As most of you know, the Christian Church celebrates three major festivals. Easter was the first to be celebrated, soon followed by Pentecost, and quite some time later, Christmas. American Christianity changes the significance of the three, giving primacy to Christmas, second place to Easter, and giving a bronze medal to Pentecost. In 1993 when I took a sabbatical in France, I arrived in the small town of Annecy on the last weekend of May. Almost out of cash and standing outside the local bank, I was dismayed to see that it was closed for the Monday after Pentecost, just as our banks close on Monday if Christmas falls on a Sunday.
It has been the practice here at Rutgers to have a cake on Pentecost and sing Happy Birthday to the Church, to encourage the wearing of red, and to release pigeons on the front steps of the church after worship—pigeons being as close as we can get to doves, a symbol of the Holy Spirit in the New Testament. I've come to appreciate the disconnect of the pigeon's flying up into the air while the Biblical record speaks of the Spirit descending from above. But that disconnect reminds us of the unpredictability of the Spirit mentioned in John's Gospel, chapter 3. "The wind blows where it chooses, and you hear the sound of it, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit."
The story of Pentecost, given to us in the second chapter of the Book of the Acts of the Apostles, is one of at least three New Testament stories about the coming of the Holy Spirit among the early followers of Jesus. The facts of the story, if we can call them facts in the twenty-first century sense of that word, are that the followers of Jesus were gathered in a room some time after his resurrection appearances. There came a sound like the rush of a violent wind, filling the entire house. Divided tongues, as of fire, appeared among them, and a tongue rested on each of them. All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other languages as the Spirit enabled them. According to Luke, that's what happened. Some commentators have noted that it could be a description of a violent thunder and lightning storm. If you've ever been in a building hit by lightning, and I have been, you may agree—or not.
The four verses in chapter 2 that tell us "what happened" on Pentecost follow chapter 1, in which Jesus said something to his followers before he left them for the last time. He said, "You will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, and to the ends of the earth." The story of what happened on the Jewish feast of Pentecost was the fulfillment of a promise made by Jesus to his followers. Jesus promised them power, and the promise came true.
Pentecost, then, is about power. Balloons are nice, birthday cake is nice, doves or pigeons are nice, but Pentecost is about power. That's strong stuff—not a subject for tame preaching. In fact, it's dynamite as we know from the Greek word for power: dynamis, from which we get dynamic and dynamite. Power! Dynamite! That's what Pentecost is all about.
What Luke is saying in his Pentecost story and in the twenty-six chapters that follow it is that the Christian Church is not just another organization in existence to keep alive a story, not just another organization concerned for peace and social justice. The Church has those concerns as part of its mission, but the Church is a community of people who have been given power by God to do what the Church exists to do: tell its story, continue the healing ministry of Jesus, and continue his prophetic work on behalf of the world's poor and abused people.
It is my conviction that we in the church need to have an on-going conversation about the nature of power, the nature of the power unleashed in North Korea's exploding a nuclear device, yes. But more essentially a conversation about the nature of the power available to us by the Holy Spirit. Try talking about that at a dinner party in New York City. It's risky enough to mention God at such a gathering, although there are signs the tide is turning. But the Holy Spirit? Mentioning her, or him, or it, will assure your being dropped from the guest list the next time the group gets together.
Interestingly enough, many people these days like to say, "I want nothing to do with religion"—sometimes they say "organized religion—but I'm definitely interested in spirituality." I very much appreciate what they are saying. Often what I hear in such a remark is an expression of woundedness from a negative past experience in a church, synagogue, or mosque. And millions of people have been burned or bored by rigid, rule-bound, life-draining, or just plain dull religion.
But occasionally what I hear when I hear someone say they like spirituality but dislike religion is a desire to avoid rigorous self-examination, to shy away from a searching and fearless moral inventory, while at the same time desiring the positive benefits of being in touch with God or a higher power that can add a dimension of transcendence to an otherwise materialistic and self-focused life. I don't mean to sound harsh in saying that. I am not in a position to evaluate anyone else's spirituality. But the very word spirituality has become so amorphous in our culture that it can mean anything or nothing.
I checked the word spirituality online, and I was directed to Amazon books. Amazon's category is "Religion and Spirituality," not distinguishing between the two. Some of titles recommended to me were Breakfast With Benedict (a book about the pope, not about eggs benedict); The Apocalypse Code: Find Out What the Bible Really Says About the End Times...and Why It Matters Today; Real Church: Does It Exist? Can I Find It?; and my favorite, Saltwater Buddha: A Surfer's Quest to Find Zen on the Sea.
The word spirituality is very broad. It covers a lot of ground—or water in some cases. If you are a person who has trouble with religion but is interested in exploring spirituality, I assure you of my encouragement and support. Please remember that the word I has its roots in the Hebrew and Greek words for breath and wind, which are also translated as spirit. Also explore thinking about religion as spirituality with structure.
Recently I read Bruce Springsteen's address on the occasion of the band U2's induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in March of 2005. I thought it was a masterful speech. At one point Springsteen said of U2's output, "It's an incredible songbook. In their music you hear spirituality as home and as quest. How do you find God unless he's in your heart? In your desire? In your feet?"
I remembered a song U2 released in November of 2001, two months after 9/11. They sang,
"Walk on, walk on,
What you've got they can't deny it,
can't sell it, can't buy it,
Walk on, walk on,
Stay safe tonight.
Home...hard to know what it is if you've never had one
Home...I can't say where it is but I know I'm going home
That's where the hurt is.
I know it aches, How your heart it breaks
And you can only take so much
Walk on, walk on
You've got to leave it behind."
Spiritual religion gives energy for walking on when the walking is tough. Religion that is infused by God's Spirit strengthens people when they experience tragedy like 9/11 and the hurts and losses that are part of life as it comes to all of us. Religion that is energized by God's Holy Spirit, given so dramatically on the day of Pentecost two thousand years ago, will resist the human tendency to become judgmental and exclusionary. Christian faith that is empowered by God's Holy Spirit reflective of Jesus' loving ways will express itself in a religion that confers a new competence on the Church to carry out its many-faceted mission of proclamation, nurture, worship, justice-seeking, peace-making, and enjoyment.
Authentically Christian religion energizes the Church, and it can also empower individual persons not just to survive whatever life throws at them, but to thrive. Christian religion at its best can lead women and men to add to Reinhold Nibebuhr's Serenity Prayer, which asks for serenity, courage, and wisdom, by praying for power to live confidently and joyfully in all the circumstances of life. Authentic Christian religion leads people to the simple but profound self-acceptance that moves on to a healthy kind of generosity of service and concern.
It is my Pentecost prayer this morning that the dynamic power of God's Holy Spirit will continue to energize Rutgers Presbyterian Church in its total mission, and that all who seek a meaningful connection with the living God will find it by the grace of God, who continues to pour out the Holy Spirit in unpredictable and exciting ways.