Would That All the Lord's People Were Prophets, a sermon based on Numbers 11: 24-30 and Acts 2: 1-21, preached on May 24, 2026

There’s an old trailer in our big parking lot. I’m talking about the parking lot that’s across the Harris Hines Bridge. In a corner of that great big parking lot is an old trailer taking up space. You may have noticed it. While we now have four beautiful vehicles parked where people can see them, we’ve been hiding this one old trailer in the corner of our biggest parking lot, and last Monday morning, as I looked at its flat tires and noticed the lichen growing on it, I thought to myself, “I hope we can get rid of this thing somehow.” That was Monday, but selling a used trailer wasn’t on my calendar. I didn’t have any more time to think about it. Last week, I was busy with meetings and preparing for a wedding. On Tuesday, I was honored to pray the opening prayer at the Cobb County Board of Zoning Appeals. That was an exciting opportunity. I was honored to be invited to ask for God’s guidance as the county commission considered their business on a day when two of them were facing opposition in a primary election. I was thinking about how to pray as I walked through the metal detector. The room was full of people ready to speak up and have their voices heard. I found an open seat at the front next to a man who clearly thought I had sat down too close to him. He looked at me, then scooted over a little bit. Noticing his discomfort, I introduced myself and told him that I’m a pastor at First Presbyterian Church. Sometimes, sitting next to a pastor makes people feel more comfortable. Other times, it makes them feel less. In the case of this man, it was a moment of providence, for he took out his phone and began scrolling through pictures. He asked if First Presbyterian is the church with the old trailer in the great big parking lot, then showed me the picture he had taken of our trailer on his phone. “I was showing a picture of your trailer to my wife,” he said, “We’d like to take it off your hands. Would you be willing to sell it to me?” My friends, that’s no coincidence. In that simple gesture, I felt again the assurance that God is at work in our world. When we step out into the world, we go, not alone, for there is no place we can go where God is not. Pushed by the Holy Spirit, we go out into the world as His disciples, and the more we are open to the movement of the Holy Spirit, the more confident we are in the truth that God is at work in our world, the better we can step out in faith. Today is Pentecost Sunday when we remember all of that. The Great Hall is adorned in red as we remember how the Holy Spirit blazed like a fire among those first disciples. The Spirit gave them the ability to speak in other languages so that they might be understood by the crowds of people who traveled to Jerusalem from the four corners of the earth. That was a miracle, plain and simple, yet notice with me what the Spirit did. The Spirit pushed the disciples out into the world and gave them the ability to speak in other languages. Consider with me the specifics of this miracle: They were pushed out into the world, and they began to speak in other languages. Think about these things because there have been Christians nervous about foreign languages for hundreds of years. I told you before in the announcements that this summer, we’ll be preaching a sermon series on the Apostles’ Creed and will spend time trying to better understand some of the more difficult lines in that creed that we say week after week. Each time we recite the Apostles’ Creed, we say, “I believe in the holy catholic church.” We’ll spend more time on this later, but for today know, that it’s lower-case “c” catholic, which means we’re talking about the church universal not the Roman Catholic Church. The Roman Catholic Church got worried about other languages, and so they mandated that certain parts of the liturgy always be said in Latin. Why? Because even though the Holy Spirit gave the disciples the power to speak in other languages, sometimes other languages make people nervous, especially if they’re trying to stay in control. For example, I used to lead a lawn maintenance crew, and if the guys I was working with started speaking in Spanish, I got worried they were talking about me. Often they were. Likewise, there’s a famous line from the first female governor of Texas, Miriam Ferguson, who did all kinds of wonderful things for her state but is most often remembered for saying, “If English was good enough for Jesus, it’s good enough for Texas school children.” We get worried about other languages, yet the Holy Spirit pushed the disciples out into the world and gave them the ability to speak in all the languages of the world. What does that say about God? God is powerful, and our God wants all people to hear the Gospel spoken in the same language that they heard their mothers speak when they were but babies in her arms. On Pentecost, the Gospel was heard in the mother tongue of all God’s people. That’s a beautiful thing, but let me get back to our church parking lot. I really was inspired by our church parking lot last week. Let me tell you what else happened out there. Not only did I nearly sell a trailer. I also cleaned up yard signs from the midterm election. One of our neighbor churches is Maple Avenue United Methodist Church. I vote there. Maybe you vote there, too. Because our big church parking lot is right across from a place people vote, last week, I caught two sweet little old ladies putting campaign signs on our church property. They looked like they felt guilty about it. They didn’t have our permission to do it, but they did it anyway, and it became my duty to pick up after them because many Presbyterians don’t like the idea of our church participating in political elections. I carried at least 30-yard signs and put them in our dumpster because you can’t campaign on our church property. Why, then, do people do it? I believe it’s because with each election cycle, it feels a little more like the fate of our nation hangs in the balance. Each election cycle, Christians get a little more involved. Each year, there are a few more pastors become politicians. Each year, Christian Nationalism gets a little less Christian. Each meeting of the Cobb County Commission gets a little more heated. Last week on my ballot was whether the Cobb County School Board meetings should be televised. Isn’t there something better for us all to watch? Yet even the school board has become infected by a toxic political culture. I believe people have put too much faith in politics and not enough faith in God, so while I’m thankful to serve the Lord in a church engaged and mindful of current events and political realities, I feel obligated to say that the future of our world does not rest in the balance of any election. It never has and it never will. Remember with me that God is at work in our world, and the Spirit of Pentecost still blows, bringing all God’s people together in a common cause for a common purpose, less concerned with winning a partisan election and more concerned with making sure that all God’s people hear the Good News of Jesus Christ regardless of where they’re from or which language they speak. Did you hear that line from our first Scripture lesson? Moses said, “Would that all the Lord’s people were prophets.” Not politicians. Not pundits. Not critics. But prophets, proclaiming the truth that God is at work in our world bringing together nations, healing division, and leading people into a future brighter than all our yesterdays. Remember with me that the end of segregation didn’t start with Lyndon Johnson. He’s just the one who signed the legislation. The push, the transformation, the change, came from the prophet who inspired the people with the power of a dream. Remember with me that apartheid was outlawed by the politicians, but the push to end it came from the people led by a bishop named Desmond Tutu. Remember with me what the Bible says: “If my people who are called by my name humble themselves, pray, seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin and heal their land.” Don’t just quote that verse from 2nd Chronicles. Live it. Believe it. The world changes, not with elections or legislation, but when God’s people step out in faith and are pushed by the Spirit to speak out from the mountain tops. That’s what we remember today on Pentecost Sunday: God is at work, and God is concerned with all people. Dare to be a prophet declaring this truth. Dare to testify to the reality that God is in control. When you face the anxiety of this present evil age, choose faith, choose hope, choose love. Amen.