Good morning and welcome. At this time of year, while we welcome the warmer temperatures, we also welcome the storms that come, such as the tornadoes that hit recently in the southern United States and the major flooding that has hit the prairies.
The storms hit fast and furious and the associated winds are devastating. It’s hard to even imagine that type of destruction. Yet this year we have witnessed a one-in-350 year occurrence of flooding along the Red and Assiniboine and associated rivers. Countless numbers have been evacuated from their homes. For some, sand bagging made no difference. Up along the Interlake and Lake Winnipeg, it had no effect on the direction of the winds. If they were from the south, damage was limited. If they were from the north large tracts of land were swallowed.
We have no control over the weather, over the storms that come to us. We have little warning and, in many cases, in the small countries overseas, there is no warning. Not long after an earthquake, for example, there is tension while residents wait for a possible tsunami or tidal wave that can devastate an entire country.
And so it is that we are here today to hear of another violent storm, a wind that blew renewal into a frightened bunch of followers not unlike you and me. It was not long after the death of Jesus that His followers scattered and made their way to an upper room for fear of the Jews, we are told. Those same followers of Jesus who felt they were safe, who felt they were knowledgeable about the end of the earth, about the coming of God’s reign, were holed up in the upper room. Their savior, their Lord, their Messiah, was beaten, humiliated, scourged and hung on a cruel cross to die, not unlike the other criminals of the day. In fact, there were two other criminals with Him, one on Jesus’ right, and one on His left.
This same Jesus, who told His disciples He must die in order to rise again, faced a storm of another kind…that of incredible violence to His person, His dignity and finally, suffering that ended His life. While He suffered on that cross, the disciples scattered. One of those disciples, Peter, even denied three times that he knew Jesus.
At the point of today’s reading, the disciples are afraid, until a wonderful event happened. This violent wind filled the room and tongues of fire rested on each of them. All were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues. Everyone understood the message in his/her own language.
Peter, the very one who denied he knew Jesus, now stands up with the eleven, addresses the crowd and quotes the prophet Joel, saying, “Listen carefully to what I say. These men are not drunk, as you suppose. It is 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 your daughters will prophesy, 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 prophecy. 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.”
Peter is describing the coming of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost. It was the fulfilling of the promise Jesus Himself had made. “I will not leave you orphaned, I will come to you. I will send you the comforter, the Holy Spirit.” Earlier, in the upper room, as we heard today, Jesus fulfilled His promise by breathing on the disciples and gifting them with the Holy Spirit.
What we are hearing about in today’s readings is the birth of the church, the sending of the Holy Spirit to many more gathered people coming from many varied lands. Up until that time, Jesus was known to His followers in person and He had taught them about God’s love, about miracles, about forgiveness and how much God loved them. The disciples walked and talked with an earthly Lord.
Yet, He had told them many times He must suffer and die and rise again, so that He could send the Holy Spirit. While Jesus was with them, the disciples could not understand this.
Essentially, the Holy Spirit is the third person of the trinity—the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. All three existed before time as you recall in Genesis… “Let us make man in our image”… The plan of salvation was that God would come into our lives and interact with us that we might come to know Him personally, that we might learn how to forgive, how to love unconditionally as He loves us.
In order to fulfill His promise of being with us forever, and of opening a gateway for us to eternal life, God’s plan of salvation was to become human and to die for us, for you and for me, so that we would not have to struggle in sin, but have eternal life.
Jesus knew we would have problems on this earth, He knew we would suffer from all sorts of storms in our life—health problems like diabetes, heart ailments, dietary problems, problems with depression, mental illness and low self-esteem, problems with relationships, problems with loss and grief. He knew we would get into all kinds of trouble and stray away from His message of faith. We are human after all, and that is part of our nature, to rebel, to want to have things our way, to go it on our own.
Jesus knew we would struggle, so He said “I will not leave you alone as orphans, to struggle… I will send you the comforter, the Holy Spirit, to be with you forever.”
At that first Pentecost, the believers received the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit, sent by Jesus, would give them all new life, would lead them out of despair, out of depression, out of sickness, out of the storms of life and into new life. The Holy Spirit would remind them of all of the things Jesus had said. He would give them the gifts they would need for ministry. The Holy Spirit would convict them of their wrong doings and bring them to repentance, to a new behavior. The power of God, through the Holy Spirit, had the power to transform lives.
The evidence of this was in Peter, the very one who disowned Jesus three times. This same Peter was one of the disciples who abandoned Jesus at His death and fled for safety for fear of his life.
This same Peter was given the strength, the courage, the power to witness to the Holy Spirit in his life. He challenged the authorities of his day and called them to repentance. He was a new person in Christ.
As Christians, we have the same Holy Spirit within us today. We have the same capability to draw on the power of God to witness, to bring healing, to transform lives. In fact, it is our calling. You don’t have to be ordained to have a special mission or ministry for God. God has given each of us at least one spiritual gift as mentioned in Corinthians—perhaps it is the gift of speaking in tongues, perhaps it is the gift of teaching, perhaps it is the gift of leadership. There are many. This past week, we met with the clergy of the diocese at Pinawa and heard teachings from the National Indigenous Anglican Bishop, Mark Macdonald. Many of you would have met him at the opening of our historic church last summer. Mark’s message to the clergy was that indigenous people are waking up to healing in their lives and that awakening is coming through Jesus. Many are discovering the “Jesus Way,” as described in a book by Richard Twiss, One Church Many Tribes. The Jesus way is a movement of people discovering new life in Jesus outside of any denomination. It is a way we as followers of the risen Lord must appreciate and assist others with as well.
