Pentecost as Living Breathing Witness!

Last week, I explored (wrote and preached on) the Ascension as Benediction.  So here is a followup, on Pentecost, the amazingly explosive day God gave "birth" to the church through the power of the Holy Spirit!   Last week, Jesus ascended into heaven blessing the disciples as he "disappeared."   Of course, Jesus didn't exactly disappear for he was on his way to re-union with God. This reunion was one from which the Spirit would come upon, not just special people for special times, but potentially upon all people for all times.     As I contemplated Pentecost and the early church this week, I rested in a fallow time of waiting by praising God with the disciples and keeping a gratitude journal.

Mexican Pentecost Icon (public domain artwork)

In great anticipation, I wait for the story of the Spirit to descend upon the people of God to give them the power to be witnesses to the Gospel.  What about me?  Do I experience the word "witness" as a verb - is it something I do?  Or do I experience it as a noun - something I am?    OR ... it is the now old expression "both/and?"  YES!  The question becomes for me, "What does it mean for my life to 'be' a living, breathing witness?

Emerging last week from my ponderings on the Ascension, I meditated on the rhythm of life that Jesus lived and invites us into, his own withdrawing for prayer and rest woven together with his ministry of preaching, teaching, and healing.  As he left and blessed the disciples this rhythm was heard in the text: wait! pray & praise God then receive power & witness ... remembering this same rhythm has arisen over Christian history:  St. Benedict's "pray and work," Wesley's means of grace in "works of piety and works of mercy," and Rohr's center for "action and contemplation."  In many ways, this rhythm itself is "archetype" of the spiritual journey, which means it "recurs as a symbol or motif."  I suppose if we think of creating a life with God, we could go all the way back to creation for a foundational symbol.  God, as Creator, worked and rested. 

For many months, I have felt a shift within, God moving me deeper and wider and farther into the unknown.  I feel like I am being called into a place I have never been before.  What I found this week as I spent time seeking God through praise and gratitude is that I am, once again, looking at every space and every movement as a time for finding blessings within them.  It is deepening my sense of God's presence and my faith in the unknown. I can feel my heart opening wider ... fertile ground for the question, "What does it mean for my life to 'be' a living, breathing witness?

Look up joyfully and say to the Lord in words or the desire of the heart: that which I am I offer to you Lord for you are it, and think nakedly, fully and boisterously that you are who you are without any questioning.  ~ The Cloud of Unknowing

As Christians, we celebrate these 2 weeks, Ascension (Jesus ascends) and Pentecost (Spirit descends) as an ending and a beginning.  Our texts emerge from the 2-part volume (Luke-Acts) penned by the author, traditionally known as "Luke."  As we left the disciples last week, the gospel text says they, "were continually in the temple courts blessing God."  (Luke 24:53, NET)  Blessing, in this context, means they were praising God.  As we move into the reading from Acts (2:1-4, NET) this week, it begins, "Now when the day of Pentecost had come, they were all together in one place. Suddenly a sound like a violent wind blowing came from heaven and filled the entire house where they were sitting. And tongues spreading out like a fire appeared to them and came to rest on each one of them. All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit, and they began to speak in other languages as the Spirit enabled them."

WOW!  All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit, and they began to speak in other languages as the Spirit enabled them! I am drawn to the Holy Spirit!  I am drawn to this sense of power that descended upon them just as Jesus said it would.  The disciples and all of the followers of Jesus received the power to communicate with the world!  What rejoicing there must have been ... and yet, there is more to the story!  Read Acts 2:5-13 (NET)

Now there were devout Jews from every nation under heaven residing in Jerusalem. When this sound occurred, a crowd gathered and was in confusion, because each one heard them speaking in his own language. Completely baffled, they said, “Aren’t all these who are speaking Galileans? And how is it that each one of us hears them in our own native language? Parthians, Medes, Elamites, and residents of Mesopotamia, Judea and Cappadocia, Pontus and the province of Asia, Phrygia and Pamphylia, Egypt and the parts of Libya near Cyrene, and visitors from Rome, both Jews and proselytes, Cretans and Arabs—we hear them speaking in our own languages about the great deeds God has done!” All were astounded and greatly confused, saying to one another, “What does this mean?” But others jeered at the speakers, saying, “They are drunk on new wine!”

