On this Feast of Pentecost, fifty days after Easter, we commemorate, we remember, we celebrate the moment when the Disciples were gathered together, and the Holy Spirit came down upon them like a rushing wind and tongues of flame. It empowered them to preach the Good News, and 3000 people were baptized that day. I cannot imagine that number. I am super excited because we have one baptism today. Can you imagine 3000? That would be a long service.
The Holy Spirit is the focus of Pentecost, but who is this Holy Spirit? Of course, the Holy Spirit is God, part of the Trinity. Next Sunday is Trinity Sunday, so we might unpack that more that day.
In terms of the Scripture, the Holy Spirit is there at the very beginning. In the Creation Story we hear about the Holy Spirit moving over the waters. And in the story of Creation we hear that God breathed the Holy Spirit on Adam to make life.
The Holy Spirit is there time and again throughout Scripture, filling the leaders and the prophets to give them the power they need for the work they are to do. The Holy Spirit is there in the life of Jesus, making it all possible. The angel proclaimed to Mary what is about to happen, and she says that is not possible. But the angel said it is possible. All things are possible with God because Holy Spirit will make this happen.
The Holy Spirit was with Jesus like a dove, coming down upon him at his baptism. The Holy Spirit led or pushed, depending on the translation of the Gospel, Jesus out into the desert. The Holy Spirit was with him at the beginning of his ministry, at his first sermon in Nazareth when he said the Spirit of the Lord is upon me. The Spirit has sent me to preach Good News to the poor, to proclaim release to the captives, to give sight to the blind, to give liberation to those who are oppressed, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor. The year of the Lord’s favor is a particular phrase that means a jubilee year, a year in which all debts are erased so we can try again. It levels everything out so we can give it another go. Jesus is filled with the Holy Spirit.
Jesus teaches us about the Holy Spirit. He says it is like water, a river of Living Water that will give us eternal life. Jesus gives the Holy Spirit to the Disciples after the Resurrection, as we heard in the Gospel reading today. He breathes the Holy Spirit upon them.
Today, on Pentecost, the Holy Spirit is likened to wind or fire. Paul, as we heard in today’s Epistle reading, teaches us the Holy Spirit is the one that gives us gifts. All the gifts we have are given to us by the Spirit. He names some, like wisdom and knowledge and prophecy, speaking in tongues. The Epistle goes on to list more, including that wonderful passage in 1 Corinthians 13, the great ode to love that comes out of this section describing the gifts of the Spirit. Faith, hope, and love are gifts the Holy Spirit gives us, and the greatest of these is love.
When we look at all the stories about the Holy Spirit in Scripture, what are the takeaways? First of all, the Holy Spirit is intangible and ineffable. The Holy Spirit as wind, rushing wind, the breath of life, flames, birds, water are things we can only grasp through metaphors, including paradoxical metaphors that contradict each other, life fire and water.
The Holy Spirit is a little chaotic and uncontrollable, like wind and fire, and like doves. Have you ever spent time looking at doves? They are chaotic, going in ways we don’t expect them to go. That is like the Holy Spirit.
The Holy Spirit is also quite powerful. A powerful and combustible energy that is transformative. And the Holy Spirit is motivating, empowering, an insistent present in our lives. The Holy Spirit is the giver of gifts and the giver of life itself.
The Holy Spirit is intangible, ineffable, chaotic, powerful, empowering, motivating, life-giving, gift-giving. This thing that we cannot get a handle on completely, and we certainly cannot control it, will come and go as it will. The best we can do with it is to pray, to pray for the Spirit to come upon us.
We will soon pray for the Holy Spirit to come upon the person being baptized here today, so that she can join those 3000 baptized on the Day of Pentecost and become a part of the Body of Christ. We will pray that this chaotic, ineffable, powerful, transformative, gift-giving, life-giving Spirit is going to fill her and make her one with Christ, and one with us as a member of the Body of Christ.
My prayer for you on this Pentecost, my friends, is that the Holy Spirit may come upon you like the wind, and fill you with the breath of God, the breath of life. I pray that the Holy Spirit may burn above you like tongues of flame, and may burn below you to get you moving. I also pray that the Holy Spirit may burn within you, and the light of that flame may shine brightly into this world, shining to illuminate the love of God. I pray that the Holy Spirit may soar around you like a bird, like a dove, and bring peace to your life and those you interact with. And I pray that this Holy Spirit may guide you and lead you and sometime push you, empowering you and transforming you with those spiritual gifts, most importantly the gifts of faith, hope, and love.
That is my prayer for you, my friends. Come, Holy Spirit, come.
AMEN
