May 24, 2015

Helen Jacobi

The Day of Pentecost     Acts 2:1-21     John 15:26-27; 16:4b-15

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Who was there, I wonder? Mary, Jesus’ mother, Salome, Mary Magdalene, the other Mary, then the 12 - Peter, James, John, the disciple whom Jesus loved, then maybe Nicodemus, Joseph of Arimathea, Jesus’ sisters and brothers, his followers, people he had healed. They were all there. They had gone to Jerusalem to celebrate the festival of the harvest, the festival of weeks. 50 days since the Passover, 50 days since he had died.

Many of them had seen him, alive, or so they thought. Afterwards, when telling other people and trying to answer their questions, sometimes they weren’t so sure. So they gathered together to reassure each other. Yes they had seen him, it wasn’t just a trick. But now he had gone. He had said to wait, but for what?

At the time, no one had a clue what was happening. Later some of them said it felt like a wind. Made them think of the wind of God at creation. Some of them said they saw fire, but no one was burned, like Moses’ burning bush, or the fire that led the people in the desert. And then they found themselves out on the streets wanting to tell everyone about Jesus and who he was and what he did. And it all seemed much clearer, who he was and what he had done. So clear they were able to explain it to others, and the others understood.

Then Peter gathered a crowd and started preaching about a new way. A way to be, to be a follower of Jesus. God, he said, will give young people visions of the way the world could be, and old people will dream dreams and want it to be so. Others will interpret the events of the day and see them through the eyes of God. And so it was that the Spirit burst once more into the world and turned the world around. And the disciples found an audience receptive to their preaching. Their’s was a world in flux and change. There were many cultures living alongside each other, many religions. People were seeking and searching for a deeper meaning in their lives.

So before too long there were small communities emerging inspired by the Spirit and led and taught by those first followers. But before even a new generation of leaders had emerged there were fights over the interpretation of the teaching and who could speak the “truth” on behalf of Jesus. By the time John wrote his gospel a debate about the nature of truth was well alive.

John has Jesus say, “when the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all truth” (16:13). This is not a true / false kind of truth. Not a modern understanding of truth where if one concept is true the rest are untrue. It is more of a post modern understanding of truth being something to be discovered and not exclusive. The Greek word aletheia means something that is unveiled, or no longer concealed, a mystery that is unveiled, and it is more the truth of wisdom than the truth of knowledge [1]. Aletheia, truth, is a way of being more than a thing to be known. What kind of truth do we seek here this morning as we gather to recall the events of long ago?

Many years ago when I was first ordained, I was a curate at St Marys’ in Karori, Wellington and as a clergy team we were chaplains to Samuel Marsden School across the road. I was assigned an RE class for a 6 week block, teaching something on the NT, I think. The girls were 11 and 12 year olds. I was very excited about this opportunity and was sure I was going to inspire them as a young woman deacon. But of course I knew nothing about teaching 11 year olds… Part way through my first class a hand went up and a sweet young thing asked me “is the Bible true?”. And I said “well, that depends what you mean by truth” and then I got stuck in a conversation about the reliability of scripture and didn’t God write it? (the girl was a Baptist). I now know more about the learning development of children and their different conceptual levels of understanding; and I also know more about being manipulated in the classroom by little brats; and so my answer should have been “yes” and moved on. I never quite got the class back on track after that.

The truth the Spirit brings us at Pentecost is deeper than an 11 year old understanding of truth. It is not black and white, true or false truth. It is an opportunity to discover once again and for us in this time and place who we are called to be as the people of God today. If there was one big Truth with a capital T you would think we would have figured it out by now. But that is not the way God works; instead we are to journey together and discover together for our time the wisdom of our day. Our young people will have a vision and our old people will dream dreams and together we will follow the promptings of the Spirit.

In two weeks time we are having a Visioning Day for the parish – a chance to listen to each other and to listen to the Spirit. There is no script or definitive plan for what our next few years will look like and we are not going to write a 15 page strategic plan. We are going to discern a vision, a dream, for who and what we want to be; and then as time evolves we will see what ministries and initiatives might evolve within that vision. And like long ago it will just be the simple followers of Jesus who will be there; and like long ago we will pray that the breath of God will breathe on us and the warmth of the fire of passion will inspire us. And we will pray for the gift of understanding and the privilege of discovering a little more the mystery that is God and the blessing that we can receive from being part of a community of faith. This might be our prayer:

Pentecost Blessing by Jan Richardson

On the day

when you are wearing


your certainty


like a cloak


and your sureness


goes before you


like a shield


or like a sword,

may the sound


of God’s name


spill from your lips


as you have never


heard it before.

May your knowing


be undone.


May mystery


confound your


understanding.

May the Divine


rain down


in strange syllables


yet with


an ancient familiarity,


a knowing borne


in the blood,


the ear,


the tongue,


bringing the clarity


that comes


not in stone


or in steel


but in fire,


in flame.

May there come


one searing word:


enough to bare

you
to the bone,


enough to set


your heart ablaze,


enough to make you


whole again. [2]

[1] Raymond Brown The Gospel according to John p. 499.

[2] Jan Richardson http://paintedprayerbook.com/2011/06/05/pentecost-one-searing-word