Happy Birthday, Church!—A Sermon on the Power of Pentecost

Grace and peace from God our Creator, hope in our Redeemer Jesus the Christ, and the promised gifts of the Holy Spirit are with you, always.

Throughout Easter, we’ve been starting every service—and again every sermon—with “Christ is risen! Christ is risen indeed, hallelujah!”, right? And that’s true again today—because every morning is Easter morning—but today is also not just any Easter day. It’s the festival of Pentecost! There is, disappointingly, no Pentecost-specific call and response to kick off with. I think we should invent one. The one I have invented is that I say, “Happy Birthday, Church!” and then everyone replies, “Happy Birthday, Church” in a different language.

Feliz cumpleaños, iglesia!

Bon anniversaire, église!

(I also signed “happy birthday, church”)

Since we read the text from the Acts of the Apostles in a few languages, and the Holy Spirit empowered the disciples to go out and do the work in every place, I assume that you get it. This is, easily, in the top five nerdiest things I’ve ever suggested. Perhaps it will catch on? Perhaps we will never speak of it again.

This Pentecost day is a very important one in the history of Christianity, but it has not caught on in our popular culture the way that Christmas and Easter have. I’m not 100% sure why that is. Perhaps it’s because we get a little weirded out by the whole “tongues of fire” thing, or because that whole list of people—Parthians, Medes, Elamites, etc.—doesn’t mean much to us, or maybe because we agree with the person in the crowd who suggested that everyone was drunk.

I think, though, that being 2000 years removed from this spark of the Church, we’re just not amazed. 

We are the results of this day of Pentecost. We, the Belfry, and we the ELCA, and we the Episcopal Church, and we, Christians of any kind from any place are only assembled here today because those folks were assembled there that day. We have travelled to other cities or states and found church communities we recognize. We have heard, perhaps, about the Lutheran World Federation and the Anglican Communion and the World Council of Churches, so we are not surprised that the Gospel is proclaimed in every language in every nation. We are witnesses to 2000 years of preaching, teaching, travelling, and growing. We may be a ragtag bunch of bumbling disciples—we’re in good company—but we are not the only followers of the risen Christ. We are part of a huge community of believers and practicers that spans the continents and the centuries.

We are aware, too, of the dark side of this history. We know about colonialism and imperialism, how Christendom was and is violently forced upon people across continents—including ours. We know that Christianity can be used to limit people and to subjugate them. When we think about it that way, we know that there is a difference between Christian community and Christian empire. We know that we have power to wield, and we must wield it for the good of the world. 

The reading from 1 Corinthians reminds us that each of us is part of this Church’s history, its present, and its future. “There are varieties of gifts, but the same Spirit,” the Apostle Paul writes. You are gifted with so many things—wisdom, knowledge, faith, healing, miracles, prophecy—not to mention your more worldly gifts, like learning new languages, and math, and writing poetry, and interpreting the law, and dancing, and crafting, and telling jokes, and storytelling, and comforting your friends, and speaking truth to power, and playing soccer, and baking cupcakes. “All these are activated by one and the same Spirit, who allots to each one individually just as the Spirit chooses” (1 Cor 12). 

The Church has been built by millions of people working together throughout history, and it will continue to be built by us. In this 500th anniversary year of Martin Luther’s Protestant Reformation, we are focused on what the next 500 years of change and protest will look like. The first Pentecost was the birthday of the Church; what is Pentecost 2017 the birth of?

It doesn’t have to be something quite so momentous as the start of the early church, or the Holy Roman Empire, or the Reformation, or the Great Awakening, or any other seismic shift in the life of the Church. In fact, I think we get into trouble when we expect things like that. The folks who were alive during those times probably didn’t sit around talking about how neat it was to be part of history—they may not have even really known just how world-altering those periods would turn out to be. They were faithful people, open to the movement of the Holy Spirit, going about their lives in a new way.

In what ways, on this Pentecost day, can we be open to the movement of the Holy Spirit?

How can we go about our lives in a new way?

Because of Easter, Pentecost is possible, and because of Pentecost, the rest is possible. Because Peter and the rest of the apostles before us were empowered by the Holy Spirit, we are empowered by the Holy Spirit. We are empowered to bring good news to the poor, liberation to the captive, wholeness to the broken, healing to the wounded, courage to the fearful, joy to the mourning, and hope to the hopeless.

After worship tonight, it’ll be time for our annual Pentecost balloon launch. Every year, we write our prayers for the church and the world on pieces of paper that we tie to—biodegradable, minimal turtle murder—balloons. We launch these prayers into the sky, in hopes that our words and our work will move far beyond these walls. 

This activity may feel silly; we live in a cynical world. Our cynical world routinely disparages or gives up on something before it has even begun, rather than risk being disappointed or rejected. In this environment, the bearers of good news are desperately necessary.  

To a world that says no, Pentecost empowers us to say yes.

To a world ruled by hate, Pentecost empowers us to say “God calls you beloved.”