Through my 21st century ears, the coming of the Holy Spirit sounds beautiful, but in reality it wasn't.  It was powerful but not necessarily was it a beautiful experience.  All were astounded and greatly confused!  Some accused the people of being drunk.   This amazing power to communicate, to bring people together in a new way, to be able to share the gospel story with people you couldn't even have said, "hello and how do you do?" to before the Spirit descended!  Some say this is the "undoing" of the Tower of Babel.  But ... it wasn't beautiful, people were filled with inner chaos.  How hard it is to embrace something new, someONE new!  How hard it is to believe someone else may have something that we don't have ... and yet, the gospel story invites all of its hearers to change, the ones speaking and the ones hearing.   The gospel story invites all of us into the question, "What does it mean for my life to 'be' a living, breathing witness?"

On that day of Pentecost, gathered together were many devout Jews.  The gospel story was inviting them to change not just their lives but their religion as they were now expressing it.  They were being invited to see the Messiah as a dead man now resurrected, risen, and ascended but not sitting on the earthly throne of a restored Jerusalem but on a heavenly throne.  Yeah, that's right.  Even the disciples had a hard time with that one.  Just a few verses before, they asked “Lord, is this the time when you are restoring the kingdom to Israel?”  (Acts 1:6b, NET)

How often do we hear Jesus say, "You have heard (this) but I tell you (that)" as he invites new ways of thinking, new ways of seeing, new ways of experiencing life.  And always it is with the purpose of expanding the kingdom.  Jesus welcomed the people no one else would welcome because Jesus sees each person through the eyes of the God of Love.  Jesus sees what we cannot see.  Jesus loves in ways and in depths that we cannot.  Jesus died for ALL.  This expansion of the kingdom, this welcome extended to ALL, is so often met with resistance.  Oh, yeah!  How can I confront my resistance to change so I can embody the question, "What does it mean for my life to 'be' a living, breathing witness?"

Finally in our passage for Pentecost, to accusations of drunkenness, Peter said, "this is what was spoken about through the prophet Joel: And in the last days it will be,’ God says, ‘that I will pour out my Spirit on all people ... and then everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved." (Acts 2:17, 21 NET) 

Does ALL mean ALL?  Either it does or it doesn't.  Does everyone mean everyone?  Either it does or it doesn't.  I wonder just how many and how often hungry, thirsty, and broken people, sinners all of us, who sincerely "call on the name of the Lord" are stopped at the door of our hearts and our churches and told, "no."   And somehow, I think that if they aren't calling on my name or your name, we don't have the authority to close the door to the kingdom in their face.  We just might be closing our own door to the kingdom ... and suddenly it all gets turned upside down, inside out ... the ones who think they are "in" are out and the ones we pronounce as "out" are in.   Now, that sounds like the Jesus I know and love!  Paradox abounds!

I don't know, there is just something about gratitude in my prayer life that helps me to see blessings in difficult places and opens my heart to God, to others often unwelcome in my world, and yes even to the parts of myself that I don't like.  I ask myself the question one last time,  "What does it mean for my life to 'be' a living, breathing witness?"

Jesus said, "Wait for the Holy Spirit." Only when my heart is open can I receive the power of the Holy Spirit.  Only through the power of the Holy Spirit, can I allow God to change my heart so that I can travel beyond the kingdom of Cindy to deeply embrace the kingdom of God!   


Don't you just some days want to shout, "Come, Holy Spirit, Come!  Come NOW!" 

And may it be so!  Amen!

A simple prayer to welcome the Spirit of Pentecost to the World:  May the dove of peace be with us this day. May many blessings follow us always. May the Holy Spirit guide our path, give us strength, and kindle our heart for the journey into the kingdom -- forever. Amen.

followed by a personal 3-fold Breath prayer that emerges ... 

Breathing in ... Holy Spirit ... Breathing out ... guide my path

Breathing in ... Holy Spirit ... Breathing out ... give me strength

Breathing in ... Holy Spirit ... Breathing out ... kindle my heart 

(for the journey into the kingdom)

Repeat your breath prayer until you are moved to a gentle Amen.