who are far away –whomever, in fact, our Master God invites.” (Acts 2:38,39)
Three thousand people baptized on the spot! Then Melodie stood and said, “One more thing – Come to our Strawberry Festival this Saturday. Then you will see how we love one another! How we love our community! How we love God!
The Deepest Level
Yes, Pentecost is about noise, fire, red, passion, God’s covenants with humankind.
At its deepest level, Pentecost is about receiving. Each of us receiving God in our being.
As that happens, our lives change.
We love our neighbors with passion.
We love ourselves with passion.
We love God with passion.
And we speak love so others can understand.
Amen.
A sermon by Oralee Stiles, June 4, 2006
Meridian United Church of Christ, Wilsonville, Oregon