To a world in fear, Pentecost empowers us to say, “Do not be afraid.”

To a world at war, Pentecost empowers us to say, “The peace of Christ is with you.”

To a world that says “Crucify him!” Pentecost empowers us to say, “Christ is risen, indeed!”

 

Hallelujah!

Happy Birthday, Church!

 

Belong—A Sermon of Promises

Grace and peace from God our Creator, Hope in our Redeemer Jesus the Christ, and the promised gifts of the Holy Spirit are with you always.

The lectionary is weird. We’re in the seventh week of Easter, but the Gospel lesson today is from the night before Jesus died. At first glance, it’s backward and disorienting. But the people who put the readings together are professionals, so I’ve decided to trust them.

Scholars, like the people who assembled the lectionary, call these chapters of John’s Gospel the “Farewell Discourses.” Jesus is saying a lengthy goodbye to his friends and disciples. In it, he sums up a lot of the things he has said before; he reiterates the most important details; he makes new promises. This week’s text is a prayer he says in the Garden of Gethsemane—just after the Last Supper, just before he’s arrested. That’s quite a moment in the life of his community. He prays “on behalf of these”—the disciples—“but also on behalf of those who will believe in me through their word, that they may all be one.” That's us! 


The fun thing about being Christians so many generations removed from Jesus is that there is no way that the Church looks like what Jesus thought his followers would look like. Millions of people, across the globe, organized together because of the love of God through Jesus. Except, more often than thought, we’re not very good at being “together.” We have this nasty habit of dividing ourselves on all sorts of lines—denominations, languages, races, classes, nations. 

Even when there were just the dozen or so disciples, it seems Jesus had a hunch that they’d struggle to stay together. I think the lectionary assemblers new that, just like Jesus' friends needed to be reminded of all the ways in which God would remain with them after Jesus' departure, we too need that reminder after we've celebrated Easter. We need to be reminded of the promises that were made, that are still being kept.

Karoline Lewis is a preacher I want to be like when I grow up. She wrote this about this week’s Gospel story: “...God counts on us to embody God’s promise in a world of broken ones. God needs us to give witness to the ultimate promise kept when our experience….knows only empty promises. God invites us to live in the promise that is truly ours forever—that is the resurrection difference.”

Since we are living in the world after the resurrection, there is a whole new range of possibilities open to us. But I think I speak for a lot of us when I confess that the logistics of the resurrection are distracting, and I never really get past that. Karoline continues:

“Resurrection is often relegated to a belief of the church to which we simply comply and that which we by rote confess. We go through the motions each Easter, each time the creed is said, but how often do we stop and say that resurrection makes a difference for how I live my day today? What might it feel like to know that the promise of the resurrection is mine now?”

What might it feel like to be open to the newness of resurrection? What might it feel like to try being church a completely different way? How might it change what we do and what we believe?

Let’s step back a second. What does it even mean to believe? What are some synonyms you can think of? Audience participation! 

When you google the word believe, as you might do, casually and hypothetically, the primary definition is “feel sure of the truth of.” You know those words of the creed we say before the Eucharist? “I believe in God, the father almighty…”

What if we said “I feel sure of the truth of God the Father Almighty, creator of heaven and earth. I feel sure of the truth of Jesus Christ, his only son, our Lord...” and then “I feel sure of the truth of the Holy Spirit…”

I think that, like the resurrection, we get stuck on the word “believe” a lot, because we worry about whether our beliefs are “right” or not. And often, especially on a college campus, it can be challenging to respond when people push you on your beliefs, right? And when you’re still sort of working them out, that can be a big roadblock.

There’s an Episcopal author named Diana Butler Bass who has written several books about church. She wrote one called Christianity After Religion that looks at what we’re going to be in this age of “spiritual but not religious”-ness. It’s an interesting book, and it has one part that I’ve carried with me since I read it. She says that in the old way of being church, there were three B’s: Believe, behave, belong.

You went to a church because you believed the things they believed (or wanted to) and then learned from them how to behave according to those beliefs, and then once you’d gotten all of that squared away, you could “join” the church officially. You could really belong there. That probably sounds familiar, and maybe doesn’t sound entirely problematic to you.

But what if we flipped it? She asks. What if instead, we belong and then behave and then believe? What if we are invited and welcomed into a community, no questions asked? What if, then, we see how others act and we learn new ways to love ourselves and our neighbors? What if, then, we come to believe the truths they teach?

Here at the Belfry, I hope you feel like you are part of something. I hope you feel like you are invited and welcome to be all of who you are, whether you’re even sure who you are. I hope you feel like the other people here are learning alongside you, and that you--as individuals and as a community--are growing. I hope you feel like, as we talk and learn and read and sing and laugh, that these promises that God makes are promises to you.

And I promise you that, while you’re here and after you leave here—whether you graduate or study abroad or finish your service with LEVN—that you will always belong here.

