SERMONS

There came a sound. What kind of sound?

There came a sound on a day as today, Pentecost! In the scriptures in the Book of Acts, it is the rush of a strong wind. It filled the entire house of God where the disciples were.

The disciples were locked inside the doors in fear. They were not ready for something new. Why, they had seen enough — gone through enough — had enough. All they wanted was to be left alone, now that Jesus was no longer physically present with them.

And yet, we hear the sound breaking in through the disciples’ closed doors. Doesn’t matter if they are prepared — doesn’t matter whether they are ready. Doesn’t matter what the room looks like or that you still have things hidden in the closet.

There came a sound and it filled the entire space where the people of faith gathered.

Could the sound be one that you and I can hear, feel, see and experience with our whole selves – not just parts of us?

I want to believe that the sound that came on the day of Pentecost, which we celebrate as the coming of the Holy Spirit, is more like that in our worship here at Bethany United Church of Christ, as the Spirit moves us to invite, welcome, pray and give witness in many ways, different cultures and in our native languages from North, South, East and West.

Now, this can and will certainly be disorienting! And yet, as one pastor and teacher shares: “Faith begins, at least sometimes, with a disorientation that must precede a new orientation. So the signs and wonders (of God) are a disorienting wake-up call: they provoke, evoke and awaken.”

Perhaps, the sound the disciples hear is the sound of “Boo sa sa” – the Taiwanese word meaning “in complete chaos.” The Spirit does that! — a sound that cannot ever be fully translated or put into a container, because it is not a closed vessel, but an open one.

The sound of the Spirit is one we cannot manipulate or even orchestrate ourselves, no matter how hard we try, because the Spirit does not come from you and me. The sound of the Holy Spirit is a gift – one that comes from God.

Spirit is intentional, relational and transformational — not to mention, surprise, surprise — multiracial, multicultural, intergenerational and open and affirming.

There came a sound and though we cannot nail down exactly where Spirit comes from, and where the Spirit goes, we know the sound is of God’s Spirit.

How can we know?

“At the sound” – the people gathered together. Sure, they were bewildered, surprised, transformed and filled with the Holy Spirit, who brings them in one place amidst their differences. Who wouldn’t be! The disciples know it is God’s Spirit – for left to their own devices, they would not be together in one place. Left to their own devices, they would cut their pledge or threaten to leave the community when they do not get their way.

And that is a privilege when you get to walk away with your “toys” when things do not happen the way you want.

Spirit, strangely enough, will have nothing to do with this. Spirit cannot be cajoled, co-opted, or calculated.

At the sound, the people of faith were not further isolated and separated from one another by race, culture and class. They were not set up to divide and conquer, kill and maim, and widen the ever widening gap between each other. Their insecurities did not lead them to power plays, put downs and paternalistic ways of being with others. No, at the very sound, the disciples are brought closer together in faith and spiritual practice.

It says all were filled with the Holy Spirit, not just some — ALL.

As Desmond Tutu says, “that means black, red, white, yellow, rich, poor, educated, non-educated, gay, lesbian and so-called straight – all belong. Palestinian, Jew, Iraqi, Muslim, Buddhist — all are in this incredible, wild embrace with a Spirit that will not let anyone go.”

Now that could potentially be a problem. All, not some, are given the Holy Spirit. For if this is so, we as a congregation need to be aware, spiritually aware, that anyone of us can be touched by the fire and compassion of the Holy Spirit, and thus, each is to pay attention and listen to what is said — for we do not know who the Holy Spirit will speak through next.

On Saturday, May 30, as your pastor and leader, I was one of the speakers at the Health Care for All in 2009 March. As all good things, health care is complex with no easy answers.

And even with thousands of people gathering in one place with a spirit of health care reform, there were still people yelling across the street “All means socialism.” But unlike the disciples at Pentecost, who knew they were afraid, and thus open to change and to be changed, the people shouting across the street from the march were fearful and had not processed their fear — had not worked through their baggage, their privilege, their need to believe that health care is for profit not for all the people.

And yet, that did not stop the march or the disciples. And will not stop us when the community of faith encounters a few individuals or families that are not happy with change. Remember in the scriptures, some tried to convince others that the disciples were drunk or simply out of it when in actuality, the disciples were being changed as they were filled with the love of God’s Spirit!

The disciples come together as a people, as human beings who have struggled and have been humbled, and who are hungry for transformation and new life.

Bethany too comes together as a congregation amidst all our failures and flaws, gifts and talents, hopes and fears, visions and dreams because something is at stake here!

Author and theologian, Frederick Buechner writes, “Like its counterparts in Hebrew and Greek, the Latin word spiritus originally meant breath (as in expire, respiratory, and so on) and breath is what you have when you are ALIVE and don’t have when you are dead. Thus, spirit is breath is life is the aliveness and power of your life. And to speak of your spirit (or soul) is to speak of the power of life, given by God, that is in you. When your spirit is unusually strong, the life in you unusually alive, you can breathe it out into other lives, becoming literally in-spiring.”

