“The Spirit is in YOU!”
Numbers 11: 24-30 & Acts 2:1-13 ~ Northwood UC ~ May 28, 2023
Many of you have kindly inquired about my pilgrimage through the Camino de Santiago during my
sabbatical. Two questions were the most common: how did your feet hold up to all that walking? And,
what was your favourite part? Well…my favourite part was definitely NOT my blistering feet! My
favourite part was the gathering of the people. Each day, you would set off on your trek and meet up
with different pilgrims and reconnect with others. You would share a part of the journey with them:
along the trail, over lunch, coming and going from a church. But mostly, in the gathering over the
pilgrim meal at night.
Gathering over the pilgrim meal would occur at restaurants and hostels where you would sit at a large
communal table and unite over our shared journey and our shared hunger. And, I was AMAZED! We
would sit at one big, large table as family. Let me ask you…When does this ever happen to us in any
other setting? It is rare indeed, isn’t it?: sitting at a table with almost every nationality represented;
with ages ranging from people in their early 20’s into their 70’s. And you would hear the languages
spoken. All of us struggling to understand one another…we began talking more simply; we played a
bit of charades to understand; we used google translate on or phones; we helped one another to
understand. And somehow in that powerful experience, we sat together; we understood one another;
we nourished our bodies and spirits; we became family…and the Pentecostal Spirit was present! And
as I heard Lynn read the Acts passage of the nations gathering, that is what came to my mind.
“Amazed and astonished, they asked, ‘Are not all these who are speaking Galileans? 8 And how is it
that we hear, each of us, in our own native language? 9 Parthians, Medes, Elamites, and residents of
Mesopotamia, Judea and Cappadocia, Pontus and Asia…” (and the list went on!) The miracle of
Pentecost was one of gathering in community and hearing one another!
That is a wonderful, idealic image; however, it is one that I would suggest is not readily embraced by
our world. Perhaps that is the point of visiting this story each and every year at Pentecost. If you have
ever been the reader of this tongue-twisting passage in Acts containing all the different lands, you
would like to sit that Sunday out, wouldn’t you? If you are at a table with many people from different
places. When we hear different languages spoken, we are thankful when we hear some familiar
dialect. When we see the menu brought out, we are thankful when it is contains something that we
are used to. When we see ‘the other’, we (secretly) hope there are some that are like us. We don’t
readily want to admit this; however, this is human nature. And as we gain an insight into God’s nature
at Pentecost, we begin finding tension between our human nature and that of God’s.
This, of course, was the massive flaw in our thinking with our Indigenous siblings that led to the
running of Residential Schools. The Residential Schools created by the Government and run by many
of our churches, including ours, had a colonialist mentality of making them just like us. We did not
honour the beauty of language, the uniqueness of culture, the depth of another spirituality. We saw
our way as the one way and, very sadly, this was the course of history.
This is why we come back to this part of the Christian story, each and every year. The story of
Pentecost invites us to dream into a different world: a world of awesome diversity; a world honouring
the diversity in which we were all created; God’s Kingdom. And the deep challenge to us is in how we
approach the story. Wouldn't life be easier if we were all the same, we quietly ponder? If we all spoke
the same language; if we all believed the same way; if we had more in common? Wouldn't we avoid
so many of the conflicts and rifts that destroy our relationships? Perhaps there would be none of the
“isms” that harm our world! No “sexism” or “racism” or “classism” and the list goes on. If we all shared
a common culture, wouldn't we all be much better off? Too often, Christians have (quietly) hoped for a
time when our differences would cease, when “in Christ” we would all be indistinguishable. I think on the festival of Pentecost, such impulses must be examined. And the day of Pentecost is a good day
to do so!
What we discover this morning is that our adoption as Children of God does not erase our
differences. Instead, that adoption erases the need to claim superiority or inferiority based on these
markers of identity. We are not the same, but we are reminded that our differences are not ways to
measure our value in the eyes of God or in the eyes of one another. The story of Pentecost in Acts 2
helps us understand how God sees our differences. Simply put, our diversity in Creation is one of
God's greatest gifts to the world. At Pentecost, God through the Spirit, does not erase our differences
but embraces the fact that God has made us all so wonderfully different.
Looking at this from a larger theological perspective, we have been on quite a theological journey
over the past few weeks. Coming towards the end of the Easter season, we considered our human
condition of being restless. We pondered St. Augustine’s observation that we will continue to be
restless until our hearts rest in God. The human condition of restlessness calls for a deep trusting
faith; it calls for an acknowledgement that we come from God and that our hearts must nurture that
connection as we come back home to God through prayer, communal worship and service. These
many things allow us to rest in God and bind us back to the very roots of our very being. We will be
forever restless until we rest in the source of our being…until we rest in God.
And then, last week, as we came to the end of the 50 day Easter season on Ascension Sunday, we
considered active waiting for the coming of the Spirit. We are people who found our lives in the
ground of our being…AND…we actively wait for the outpouring of the Spirit. Active waiting is living in
a posture of readiness; it is having faith in the Spirit’s promised arrival…her outpouring upon all of
Creation.
Today is that gift and blessing…and challenge. Pentecost celebrates that Spirit arrival. The Spirit is
being poured out upon You. And here is the wonderful challenge in this day…the Spirit is not just
being poured out upon You; the Spirit is being poured out upon all Creation!!! That is why I wanted to
hold in tension the reading from Numbers alongside the Acts reading, that is likely a little more
familiar. In the book of Numbers, we are reminded of the historical waiting for the Spirit that people of
faith have been doing for a long time. Long before Jesus, people of faith were waiting for the
outpouring of the Spirit. And when that Spirit arrived it brought it’s share of challenges. The challenge
in Moses’ time was jealousy. The Spirit came down upon Moses and then to the many elders. They
quickly became concerned, asking Moses if he was jealous at what was happening. “But Moses, ‘Are
you jealous for my sake? Would that all the LORD’s people were prophets, and that the LORD would put
his spirit on them!’
And that is what is being celebrated today! God’s Spirit is being poured into You…and we celebrate!
God’s spirit is being poured into you…and we celebrate! God’s spirit blessing is being poured out
upon all flesh…and we celebrate, and rejoice in the power and possibility of this day! For today, is the
day ‘the church’ the assembly of all God’s people is being birthed. Many of our churches are opened
on Pentecost Sunday because this is what allows us to be the gathering of diverse people, uniquely
blessed and enabled by the Spirit to do the work of God in this little corner of the world.
But there will always be challenges: A church is a body that celebrates, is not jealous, of the unique
gifts of its members. Is that something we are able to do? Do we raise up our leaders and encourage
their participation in new and creative ways? A church is a body that honours and celebrates our
diversity. Witness of God’s blessing upon the church is the diversity of people. Are we a diverse
people in age, culture, sexuality and all the other ways the Spirit blesses?
The Spirit is in You…and You…and You. Thanks be to God.
Amen.