Sermon for Pentecost Sunday – 19th May 2024:ACTS 2:1-21, ROMANS 8:22-27, JOHN 15:26 -27,16:4b-15

PENTECOST 2024 DISRUPT US – Deacon Chris Saccali – St Paul’s Athens

 

I speak in the name of the Triune God, Father, and Son AMEN

I am so glad we sang Enemy of Apathy again, that wonderful worship song whose words capture perfectly the Spirit of Pentecost not as a fluffy white dove, any more than Easter is about cute yellow chicks. Michael Mitton in his book Wild Beasts and Angels talks about the peristera mentioned in the gospels, as being a dark wild sort of wood pigeon which lives in caves.

Let’s read the first verse again: She sits like a bird, brooding on the waters, hovering on the chaos of the world’s first day; she sighs and she sings mothering creation waiting to give birth to all the Word will say.

I saw something similar perching on the top of a flagpole at OAKA last month when I had the honour with my family of being present at the Olympic museum when the cauldron was lit outside from the torch relay for the Paris Olympics – remember there was no international relay for the flame three years ago for Tokyo due to the aftermath of the pandemic and the change of date. Actually, that event at the Olympic Park in Marousi was a glorious spirit filled moment recalling 2004 twenty years ago and the best of human endeavours and hopes now in 2024 followed by the handover between Greece and France at the Kalimararo stadium.

How do you imagine the Holy Spirit ? Is it as a bird perching or brooding or rising and opening its wings? Perhaps you have another image in your mind or heart?

Jane Williams says that for too long the Holy Spirit in modern tradition has been thought of the soppy member of the Trinity. When I was going through selection for ordination we were discouraged from presenting on wishy washy spiritual subjects and using tealights! It was not an idea I inclined towards anyway. The Holy Spirit is all powerful and dynamic which we can see and read about that from before the beginning of Creation.

Let’s hear the words of the second verse again: She wings over earth, resting where she wishes, lighting close at hand or soaring through the skies; she nests in the womb, welcoming each wonder, nourishing potential hidden to our eyes.

The first line of the Acts reading tells us everything we want to know and hear, in other words, that this is a collective experience: ‘When the day of Pentecost came, they were all together in one place this reminds of the time after the resurrection – the Greek is: ‘ησαν παντες ομου επι το αυτο.’

With the feast of Whitsun, many things are revealed in the coming of the Holy Spirit to the assembled. Of course, this is not a new spirit but the one that has been hovering over the waters since before the world began, part of the divine, however, it is the fulfilment of a promise and a presence, a new way of empowerment for Christ’s followers and our Advocate. ‘I still have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now,’ we heard Jesus’ words in the gospel passage from John. So what is actually said when the Spirit comes; are things any clearer or coming to the surface?

No, not really. There seems to be noise, babbling and chaos according to the account in Acts 2- anything but a convenient, clarifying postscript to Jesus’ teaching. Just as guests disrupt us, whether invited or uninvited but we are called to welcome them into our hearts and homes, so does the Holy Spirit or should do – it is the whirlwind of our souls. It is when cultures and languages collide in an explosion of communication around Jesus.

 

Let us hear agaiun the words of the third verse again:  She dances in fire, startling her spectators, waking tongues of ecstasy where dumbness reigned; she weans and inspires all whose hearts are open, nor can she be captured, silenced or restrained.

The Holy Spirit is not a destructive gale force wind raging fire neither is it a fluffy comforter although she does bring comfort. Instead of bringing chaos and destruction, it brings newness and unity. It finds us in all our vulnerability and empowers us. It takes the community that is already gathered together and knits it closer. This is the fire that builds and transforms. Out of the many peoples from all over the world, it makes one people gifted abundantly with the ability to understand each other, serve one another, and live in peace as did the first apostolic community, who lived in one accord with one another.

In two weeks we will welcome our new priest Father Ben after we have celebrated Trinity Sunday next week. I am hoping that he will find a community here at St Paul’s and across Athens and beyond that is knit together and transformed, made up of diverse members and disciples  from all over the Anglican Communion.

Without the spirit of Jesus we can do nothing but in and through his Spirit we can live active, creative, free, joyful and courageous lives. We cannot pray but the Spirit of Christ can pray in us. We cannot create peace and joy but the Spirit of Christ can fill us with a peace and joy that is out of this world/ literally not of this world.

Let us hear the fourth and final verse again: For she is the Spirit, one with God in essence, gifted by the Saviour in eternal love; she is the key to opening the scriptures, enemy of apathy and heavenly dove.

We cannot break through the many barriers that divide races, sexes and nations, but the Spirit of Christ unites all in the all – embracing love of God. The Spirit of Christ burns away our many fears and anxieties and sets us free to be ourselves and recognise others in their uniqueness and made in the image of God. The Spirit of Christ speaks to, through and with the heart – that is the great liberation message of Pentecost, then and now, heard loud and clear by all believers.

What Jesus has to ‘say’ to the world through the Spirit is that worldwide community is possible and made possible by being gathered around the cross and resurrection and brought to life by the Holy Spirit. It is a new community based on Jesus’ life and teachings but learning from one another in trust and inclusivity whatever the gulfs of understanding and culture that divide us.

So I repeat the simple yet brave prayer on this feast of Pentecost: Come Holy Spirit be our guest and may this time by you be blessed. We invite God the Holy Spirit to do what guests do, disrupt our lives, share our table, open our minds to possibilities and touch our hearts while enfolding us in love.

AMEN