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The Rev. Richard Floyd Ridgefield-Crystal Lake Presbyterian Church Pentecost Acts 2:1-21 June 4, 2006 What a spectacular story this is. Mighty winds and flaming tongues and miraculous new languages and huge crowds of people being baptized. It’s very dramatic—maybe too dramatic. It sounds so very un-Presbyterian. If this is what it looks like when the Spirit comes then some of us, most of us will have to conclude we’ve never encountered this Spirit, and, to be honest, we’re not sure we want to. It’s hard for us to relate to such an extraordinary experience. So here’s an experience that’s easier for us to relate to. Pentecost is often called the birthday of the church, the day the church came into being. Birthdays are something we can all relate to. Now, granted, some of you have more experience with birthdays than I do. I appreciate that. But we all know a little something about birthdays. Birthdays are a time for taking stock, for looking in the mirror to see how we’re holding up. I don’t have to tell you, this mirror-gazing experience can be uncomfortable. You don’t always recognize the person staring back at you. Didn’t I use to have more hair up here? And why is my hair moving from up here, where I want it, to down here and over there, where I don’t? And those gray hairs are starting to spread like some kind of plague. I didn’t have this many when I first came to RCLPC. And I swear I’m just kind of getting soft all over, like I’m melting. I may not be getting much sympathy from you. As the years go by this mirror-gazing experience can get more and more depressing. But I wonder. Maybe it gets depressing because we don’t know how to see what really matters. Our culture tries to tell us what really matters, what’s really beautiful. And if we buy what our culture tells us, we find we seldom measure up when we look in the mirror. But maybe we’ve got to look harder than that, deeper than that. Maybe there are more wrinkles on our face than there were last year, but wrinkles don’t come only from age. They come from smiles and laughter and tears, too, and not just by ourselves, but shared with family and friends and neighbors and strangers. And maybe we have less hair than we used to, but maybe that’s because we have loved other people, even when that love brought worry and pain into our lives. And maybe our bodies are running down, getting tired and stiff, but maybe that’s because we’ve used them, used them to build and heal and embrace and protect. I think mirror-gazing on our birthdays is depressing only if we forget what really matters in life. This is Pentecost Sunday, the birthday of the church, so maybe it’s time for us, as a congregation, to stand in front of the mirror. But let’s not look for signs of age, though we can find plenty of that. Let’s look for signs of the Spirit. So what do you think? What do you see in your mind’s eye? Our culture tries to tell us what it means to be a successful church, and if we buy what our culture tells us, we might look for packed pews or overflowing bank accounts or shiny, new buildings as signs of the Spirit. Well we don’t always see that. Sometimes our pews are full, but sometimes they’re half empty. Sometimes we’ve got plenty of money to do good in the world, but sometimes it seems like we’re just barely hanging on. Sometimes we dream about new, shiny buildings, but sometimes those dreams seem far, far away. So does that mean the Spirit has moved on, left us behind? I don’t think so. We may not always see packed pews or overflowing bank accounts or shiny, new buildings. And we certainly don’t often see flaming tongues and mass baptisms. But if we look harder, if we look deeper, we do start to see something... I see people unloading groceries and handing out bags of food at the food pantry. I see people sifting through clothes and books and furniture and dishes and electronics and all sorts of odds and ends to get them ready to sell to support a mission trip to Egypt. I see people preparing to travel halfway around the world to see what the Spirit is up to in the lives of sisters and brothers over there. I see people digging in the dirt and sharing the bounty. I see people working to improve the lives of migrant workers in our community. I see people carrying lumber and swinging hammers and painting walls so that a Hispanic family can have a home they can be proud of. I see people cooking meals and making and sending cards and laughing and crying with so many others in the congregation. I see people working all hours of the night so that Vacation Bible School might be a life-changing experience for children. I see people working to fill our worship space with light and sound and color and images. I see people unlocking doors and shining floors, greeting and ushering, lighting candles and setting tables, paying bills and counting offerings, day after day after year after year. I see the piano and the organ and the keyboard and the guitar and the bass and the drums and the clarinet and the trombone— I see people making music with their hands and their voices and their hearts and their souls. I see people throwing a party to celebrate the long service of others. I see nursery workers and volunteers caring for our children. I see people moving and rebuilding a swing set. I see people huddled around a table folding the newsletter. I see people painting and gardening and mopping up leaks. I see all of you sitting there in the pews when there are a thousand other places you could be, singing and praying, remembering and hoping. I see fiery tongues, dancing all around this place, and falling on each of you. And not just one tongue but hundreds and thousands, one for each kind word you’ve spoken, one for each time you’ve laughed with someone or cried with someone or forgiven someone or thanked someone. Each fiery tongue stands for a gift you’ve been given, a gift you’ve shared with others, and they are all over this place. When I look in the mirror, I see, with supreme clarity, that the Spirit is alive and well here at RCLPC. Sure, we don’t have all the special effects. Our pews may not always be packed or our bank accounts overflowing or our buildings shiny and new. We may have a long way to go and a lot of work to do to be the kind of congregation we want to be. But when the Spirit came to those first disciples, it gave them courage, it gave them hope, it helped them to love one another, it helped them to reach out to others with the good news of God’s love. The Spirit does the same for us, right here, right now. That’s what I see when I look in the mirror on this day of Pentecost, the birthday of the church. Just like with the disciples on that first Pentecost, the Spirit fills this place and everyone in it. Empowered by that same Spirit, we will move into the future, faithfully, together. Thanks be to God! |