If you discern that you’re Lutheran or that you aren’t; if you discern that you’re Episcopalian or that you aren’t; if you discern that you’re queer or that you aren’t; if you discern that you’re called to be a pastor or that you aren’t; if you discern that you’re going to graduate or that you aren’t.

Whoever you are, you belong here.

You don’t have to sit in this chapel every Wednesday to belong here. You don’t have to show up for Bible study every week, or for Tapping Into Theology every month, or for book club, or for Prov, or for anything. I like you, and so I hope you want to show up to all those things and create other spaces for other folks to feel like they belong here, too! That’s the behave part. That can come next.

You are part of the Belfry and you are part of God’s family at all times and in all places. I promise.

God loves you. You are free. Go tell everyone else. (Acts 2:1-21)

On Monday afternoon, Jonathan and I were walking through Berkeley for lunch, and he casually asked—as he kindly does when he knows I’m preaching—“What’s your sermon about?” 

I said, “Pentecost!” And he, as a secular Jew, rightfully said something like, “Right. Whatever that is…?”

I tried to explain, loosely, that it’s the 50th day of Easter and we celebrate the Holy Spirit coming to the Apostles. This slough of church words did not unfurrow his eyebrows.

I tried again: The apostles were all gathered together for dinner—it was 50 days after Passover—and were locked in their upper room in Jerusalem again because they were still afraid. Things hadn’t quite settled down with the powers that be, and the apostles were struggling to proclaim the Gospel that Jesus had given them.

The thing is, I think, they were so used to Jesus being around, providing direct instructions day after day, that once left to their own devices, they realized how much they’d relied on him to do the work of the church. They felt lost.

Before he died, Jesus had told the apostles, “I will not leave you orphaned…God will send you an advocate to be with you…” (John 14). As usual, I imagine that what Jesus said and the disciples heard were not exactly the same. They likely expected some…person to show up and take the lead. Have you ever felt like that? Like in a “Jesus take the wheel” kind of way? You and Peter both.

So in this Acts story, they’re behind closed doors, whispering the good news to one another, paralyzed with fear. And for good reason! The leaders that killed Jesus are still the leaders. Politics are tenuous, and nobody wants to be made an example. The apostles face a tough choice—stay safe and quiet or take the risk and go public? “Will the movement be ruled by fear? Will the apostles be contained and confined? Rendered timid and silent? Pentecost comes with a bold answer—no.”[1]

Herein lies the deep subversive nature of the Pentecost event and of the early church.

Pentecost was and is a public display of our freedom from fear, found in the liberating power of Christ crucified, emboldening us to speak the truth of the Gospel aloud.

In the Acts of the Apostles, the powers and principalities are wary of this freedom to speak. They try to discredit this revolutionary act by claiming that those bold enough to speak are crazy or drunk.
No earthly power can match this empowered community of believers—preachers, fishermen, widows, prostitutes, tax collectors, lepers, women, children.

The promise that Jesus made to the apostles—that they will have this power—is of course tied to conflict and persecution. Remember when he warned them that they would be persecuted for being associated with him (John 15)? Welp, this is it. But he also said that in those scary times, the Holy Spirit would empower them to speak their truths even more boldly.

Pentecost means the apostles can go into their community and say “Jesus the Christ is risen—alleluia! You are free from sin! You are free from bondage! Get up—walk! Be healed! You are my sister, my brother—eat at my table! Drink and be filled! You are the beloved child of the living God! No high priest, no king, no excuse for a civic leader can chain you anymore. You are free.”

Here, now, in 2015, where are we? Are we locked in the upper room, fearful of where our truths may lead? Are we cautious to identify ourselves as Christians? Are we cautious to say “God loves you” when we meet someone who clearly believes otherwise? Are we cautious to say “come eat at our table”?

Because here, now, in 2015, it’s not hip to dig Jesus. It’s not hip to say “God loves you” in public. And the Religious Right has commandeered so much of our precious holy language that when we say “My faith informs my politics” we have to explain really hard what we don’t mean.

Proclaiming liberation is still unpopular in our world of war, mass incarceration, police brutality, racism, sexism—we have much to fear.

But after today, after the Pentecost has come, we are free. We are free to be bold. We are bold to proclaim that Jesus the Christ is risen—alleluia! We are bold to proclaim that we and every living thing are free from the power of sin and death.

When we see or hear the “good news” being used to exclude, hurt, control, or otherwise disempower our sisters and brothers, we are bold to say enough now! No more!

When we see or hear the name of Christ used to justify violence, oppression, racism, misogyny, sexism, heterosexism, imperialism, patriarchy, war, slavery, or silence—in our churches, schools, government, families—we are bold say enough now! No more!

The question I leave you with, dear sisters, is not “if” you will boldly proclaim the liberating truths of the Gospel –but when, where, and how.

May you be emboldened by the power of the Holy Spirit this day and always. Amen.



[1] Bill Wylie-Kellerman, “In the Boldness of the Spirit: Fellowship and risk before the authorities” Sojourners.