This Is Happening Now

Acts 2: 1-21, page 771

When the day of Pentecost came, they were all together in one place. Suddenly a sound like the blowing of a violent wind came from heaven and filled the whole house where they were sitting. They saw what seemed to be tongues of fire that separated and came to rest on each of them.
All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues as the Spirit enabled them.
Now there were staying in Jerusalem God-fearing Jews from every nation under heaven. When they heard this sound, a crowd came together in bewilderment, because each one heard them speaking in his own language.
Utterly amazed, they asked: “Are not all these men who are speaking Galileans? Then how is it that each of us hears them in his own native language? Parthians, Medes and Elamites; residents of Mesopotamia, Judea and Cappadocia, Pontus and Asia, Phrygia and Pamphylia, Egypt and the parts of Libya near Cyrene; visitors from Rome (both converts to Judaism); Cretans and Arabs – we hear them declaring the wonders of God in our own tongues!”
Amazed and perplexed, they asked one another, “What does this mean?”
Some, however, made fun of them and said, “They have had too much wine.”
Then Peter stood up with the Eleven, raised his voice and addressed the crowd; “Fellow Jews and all of you who live in Jerusalem, let me explain this to you; listen carefully to what I say. These men are not drunk, as you suppose. It’s only nine in the morning! No, this is what was spoken by the prophet Joel:
‘In the last days, God says, I will pour out my Spirit on all people.
Your sons and daughters will prophecy, your young men will see visions, your old men will dream dreams.
Even on my servants, both men and women, I will pour out my Spirit in those days, and they will prophesy.
I will show wonders in the heaven above and signs on the earth below, blood and fire and billows of smoke.
The sun will be turned to darkness and the moon to blood before the coming of the great and glorious day of the Lord.
And everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.’
Sermon
My daughter Lily is a year old now, so she is starting to say a few words. Her favorite word is “dog,” and she really likes to use it a lot. We have three dogs at home, and every time she sees one comes into the house she points and says, “dog” to make sure we know.
She really seems to enjoy pointing out dogs to us, but it seems as though she doesn’t completely understand how to use the word “dog,” as she will point and say “dog” whether she’s at the zoo and pointing at an elephant, whether she’s on a walk down our street and sees a squirrel, and this past Monday morning when we woke up to find a flock of 40 pink plastic flamingoes in our front yard, she seemed to think that they were all dogs too.
This morning inserted in your bulletin is the story of these flamingoes. As a fund raising technique, Katie Gomola Arnold, our Coordinator for Christian Education and Student Ministries, and several of the High School students and adult volunteers she works with have been placing these 40 pink flamingoes in the front yards of several members of this congregation. It’s a fund raising event because once they are in your yard you have to pay to get rid of them. It’s nice though because you can then pick whose yard they will go to next.
But even once you are rid of the flamingoes, you still have to explain a few things to your neighbors, as no matter where you live, 40 pink flamingoes are not often seen in someone’s front yard.
I have been explaining to people in my neighborhood their appearance for the last week:
“No, I didn’t put them there on purpose.”
“Yes, I promise, they won’t be back.”
“Yes, they really were put there by people from my church.”
“Yes, really, I am a minister.”
To which I have often asked: “Why do you look so surprised?”
It been nice living somewhere where no one knows that I’m a minister – I get treated just like a regular person – but now, all that is over. The time of keeping my faith quiet is gone – and the more I think about it, the more I thank God for that – because when you keep your faith to yourself, it can’t spread to anyone else.
“When the day of Pentecost came,” our scripture lesson reads, “they were all together in one place.”
We may assume that they were all together in the same room that Jesus had left them in. They just stayed right in that room, and the gospel stayed right there in that room with them.
I imagine that they had started to get comfortable there – and maybe they even got a little bored so one day Peter says as it goes in chapter 1, “Why don’t we elect a new disciple to replace Judas? We don’t really have anything else to do – we can get to making disciples of all nations later.”
And so it is with the church – rather than get right to the work that Christ called us to, we too often just keep ourselves busy.
It’s not that we waste our time – after all, it says in Psalms that there should be twelve disciples, so another had to be selected.
The same is true with our church - It is important to decide what to do with the house on the new property, it’s important to call a new pastor to this church, we need to spend some of our time in meetings and things – but we can never forget that we were not called by Christ for meetings, we were not called by Christ to dedicate ourselves to property management, administration, or book-keeping – we are called by Christ to make disciples of all nations!
So while they were busy taking care of the day to day proceedings of life in their little room, a sound like the blowing of a violent wind came from heaven and filled the whole area where they were sitting – the disciples saw what seemed to be tongues of fire that separated and came to rest on each of them and all of them were filled with the Holy Spirit.
They then went out from that room declaring the wonders of God to all those visiting Jerusalem – yes – some thought they were just drunk – but those who heard the gospel went back to their homes across the seas changed.
That same blowing wind is what we celebrate today.
As those same tongues of fire have descended upon us.
We have been given the gift of speech – that we might declare the wonders of God to our neighbors.
It is to this work that we are called, for we have been given the truth – that in Christ Jesus we have become a new creation – and everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.
We cannot keep this good news to ourselves.
We cannot keep this church a secret.
We must be like the disciples – proclaiming the mighty works of God to our friends, our families, and our neighbors.
Amen.