“Fiery Faith” Colchester Federated Church, May 28, 2023, (Acts 2:1-21) Pentecost Sunday

Today we are celebrating the holy day of Pentecost.  The easiest way to remember Pentecost is that it’s the Birthday of the Christian Church.  The liturgical color used today is red to symbolize the individual flames of fire that alighted on each of the gathered apostles.  It’s a day where we especially contemplate the work of the Holy Spirit.  Sometimes the Spirit seems to be the neglected part of the Trinity.  But not today—today is all about the Holy Spirit center stage with a spotlight!  Because on Pentecost (as the scene is described in the Acts of the Apostles): “suddenly a sound from heaven like the howling of a fierce wind filled the entire house where they were sitting.  They saw what seemed to be individual flames of fire alighting on each of them.”[1]  The apostles were filled with the Spirit and began speaking in other languages. 

Today we can give thanks for the gifts of the Holy Spirit, gifts that enable us to be the Church.  Historically, Pentecost is the day that the Jesus Movement took off.  Because these miraculous events are happening during the Jewish harvest festival of Pentecost—the day that was seven full weeks (or 50 days) after Passover.  Pentecost was one of the pilgrimage festivals where folks would come to Jerusalem to celebrate as Pentecost (or Shavuot) was known as the Feast of Weeks.  The holiday marked both the wheat harvest and came to symbolize when Moses and the Israelites received the Torah—becoming a nation that made a commitment to be in covenant with God.[2] 

The point being that there were diverse groups of pilgrims gathered in Jerusalem to celebrate this holy day.  People were surprised and bewildered because they heard about the mighty works of God in their own native languages even though the apostles didn’t speak those languages on their own.  People witnessed the followers of Jesus speaking to others in a way that they could understand and take to heart.  Sometimes we have thought of Pentecost as being about speaking in tongues, that’s where the term Pentecostal comes from.  Though if we go back to the text we can read: “How then can each of us hear them speaking in our native language?  Parthians, Medes, and Elamites; as well as residents of Mesopotamia, Judea, and Cappadocia, Pontus and Asia, Phrygia and Pamphylia, Egypt and the regions of Libya bordering Cyrene; and visitors from Rome (both Jews and converts to Judaism), Cretans and Arabs—we hear them declaring the mighty works of God in our own languages!”[3]  The point is that the disciples are testifying about their faith and meeting people where they were to talk about the wonders of God.  The apostles are speaking earthly languages that native speakers comprehended (not speaking in tongues).  That’s the miracle of Pentecost in our Christian tradition.  In more ways than we can comprehend, the disciples are on fire with their faith.  They were living into the words of St. Ignatius to “go and set the world on fire.” 

We still need to meet people where they are in order to spread the good news of Jesus.  The miracle of Pentecost lives on.  God is still speaking.  It’s up to Christians in every generation to speak about the love of God and transformative Way of Jesus in a way that people can take to heart.  Perhaps part of what we learned during the pandemic is that being the Church is much more about the people of God than the buildings in which we gather to worship God.  The gifts of the Spirit and spreading the good news in a way that truly reached people is why today marks the birth of the Christian Church.  The people of God did a whole new thing out in the world, out in their community. 

At its heart, Christianity is about a new way of life much more than a set of beliefs.  Our faith is about loving God, loving ourselves, and loving one another across languages and ethnicities and nationalities and sexual orientations and gender identities.  Any category of human difference humans may use to try to exclude one another?  Christianity can offer an alternative view of making the tent bigger and the table longer and saying, “Y’all come.”  Jesus turned no one away, why should we?

That list of languages and varied groups of people named on Pentecost points to the inclusivity of God.  In just a few chapters further (in Acts Chapter 10) we can see Peter undergo a significant change of heart.  His own biases will be confronted because of a centurion named Cornelius.  Cornelius was a centurion and a righteous person, praying constantly and giving to those who were in need among the Jewish people.  Cornelius saw an angel from God in a vision.  The angel commanded Cornelius to summon Peter to his home.  Peter arrives to find this large gathering of people who worshiped God and followed Christ the same way Peter himself did.  And here he is—a Jew among Gentiles, and not just any Gentiles—he’s in Caesarea at the home of a centurion serving in the Italian company.  Peter tells Cornelius and everyone gathered in his home, “God has shown me that I should never call a person impure or unclean . . . I really am learning that God doesn’t show partiality to one group of people over another.”[4]  The holy work of this purifying fire that Peter experiences on Pentecost when he gets up in front of those crowds to talk about the Spirit being poured out on all people will continue to expand his horizons.

What can we do with these stories? 

The United Church of Christ has a group called the Center for Analytics, Research, and Data (CARD) and they share in-depth reports with the wider church.  Years ago, there was a report compiled called Congregational Vitality and Ministerial Excellence: Intersections and Possibilities for Ministry.  The good people of CARD wanted to see what makes a minister effective at our jobs and what makes a congregation vital.  As the report begins, “Ministerial leadership matters, and it profoundly impacts the vitality of congregations.  In every setting of our denominational life together, talk of ministerial excellence and congregational vitality abounds.  In the United Church of Christ, the vision plan of the national setting includes the goals of having ‘a wealth of prepared, excellent leaders that reflect the diversity of God’s beloved community’ and ‘welcoming, reachable congregations…that are accessible to all.’”[5] 

In part, this report shared a congregational vitality index.  The authors encouraged congregations to reflect upon areas of congregational life, contemplating ideas like: there is excitement about the future here, there is a clear sense of mission here, this congregation is always ready to try something new, this place interacts with the local community, this congregation equips their members to share their faith with others, this place seeks out and uses the gifts of members of all ages, this place manages disagreements in a healthy respectful way, and this place helps to build strong, healthy relationships among members.  All of these areas help to encourage congregational vitality, congregations that truly make a difference in peoples’ lives and in the wider community.

That is the challenge before us on Pentecost Sunday—to do all we can to be a welcoming and reachable congregation.  To meet people where they are.  To remember Peter’s discovery that God doesn’t show partiality.  To go and set the world on fire.  Thanks be to God.  Amen.

[1] Acts 2:2-3, CEB.
[2] “Pentecost” on Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pentecost
[3] Acts 2:8-11.
[4] Acts 10:28 and 34.
[5] Congregational Vitality and Ministerial Excellence: Intersections and Possibilities for Ministry, A Research Report of the United Church of Christ Center for Analytics, Research and Data (CARD), June 2015, https://new.uccfiles.com/pdf/UCC-Congregational-Vitality-and-Ministerial-Excellence-Report.pdf

Photo by Paul Bulai on Unsplash