by Danielle Shroyer
New Testament Reading: Acts 2:1-21
For Sunday, May 19, 2013: Year C—Pentecost
I’ll be straight with you: Pentecost is my favorite Christian day. So please excuse me while I hop up on my Pentecost soapbox for a moment.
[Clearing throat with gravitas.]
Pentecost is a radically important day. It’s the rightful conclusion to the story of resurrection. The dismantling that begins in Holy Week isn’t completed until Pentecost. Yes, we are all rightfully dazzled by the surprising turn of events at Easter. But then Jesus leaves on Ascension, and the Spirit comes at Pentecost. Then and only then is the work of Holy Week finished. So unless you want to have a really slim view of salvation (and really, who wants to skimp out on something as important as salvation?), you’ve got to hold all of these mysteries together to get the fullest picture of this new creation. Otherwise, you are going to MISS OUT.
The Drip Becomes a Firehose
From the moment Jesus entered into Jerusalem riding on a donkey, our expectations have been upended, recalibrated, frustrated and fulfilled far beyond what we could have imagined. The same holds true for Pentecost. Whatever the disciples were expecting when Jesus told them the Spirit was coming, you can bet they were not expecting what they got: divided tongues of fire, rapid onset foreign language fluency, chaos on the streets of Jerusalem that apparently looked something like a drunken party in the middle of the day.
I have no idea what plans they had for the future of the faith up there in that room, if they had any at all, but there was no paper napkin with this mess drawn on it. Because nobody in their right minds would consider anointing a whole house full of prophets in the span of one day. Nobody except the Spirit of God.
Who’s The Greatest? You, and you, and you...
Please consider how world-changing that is for a moment. Up to this point in God’s story, a small select few have been given the Spirit of God, and it’s been a limited time offering. Saul got a turn, David got a turn, the prophets got a turn, and so on. It was all very contained. Now all of a sudden the Spirit comes whooshing through and starts anointing people left and right.
Remember how the disciples argued about who would be the greatest among them? Consider this Jesus’ final answer.
Within a day, there are 3000 new followers of Jesus in Jerusalem. The Spirit has left the building, people.
Don’t Domesticate the Dove
The Spirit of God has been released into the world. Not contained but set free. Not limited but expanding. And what else would we expect, if this Spirit of Life is indeed the One through whom God raised Jesus? This is the Spirit of Life, who God has called not only to raise Jesus to new life but to raise all of creation to new life.
Why is Pentecost important? Why is the resurrection story not completed until Acts 2? Because we are not equipped to be who God wants us to be in this new world moving toward new creation until the Spirit comes whooshing through the room. Pentecost is the day that makes the future of the church possible. Without Pentecost, we’d just be people who tell Jesus’ story. With Pentecost, we’re people who live into Jesus’ story.
So let us not write a sweet little sermon about how we all love the Spirit as if we are talking about the Snuggle teddy bear. Let’s go big and go bold, people. We are talking about the Spirit of LIFE.
And let’s not talk about how the Spirit gives us gifts and then list them and describe how, precisely, they are to be used. Consider the irony. Boxing in what the Spirit does and how the Spirit does it is nothing more than an attempt to clip her wings. Let her fly, preachers. Let her fly.
The Hardest Question
We don’t have any idea what the Spirit will do next, so let’s not pretend that we do, or try to limit our assumptions about what the Spirit might do. The one thing we know for sure is that the Spirit is bringing us toward new creation, so whatever it is, it’s going to be good
This Pentecost, can we let the Spirit fly? Can we take the beauty of Pentecost seriously? Can we preach it like we mean it?
Danielle Shroyer is the Pastor of Journey Church in Dallas, TX. She is the author of The Boundary-Breaking God: An Unfolding Story of Hope and Promise (Jossey-Bass, 2009) and blogs at www.danielleshroyer.com. Danielle lives with her husband, two children, and two wild and crazy dogs in Dallas.
