Pentecost 2021

Breath of life

Today we celebrate the coming of the Holy Spirit on the first disciples and also the birth of the Christian Church. So, although it sometimes slips by unnoticed it really is a red-letter day. Pentecost comes 50 days after Easter and marks the day when Jesus’ promise to his followers, that power from on high will come upon them, is fulfilled.

Some people know Pentecost by the old English name of Whitsun or ‘White Sunday’. Often on this day people were baptized and wore special white robes for the occasion. Most of all it is a time when we focus on the Holy Spirit, on this day we pray that the Spirit may come upon us filling us with wonder, love and praise, spilling over from our lives in new and creative ways and touching the lives of those we meet.

So, for this Pentecost Occasional Ramble, I would to share a few thoughts and then a reflection in music and pictures.

First, the thoughts.

I’m guessing until a year ago most of us would never have given it a thought!  What is it? Let me give you a clue, ‘It’s as natural as breathing,’ we say. All living things need breath and if by chance when they arrive, they don’t take that vital first gulp of air someone is there with a helping hand; to give a baby a slap on the back or in the case of a calf or a lamb to quickly baptise them in ice cold water, swing them round by their hind legs, or stick a piece of straw up their nose. Welcome to the world little one you’re gonna be doing this 24/7 for the whole of your earthly span.

With the advent of Covid 19, we have rapidly become aware of how breath is also a living thing. Viruses are transferred through breath, more specifically the droplets within our breath.  Face masks appeared, along with social distancing and hugging was definitely off. Scenes of people struggling for breath, on ventilators in hospital, needing oxygen to survive, have made us all too well aware of the vital connection between life and breath.

So, this year as we celebrate Pentecost, as we gradually start to breathe a little more easily and things begin to open up perhaps more than ever before, we ‘get’ this connection between life and breath.

As I read the passage set for Pentecost Sunday from Acts Chapter 2, the coming of the Holy Spirit with rushing wind and tongues of flame and a bunch of inadequate disciples being instantly transformed into 1^st class preachers, I wonder if this is really how it went.

By this point in their journey, the disciples were probably quite breathless themselves. A great deal had happened in the last 50 days. Jesus had been arrested and crucified, buried in a garden tomb. But just at the moment when they were at their lowest, something took their breath away. Jesus had promised this, of course, but somehow, they never quite took it in. Yet there he was standing among them, and in the course of their short time together, they met, they talked, they ate with him. They had breakfast on a beach, one found answers to his questions, one also found forgiveness, all found new joy and confidence.

But just as they were catching their breath, Jesus did exactly what he said he would do, he left. And so, the disciples did what church people often tend to do in times of fear and chaos- they had a meeting. They busily began to trying to get a game plan together, Jesus had left them so much to do, they really had to get organized. Boy, it was a daunting task! They really needed a mission plan.

The only breath in the room on that day came from sighs of anxious frustration. A sense of not being up to the task, stifled by their own limitations along with a whole series of questions.

How on earth can we manage to do all the things we need to do?
How can we preach the word like Jesus?
How can we care for the poor like Jesus?
How can we speak to the powerful like Jesus?
How can we bring healing like Jesus?
How can we make disciples like Jesus?

 None of us can do any of these things so perhaps we ought to find someone who can do all of them for us, call it a minister, priest or leader, the name’s not important it’s capability that counts.  We would be right behind them…of course!!! 

But as they sat pondering, all of a sudden whoosh! From out of the blue came a might wind, heading straight in their direction.  It blew through the house, raising the dust, rattling shutters filling each one of them with a breath that seemed to come from somewhere else, and indeed, from someone else. They’d not asked for this breath or expected it. This Spirit simply swooped down upon them and filled them in ways they could never have imagined, and with it, they found, that YES, they had gifts they never even knew they possessed. And so, what did they do next?

Once the disciples discovered they could breathe again, once they shook themselves loose from the knot in their throats, they found themselves speaking naturally about everything God had done. They burst out in languages they did not even know they could speak-telling the story of how once they were no people, but now they were God’s people.  Once they had no name, no faith and no future, but now they were God’s own sons and daughters.

What’s more these timid, stressed-out disciples found themselves preaching and sharing their faith in ways that were simply so compelling that people had to stop and listen. As the crowd grew, some thought they were drunk, and had we been there on that day we might well have imagined the same, there was no rational explanation.

But then Peter stood up and spoke. And I like to imagine all these people-from near and far, strangers and foreigners, young and old, beginning to breathe more easily, beginning to savour the fragrance of God and deeply inhale the Spirit.  And thus, the church took its very first breath, not with a smack on the back and a cough, not with a bucket of icy cold water. NO, in that very first moment it flew! As people from far and wide, all kinds of languages and traditions, began to speak of the wonder of God. And this breath/this Spirit blew freely, swooping and soaring and dancing among them. And, like a beautiful multi-coloured balloon Christ’s body, the church filled with life, lifted off and set sail on its journey.

But here’s the kicker in the story! Because whilst it is a lovely story, a meaningful story, a powerful story we can’t keep it rooted in the past. God’s Spirit still works in the very same way, the Holy Spirit, the breath of God is at work right here and now. And here’s the shocking/surprising part, it’s not restricted to the church, either the people or the building. You see it when people pray together, talk together, listen together, spark and become creative together. You see it in music, poetry, art, in nature and everyday conversation.

God’s Spirit will not be limited. It challenges, sometimes it scares, it comforts us and enlightens us, this is why the Spirit is sometimes called ‘Wisdom’. It is God’s moment by moment gift, we may call it air, breath or Holy Spirit, but whatever label we chose to use, it invites us to warm it and lend it our lives. In return it promises to fill us with life, set our hearts on fire give us words to speak of mysteries we can’t begin to comprehend. So just sit back, take a deep breath, savour the fragrance of God’s Holy Spirit.

The story of Pentecost reminds us if we are open to breathing it in, if we dare to pray “Come Holy Spirit,” our lungs will be filled to the gills with courage, strength, hope and faith we never even knew we had.

And so, on this Pentecost Sunday, I invite you to reflect for a moment on how you picture the Holy Spirit and then to end with a couple of simple prayers.  

Reflection

A Pause for Prayer

Blessed are you, Creator God:
Your Spirit moved over the face of the waters bringing light and life to all creation.
Pour out your Spirit on us this day, that we may walk as children of light
and by your grace reveal your presence, Father, Son and Holy Spirit.
Amen.

God of power, may the boldness of your Spirit transform us,
may the gentleness of your Spirit lead us,
may the gifts of your Spirit be our goal and our strength
now and always.
Amen.