“Now Spirit is highly contagious. When people are very excited, very joyful, very sad — you can catch it from them as easily as measles or a yawn. You can catch it from what they say or from what they do or just from what happens to the air of a room when they enter it without saying or doing anything.

Spirit can be transmitted across great distances of time and space. For better or worse, you can catch the spirit of people long dead, of people whose faces you have never seen and whose languages you cannot speak.”

Though it has been over thirty years since we lost my grandfather to a sudden heart attack, I still can hear the sound of my grandfather, who not only gave me faith, wisdom and told me stories I will never forget, but whose very presence made other people laugh and better yet, learn to laugh at themselves. He was a world traveler, a brilliant teacher, a renowned musician who had written music with the famous Japanese musician, Suzuki, of Suzuki violin. My grandfather was a loving and faithful husband and father of ten children. But to me, he was my Akon (grandpa in Taiwanese). One who would dare to tell me to eat my carrots and get me to eat them, because he and I were both born, sixty years apart, in the Year of the Rabbit! And if that did not make any logical sense to you, then the spirit that filled the room when my humble Akon got up from the table to dance and learn the American version of the Bunny Hop or play Hide and Seek with his grandchildren wouldn’t either.

There came a sound. And this sound causes the people to speak and witness boldly in their own native language.

What does it mean to speak with courage? To hear languages amidst the mystery of Spirit, and not needing everything explained away.

There came a sound — the sound of each one of Jesus’ dispirited and fearful disciples now becoming “on fire” with the Spirit.

In his book, God Has a Dream: A Vision of Hope for Our Time, Desmond Tutu shares “one image that I have of the spiritual life is of sitting in front of a fire on a cold day. We don’t have to do anything. We just have to sit in front of the fire and then gradually the qualities of the fire are transferred to us. We begin to feel the warmth. We become the attributes of the fire. It’s like that with us and God’s Spirit. As we take time to be still and to be in God’s presence, the qualities of God are transferred to us.”

God’s Spirit is transferred to us just by Be-ing.

Look at Peter, from a disciple scared out of his wits and one who denied Jesus three times, to a human being able to find the words and the very language to speak and articulate his faith with courage and conviction — when the Spirit blows. Peter dares to call God’s own people, who thought they had pretty much arrived, to wake up, repent and turn around.

“That’s Peter,” you say. “I could never do that.” Or really?

Perhaps, not you alone, but what about in faithful community by God’s Holy Spirit.

This week, I was unexpectedly hit by the Spirit. He was not a touchy-feely Holy Spirit. She was a spirit willing to change me, by blowing not where I willed, but where the Spirit wills.

The kindergarten teacher asked me to come in as she explained to me the classroom routine during quiet time. That particular day, it was our daughter’s turn to lead, where one child distributes the blankets and writes the names on the backs of each child in the room. She knew what she was to do. But another girl in the class convinced our daughter to leave some of the children out. “If you do this – I will be your friend,” the girl told our daughter. Where have we heard this before? Wanting to befriend this girl, our daughter followed and later shared with the teacher and me that she knew she should not have followed. Listening to this, I wondered why the bright teacher had called me in rather than the other girl’s parents.

Perhaps, as I soon discovered, the teacher knew from where the change would come. It would not come by targeting, attacking or pointing fingers at “the bully.” In life, they will always exist. It would come by teaching every child to listen to the Greater Spirit (for people of faith, this is God!) and to resist evil at any age, even at six.

“What do you think we can do?” the teacher asked our daughter as she and I looked in her eyes. “Get God! Because if you do not have God in your life, how can you know how to love,” my daughter replied.

I had not yet thought to teach her as a kindergartner the division of church and state!

“How else, as some families may not know God, as a daily practice in their lives, could you lead?” the teacher asked.

There was a long pause.

We waited and waited and waited — and then by the Spirit, I heard our daughter’s voice say, “I guess, teacher, I could lead as Martin Luther King, Jr.!”

This can only come out of faithful community. For as a First People’s leader shares, “If you have come to help me – you are wasting your time — but if your liberation is caught up in your being with me, then let us work in community together.”

We see the community of faith at Pentecost, as we at Bethany are called, to begin to take this experience of the coming of the Holy Spirit, as the beginning of cultivating spiritual leaders in our community, as we continue to grow.

The disciples spent much time together devoting themselves to teaching and worshipping, to breaking bread and praying, to distributing and re-distributing the wealth and goods with glad and generous hearts, to giving God praise and having the good will of all the people.

With the Spirit’s help, what could happen next here at Bethany Church?

On Pentecost, people from every nation are present and invited in God’s Spirit-filled house. A Spirit, as the hymnist proclaims, “who calls from tomorrow, who breaks ancient schemes, from the bondage of sorrow the captives dream dreams; our women see visions, our men clear their eyes. With bold new decisions, God’s people arise.”

There came a sound. A sound of the Holy Spirit breaking in.

Listen, can you hear, feel and see the Spirit? And in the days, months, and years you and I have together – I wonder for God and for Bethany — What does this mean?!