Pentecost

Sermon Notes Pentecost 24th May John 7:37-39 by Geoff Vidal

How would you respond to someone asking you to explain Pentecost?

Unlike Christmas and Easter, there has been nothing in our shops to say that it is Pentecost. Maybe Pentecost doesn’t get so much attention because no one has found a way to commercialize it. We don’t turn Pentecost into a culture extravaganza, or into a national holiday. So, this major Christian festival goes unnoticed.

But for us Pentecost is a big thing. This festival, this holiday is very important for the life of the church, for your life and mine.

Pentecost for Jews is celebrated 50 days after Passover and for Christians 50 days after the Resurrection. We have made it a red day. We have red decorations and sometimes red balloons; many of you are wearing red clothes. This is not “modern”. In the 13th century, the French Bishop Durandus wrote of Pentecost celebrations with masses of red rose leaves and sparks of fire blown over the congregation. They obviously had no risk assessment requirements back then.

Why red? Red represents the heat, power, and passion of God's love. It mimics the physical imagery of flames described in the Acts of the Apostles. It also honours the courage and missionary zeal of the early Christian martyrs who shed blood to build the early Church.

You also hear of Pentecost being referred to as Whitsunday (White Sunday). White is used during the seasons of Easter and Christmas. It represents purity, holiness, and the joy of Christ's resurrection. Historically, particularly in England, Pentecost was a popular day for mass baptisms. The newly baptised wore white robes to symbolize their new, purified life in Christ.

So, how do we properly describe Pentecost?

It’s not exactly a birthday for the Church. God’s people have always been God’s people meeting as church. But something very special happened at this time. There was a sort of transition from a “Church of Law” to the “Church of The New Covenant of Jesus”. The church began to see that the role it had was to continue the ministry of Jesus. So, perhaps, more than celebrating birth, we have a celebration of newness or remodelling.

And, here’s the real mystery. How do we understand the Holy Spirit? Pentecost was not actually the moment that the Holy Spirit came into being. It’s somewhat misleading to make our Pentecost focus the coming of the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit was present at creation. The Holy Spirit was with God’s people with Moses in the desert. What we are doing at Pentecost is noticing the Holy Spirit in a new way.

As we will focus on next week, God, The Holy Trinity, has always existed as Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

Here at Pentecost, we celebrate the specific work of the Holy Spirit in giving power to the Church for serving Christ in the world. The Church has always called upon the Holy Spirit when we intend to perform some serious work (such as Holy Communion, Ordination or Baptism).

I’ll share a story. "Several years ago, engineers building a new bridge over the East River in New York, discovered that the wrecked hull of a ship was lying right where the centre piers were to be built. Powerful machinery was brought in to remove the ship, but it would not budge. Then one of the engineers had an unusual idea. Why not have the tide raise the ship! Some strong cables were attached to the hull when the tide was very low. The other ends were fastened to the barge above. As the tide came in, the barge gradually lifted the sunken ship which was then moved out into the ocean and sunk at a spot that would not cause future problems."

God’s Holy Spirit is like the tide, it comes quietly, it comes in slowly, but it comes to us with enough power so that we might do the job God has called, led, each of us to do. There is a power, a force and for many an untapped force in each of our lives, that is the Holy Spirit. Frequently it is not dramatic, it does not cause us to do dramatic things, but it is there to give us the power to live the kind of lives, to be the kind of people, that God intended us to be.

The church grows through the action of the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit has been calling, prodding and pushing the church into new life right throughout history.

The presence of the Holy Spirit is often connected with the ability to understand different languages and with speaking in tongues.  

In Genesis, we read the story of the Tower of Babel. God’s people were given a lesson when God caused their language to be confused. Now, at Pentecost, God has done something new. Language is no longer confused. There is now a unity of faith and willingness to hear what others are saying. The Holy Spirit brings a willingness to accept different ways of expressing the Good News. This is not uniformity but acceptance and understanding in diversity.

So, in our celebration of Pentecost, what are we able to discover in our Gospel reading today?

In John chapter 7, we have an invitation to come to Jesus for living water. Jesus has gone to Jerusalem to attend the big annual celebration of the Festival of Booths. The festival went on for a week.

This feast included a daily procession of priests to the pool of Siloam. The priests collected water from the pool and brought this water back to the temple. Then, they marched around the altar seven times and recited a passage from Isaiah 12:3 saying, “with joy you will draw water from the wells of salvation”. Then they ceremonially poured out the water at the altar. This was all in remembrance of God’s provision for the thirsty people travelling in the Sinai desert with Moses.

But that water had left the people unsatisfied: the people still grumbled.

The story of God’s provision of water in the desert was significant in people’s minds.  So, it would have been really dramatic when Jesus stood up and shouted out his great invitation to people thirsty for a stronger connection to God; “Let anyone who is thirsty come to me and let anyone who believes in me drink. Out of the believer’s heart shall flow rivers of living water.”

Everyone understands thirst. We all know what it feels like when our bodies are dry and desperate for water. But Jesus is speaking about a deeper kind of thirst. The thirst of the human heart. The thirst for purpose. The thirst for forgiveness.  The thirst for love and belonging. The thirst for hope; the hope that life means more than what we can see.

At this Festival of Booths, the people were reenacting a tradition that could never satisfy the heart.

Jesus offered them living water and eternal satisfaction.

So, on this Pentecost Sunday, let’s hear again the voice of Jesus calling out across the crowd. Calling us too! Saying, “Come and drink”. 

God is trustworthy, and the Father is how we know. The Father relentlessly pursues us with love and does not give up on his creation. God rescues us, and the Son is how we know. Jesus became one of us and entered our darkness so that he could bring us into God’s light. God is within us, and the Spirit is how we know. The Holy Spirit makes a home in us and invites us to share in the life of our God - the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.

We have been invited to come and to drink deeply.

And as you do, may the Spirit of God fill you so fully that rivers of living water flow from your life into a thirsty world.

God’s Spirit is within us. Amen.