Sunday Worship 8 June | Pentecost

Jesus said, “If you love me, keep my commands. And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another advocate to help you and be with you forever— the Spirit of truth. The world cannot accept him, because it neither sees him nor knows him. But you know him, for he lives with you and will be in you. (John 14:15-17) He will teach you all things and will remind you of everything I have said to you. (John 14:26) When he, the Spirit of truth, comes, he will guide you into all the truth. He will not speak on his own; he will speak only what he hears, and he will tell you what is yet to come. (John 16:13) You will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth. (Acts 1:8)"

And Paul wrote, "The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. Against such things there is no law. (Galatians 5:22-23) The Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us through wordless groans. And he who searches our hearts knows the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for God’s people in accordance with the will of God. (Romans 8:26-27) So may the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit. (Romans 15:13)"

I drew that handful of passages from the New Testament, but I want to start by reminding us that the Spirit is not a latecomer to scripture. Genesis opens with the Spirit hovering over the face of the deep. Exodus tells us that Bezalel was filled with the Spirit of God in order that he might have the inspiration and skill to craft the decorative elements of the temple. The Spirit is said to be in or on David and Saul and Samson, men who are shown to be both holy and flawed. Isaiah declares that the Spirit of the Lord is upon him, for he has been anointed to declare good news to the poor and freedom to the captives. Joel prophesies that in the days to come, the Spirit will be poured out upon all people.

The Spirit is and has always been part of the great mystery that is the Trinity, and that means it is difficult to say a great deal about them without veering into one heresy or another. The best way I can express what I understand by the Spirit is to say that they are how we most commonly recognise and experience the presence and activity of God within creation. They are God with us in essence, as Christ was God with us in flesh. Depending on who you ask, there were probably at least three different heresies there, but all committed with an open heart and a curious mind, which I think is the only way we can possibly come at the great mysteries of faith, because they are bigger than our ideas and our words, and so it is only natural that we will fumble a bit.

So the Spirit is eternally present and active, and yet there does seem to be a shift between the Old and New Testaments, at least in the way the Spirit is spoken of. In the Old Testament, the Spirit appears to be given to specific people for specific purposes. In the New Testament, we see the fulfilment of Joel's prophecy as the Spirit is poured out with abandon. Jesus promises baptism with the Spirit to all who believe, and when Peter preaches to those gathered at the home of Cornelius, the Spirit falls on all those who are present. The Spirit empowers the believers to teach and to heal, but it also guides them into all truth and intercedes for them when they are at a loss for words and nurtures them so that they bear good fruit. This is the Spirit at work in everyday people and in the stuff of everyday life. And I say the Spirit does this for them, but I really mean us, because this is what the Spirit does for all who are open to their movement and inspiration.

What does it mean then to be open to the Spirit, or to be baptised with the Spirit? I think the answer is that there isn't just one answer. In some church traditions, baptism with the Spirit is evidenced by speaking in tongues, which is the phrase most often used to describe speaking in unknown languages, as the disciples did at Pentecost. I do believe that the Spirit still leads people to speak in tongues, but I do not believe it is the only sign of the Spirit. I have never spoken in tongues, but I am absolutely certain that I have experienced the Spirit, so please never feel you are lacking anything if speaking in tongues is not how the Spirit has moved you. And while I am on the subject of tongues, scripture suggests that they are not meant to be a private prayer language, as I have sometimes heard them described, but a way of communicating that is beyond what we are normally capable of. They are a gift for the whole church, and should always be accompanied by the gift of interpretation.

So being baptised in the Spirit may mean speaking in tongues or it may not. It may bring other spiritual gifts such as healing or visions or words of knowledge. Or it may be an experience of love or joy or peace or patience or kindness or goodness or faithfulness or gentleness or self-control. Those quieter moments may not always be so obviously spiritual, and they are so easily overlooked, but I think they are where the Spirit does most of their work. Think of Elijah on the mountain. God was not in the wind or the earthquake or the fire, but in the gentle whisper. That is so often the way of the Spirit, coming not with fanfares or fireworks but with nudges and niggles. Being baptised in the Spirit simply means that we allow ourselves to be immersed in the Spirit, and to be transformed by that experience, and that will happen differently for each of us.

Lest I make the Spirit sound too gentle, I do want us to remember that there is a wildness to them, and however slowly or subtly it happens, we are transformed that we might transform the world. We began this morning with a prayer of invocation, and that is a daring thing. When we open ourselves to the Spirit, we cannot be sure quite what we are letting ourselves in for, except that it will lead us further into the kingdom. There is a song I love by a band called Rend Collective, which has these words: “Come be our liberator, speaking Your truth to power / Come like the winds of change / Come like a wildfire, come rolling like a river / Come now and break the chains / Holy Spirit, holy rebel / Rattle cages, kick over the tables / Start a riot of revival / Come on holy renegade/ Start somе holy trouble”. I want to jump onto the barricades every time I listen to Les Miserables, so perhaps there is something in me that is particularly drawn to this image, but I do think we need to expand our ideas of what is possible when we are moving with the Spirit. 

Micah spoke of armies beating their swords into ploughshares and no longer training for war. Mary sang of sending the rich away empty and filling the poor with good things. Jesus called us to love our enemies and treat anyone in need as our neighbour. This is chain-breaking table-turning world-changing stuff and all of it is possible. But it is only possible with the Spirit of God, because a revolution without love or joy or peace or patience or kindness or goodness or faithfulness or gentleness or self-control will only build another empire. We see in the story of Pentecost that the church began as a move of the Spirit, and it became a community where women and slaves were given the same dignity as free men, where everything was held in common and so no one went hungry, where prayer and the breaking of bread were the rhythms and markers of a shared life. It became a community which was known for its radical equality and inclusion, which was persecuted because it was a threat to the status quo, which grew like the mustard tree we talked about a few weeks ago. The church has stumbled many times in the last two thousand years, has become arrogant or complacent or insular. But hope is not lost because it is never lost. The church can and must continue to be a move of the Spirit, open to the wind and the fire and the gentle nudge, speaking the liberating word of God in every tongue, and ready to start some holy trouble.