The Holy Spirit gathers us as common followers of Jesus, creating the Church. The Holy Spirit gifts us for ministry. At St. James, I see many gifts at work in lay readers, in music direction, in altar guild, in readers, servers and administrants, in vestry and committee members and in the community, in the Lighthouse program and Happy Mike’s to name a few. I see gifts at use in the wider community as well, in the various careers and jobs our folks are in. For example, just a couple of weeks ago I had a chat with Kayla Johnson, happily assisting the Indigenous community through her work with the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC).
Through the Holy Spirit, we can come to know God, to know Jesus in a very real way. We cannot see Jesus face to face, but He is present in each of us, and so we need to look for His face in each other, we need to listen for His voice in each other and we need to be His hands and His feet in today’s world. And boy, does that world need Him, with violence, war, drug abuse, sickness, and disease rampant. This month, the Church takes time to honor Indigenous or First Nations or Aboriginal peoples in Canada. Our Prime Minister has apologized for the suffering of survivors in Residential Schools and our church along with the Roman Catholic, United and Presbyterian have apologized and pledged to work at healing and reconciliation.
I encourage all of you to learn about Aboriginal issues and to join me and others in the Indigenous community at a Sacred Circle, a diocesan Sacred Circle to be held at Pinawa September 9 and 10. This unique sacred gathering will be packed with learning opportunities and a chance to meet some very gifted and loving Indigenous people. Thanks to the bishop, I am acting as co-chair of the planning. I hope to offer some learning opportunities prior to the fall event, and I hope you can join us. Reconciliation only happens in relationship, when Indigenous and non-Indigenous come together in friendship and love. I have seen it happen and I look forward to it happening again.
Pentecost marks the birth of the church, but let us remember that Jesus did not come into this world to establish a church. He came that you and I might have life and life in abundance. He came that you and I would forever be in relationship with Him. It has been said by elders in the Aboriginal community that the early missionaries came to this country bringing us Jesus Christ, instead we got the church; … ‘we got the church’ — when I say that I mean what we see in the form of bishops, priests, deacons, lay readers, vestries.
In other words, an institution. Those elders were right. The church back then and today is really you and me in relationship with a living God. This is the essence of Tweet’s thesis in “One Church Many Tribes”, a recovery of the relationship with Jesus.
We come to that living God in prayer and we communicate with Him. Through prayer, that very same God Who was mentioned in the Pentecost reading comes to dwell in our hearts and lives.
There are many today who are not in churches, in the buildings. Why? Because they have not grasped this truth of the church being the people and not the building or the institution. Today, some who were in the church have left after being hurt by someone within the church itself. My former lay reader in northern Manitoba once told me he had a hard time going to church because the very ones who went said the words, prayed the prayers and then went home and did the opposite by drinking and abusing family members. There are many stories like that in many parishes.
The message of faith, the message of Pentecost, the message of the church, was not clearly understood. The one who is in Christ is a new person, the old life of sin has passed away. The person is transformed by the power of the Holy Spirit and the person is led by the Holy Spirit to a life of love. If this is not happening, you have to question whether the message is understood. Perhaps it is a matter of ownership of the message.
Having said that, we must also understand that Jesus Himself said the church is not a place for perfect people. Rather, it is a hospital for sinners. It is a place where the love of Christ can transform the human heart and move people to love and service for others and for God. For the one in Christ, that person becomes a servant to others and follows in Jesus’ path. Jesus Himself said “I have come not to be served but to serve.”
Serving others is not always easy, especially if there is hatred or jealousy or pride operating. Through the Holy Spirit, we can learn patience, be given wisdom and direction to move ahead, eventually assisting others to find God’s love. We are told in the Bible that we are to witness God’s love but if we cannot find the words, the Holy Spirit will move in us to give us those words. The Holy Spirit will help us to grow in faith.
As Christians, we are in this world, but we are not of it, since we have the Holy Spirit moving in us. The face of God can certainly be seen in those we meet, but as Christians, we have access to the living Lord and His power. As a member of the International Order of St. Luke the Physician, for example, I have seen many healings. As we anoint with holy oil, we call upon the Holy Spirit to heal and make whole. That anointing is available to you or a loved one each week at the altar.
The Holy Spirit also has another task, and that is to draw us all together as one, as the body of Christ, as a family together. Have you ever heard someone say “I can be a good Christian at home. I don’t need to go to church.” While it is true we can pray on our own, we can read the Bible on our own, we can call upon the Holy Spirit in our lives, it is only one part of a life in faith. It was the apostle Paul who told us we are like a body with many parts and each part works as part of a whole. If the whole body were an eye, where would the sense of smell be? And so on.
When we come to church, we connect with others in the spirit and in a very real way we become the body of Christ Himself. As His body, then, we worship and praise and glorify God and we are empowered by the Spirit to go into the world to proclaim God’s love and to bring others to know Him.
Happy birthday to our church, happy birthday members of St. James and may the Lord continue to bless us and to move us to continue to grow in faith and spread the good news of Christ in a world that desperately needs Him.
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