Today is an exciting day in the Christian calendar… so exciting that most of you are wearing the colour red as a reminder of what day it is. Today we celebrate Pentecost. 50 days after the resurrection of our Lord and Savior. 10 days after his ascension into heave. Today is the day we celebrate the coming of the Holy Spirit, the day the 12 apostles received the gift of tongues, the day which some argue as the first day Christianity became an actual religion. It is a day we celebrate the completion of the Trinity. Truly this is an important day for us to remember.
Now, for those of you who do not know, I have just recently graduated from Moravian Theological Seminary. I have spent the last 3 years studying scripture, learning how to preach and teach and look at things from a theological perspective. Most of the time, this ought to give me an advantage in understanding the Scripture, but in this instance, I’m not sure if it really does. You see, it seems that for those who are theologically trained, it is easier for us to identify with the 12 disciples who had tongues of fire come and rest on them. That’s the reason we pastors ask you to wear red on days like this. We want you to identify with the disciples like we do.
Unfortunately I don’t think most people identify with the 12. I don’t think we really grasp the concept of speaking in tongues…otherwise we probably wouldn’t be in the Moravian church this morning, we would be in a Pentecostal church, watching others around us speaking in tongues. The question then becomes who do we identify with? How does the story of Pentecost become the story of us?
I think we best identify with the crowd…the ones who gathered in bewilderment at the strange sound that apparently emanated from those flaming tongues. Perhaps we even are a part of the crowds who proclaimed that the disciples have had too much wine. We are the ones who listened to Peter, the rock on which Jesus shall build the church, who heard the words
“People of Judea and all who live in Jerusalem, let this be known to you, and listen to what I say. 15Indeed, these are not drunk, as you suppose, for it is only nine o’clock in the morning. 16No, this is what was spoken through the prophet Joel: 17‘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. 18Even upon my slaves, both men and women, in those days I will pour out my Spirit; and they shall prophesy. 19And I will show marvelous things in the heaven above and signs on the earth below, blood, and fire, and smoky mist. 20The sun shall be turned to darkness and the moon to blood, before the coming of the Lord’s great and glorious day. 21Then everyone who calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved.’
That everyone that Peter and Joel were referring to is you and I. Now, the Scripture which we read today ends without telling us what happens to the crowd. In fact, most of the Book of Acts focuses more on what happened to the apostles rather than the regular people. Its only natural for a story to focus on the people who received those flaming tongues… but it means we are stuck as congregations knowing how to function. Now over the past 2000 or so years, we’ve developed complex systems of how we “do” church. We have pages and pages of bylaws, we have unwritten rules of what it means to be a member of each and every one of our congregations… yet often we fail to look at the end of the second chapter of the book of Acts to use as a guide in how to do church.
Verses 42 through 47 state that “they devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and to the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer. Everyone was filled with awe, and many wonders and miraculous sings were done by the apostles. All the believers were together and had everything in common. Selling their possessions and good, they gave to anyone as they had need. Every day they continued to meet together in the temple courts. They broke bread in their homes and ate together with glad and sincere hearts, praising God and enjoying the favor of all the people. And the Lord added to their number daily those who were being saved.”
Now, there is a growing movement in Christianity today to get back to this type of church. The idea of communal living and helping their neighbors in a sort of new monastic movement has really caught on. In fact, next fall Moravian seminary is going to have a special guest lecture by Shane Claiborne, a person who is leading an intentional community of believers who seek to make a difference in Kensington Philadelphia. Yet, as appealing as this idea might be to some, I don’t think the answer to identifying with the first century church is to act in the same manner as much as possible. Instead the answer lies in the gospel text we heard this morning.
From John 16:13 we hear that “When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth; for he will not speak on his own, but will speak whatever he hears, and he will declare to you the things that are to come.”
This means that the answer to being a successful church, the answer to the question of how we identify with the crowd of believers at the very first Pentecost is to be led by the Holy Spirit. To be led into the truth. This should be both an exciting and scary journey. To be led by the Spirit means that we must be willing to go to places we never thought we would go before. Remember how I had previously said that when we pastors ask you to wear red, its usually because we want you to identify with the disciples? When you look at the red that you are wearing, you should instead identify with being led by the spirit as a community of believers.
There are really only two keys which I believe the early church gives us as a model to being led by the Spirit today. The first is the breaking of bread and the second is prayer. Take a moment to look at the family on your right and on your left. When was the last time you broke bread with them and prayed with them in a place other than church? When was the last time that together you sought to help their neighbors who had a particular need? Our challenge is to get to know one another as brothers and sisters in Christ so that we may share what we have with those who need it. I don’t know what the needs of those around you are. The only way we find out is through time together and prayer and then a willingness to follow the Spirit’s answer.
I trust that the Spirit is going to lead this congregation to do amazing things in the west side of Bethlehem. The only thing we have to do is follow.
