We gather this day to celebrate the sending of the
Holy Spirit. In so doing, we are reminded that the Church is something more than
a club or a place of learning or a place to find people to care for us or a
social service agency. In and through Holy Baptism, we are called to be the Body
of Christ.
From
time to time I am asked “why does the Church matter?” It’s a fair question to
ask a priest. Why do we baptize and confirm and teach and send people out in
mission?” One could argue that over the centuries, the Church has caused as
much harm as good. All kinds of atrocities have been done by “Christian” people
in the name of God and one doesn’t have to be a historian or social critic to
know that.
Certainly God is bigger than the Church, and I think it’s
good theology to admit that. The Spirit of God is like the wind, blowing where
it will. Nevertheless, the Church claims that through this same Holy Spirit the
baptized are called into covenant with God, to bear witness to what God has
done in Jesus Christ, and to be agents of healing and reconciliation. It seems
to me that when we fall short it’s because we aren’t paying attention to the
Spirit. That doesn’t make the Church “null and void.” It just means we can and
must be intentional about remembering who we are and continue to listen for
the Spirit that leads us into all Truth. Today is an invitation to imagine what that might look like, if and when the Church is being what God
intends it to be.
In
the reading from the second chapter of Acts, Luke insists that we find this Spirit when we encounter “the
other.” People who speak different languages are all in Jerusalem. But this
story isn’t just about people who speak German or French or Russian or
Armenian. People can speak the same “mother tongue” and still speak different
languages. Sometimes that’s because we come from different generations. Other
times it’s because we’re shaped by urban or suburban or rural values.
Communication
is hard work! Most
of us—even when raised in the Church—aren’t accustomed to seeing “the other” as
a gift who can lead us into truth. We see them as a stumbling block and so we're tempted to build walls, not bridges. We are tempted to see them as a barrier to our getting what we
want or think we need. When that happens we begin to allow fear to influence
our words and our tones and our body language—and to block our willingness to
listen. On both sides, conflict potentially escalates and authentic
communication is hindered.
The
story of that first Pentecost isn’t just about what happened one day a long
time ago in Jerusalem. It’s a story about how the Spirit works: about how by
the grace of God sometimes people do listen to, and even hear one another.
Nelle Morton, a twentieth-century Christian educator, liked to use the phrase,
“hearing one another to speech.” That is to say, when we listen for the Spirit alive
in “the other," we are not being passive. Rather, we actively empower “the
other” to speak their truth. Where that happens, whether in first-century
Jerusalem or twenty-first century Massachusetts, the Holy Spirit is at work, and all
are enriched and amazed in the process. The Church matters more than ever in a
pluralistic society precisely because this story reminds us of what is possible
when the Holy Spirit “shows up”—when people do “hear one another to speech”
that leads to healing and to mission
Truth—the
whole truth and nothing but the truth—is never something that any one of us can
possess on our own. It requires community and intentionality. It requires plurality not singularity. “In Christ,” St.
Paul insisted, “there is neither Jew nor Greek, neither male nor female.” On
the great questions, one side never possesses the whole truth; and I believe it
is the Spirit that pushes us into acknowledging that hard reality. Until we are
able to hear, “each in his or her own native tongue.”
The Church is called to be an icon of what is
possible—that is, an image of abundant life animated by God’s Holy Spirit. That
is at the heart of what Pentecost is really all about: the Church as the Church,
showing the world what is possible when the Spirit of God is trusted for
guidance, and wisdom, and comfort.
That doesn’t mean there will be no conflict, and in fact the rest
of Acts is filled with brutal honesty about just how difficult it is to be the
Church. That keeps us from falling into the trap of a false kind of idealism that any
of this is easy. But Pentecost insists that our agendas do not get the
last word—that always the Church is meant to be a place where the simple
question is asked: “what does God desire here?” Where is the Spirit blowing?
That doesn’t ensure that we will always get it right. But it does mean
that we develop the practice of looking beyond ourselves for guidance. It
doesn’t mean that everyone will speak the same language. But it does mean that
we are intentionally becoming multilingual, that we are intentional about
being a listening community, where we “hear one another to speech.”
The
poets may be our best guides in this endeavor. So I close with the text of Timothy Rees’ hymn, found in the Hymnal 82 on page 511.
Holy Spirit, ever
living as the Church’s very life;
Holy
Spirit, ever striving through her in a ceaseless strife;
Holy
Spirit, ever forming in the Church the mind of Christ:
thee we praise
with endless worship for thy fruits and gifts unpriced.
Holy Spirit, ever
working through the Church’s ministry;
quickening,
strengthening, absolving, setting captive sinners free;
Holy Spirit, ever binding age to
age, and soul to soul
in a fellowship unending: thee we
worship and extol.
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