"Wireless Connectivity"
June 4, 2006: Pentecost Sunday, Year B
The Rev. John MacIver Gage, pastor
United Church on the Green, UCC: New Haven, CT
www.newlights.org

Scripture:
Acts 2:1-21
When the day of Pentecost had come, they were all together in one place. And suddenly from heaven there came a sound like the rush of a mighty wind, and it filled the entire house where they were sitting. Divided tongues, as of fire, appeared among them, and a tongue rested on each of them. All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other languages, as the Spirit gave them ability. Now there were devout Jews from every nation under heaven living in Jerusalem. And at this sound the crowd gathered and was bewildered, because each one heard them speaking in the native language of each. Amazed and astonished, they asked, "Are not all these who are speaking Galileans? And how is it that we hear, each of us, in our own native language? Parthians, Medes, Elamites, and residents of Mesopotamia, Judea and Cappadocia, Pontus and Asia, Phrygia and Pamphylia, Egypt and the parts of Libya belonging to Cyrene, and visitors from Rome, both Jews and proselytes, Cretans and Arabs—in our own languages we hear them speaking about God's deeds of power." All were amazed and perplexed, saying to one another, "What does this mean?" But others sneered and said, "They are filled with new wine." But Peter, standing with the eleven, raised his voice and addressed them, "People of Judea and all who live in Jerusalem, let this be known to you, and listen to what I say. Indeed, these are not drunk, as you suppose, for it is only nine o'clock in the morning. No, this is what was spoken through the prophet Joel: 'In the last days it will be, God declares, that I will pour out my Spirit upon all flesh, and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, and your young men shall see visions, and your old men shall dream dreams. Even upon my slaves, both men and women, in those days I will pour out my Spirit; and they shall prophesy. And I will show portents in the heaven above and signs on the earth below, blood, and fire, and smoky mist. The sun shall be turned to darkness and the moon to blood, before the coming of the Lord's great and glorious day. Then everyone who calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved.'"

May God speak through these words and make from them a holy word for us today. Amen.

Sermon:
So just in case you missed it somehow—despite the introit, the call to worship, the hymn, the children's sermon, the scripture, the pinwheels, and the whistles—today we're celebrating Pentecost, one of the great high holy days of the whole Christian year. Today is the day we mark the birthday of the church, that day long long ago when the disciples, those men and women who followed Jesus in his earthly ministry, received a new title and a new job description as apostles commissioned to carry on Jesus' work "in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth" (Acts 1:8). We are here now because they were there then, that Pentecost day, gathered all together once again in the upper room.

It's likely a fairly familiar story to you, since we read it every year at this time. Pentecost is one of those places where the lectionary that generally guides our reading over a three-year cycle narrows in order to focus our attention on a particular foundational story. And here it is: After a sweet honeymoon among them, the resurrected Jesus has finally withdrawn from the disciples and been lifted up into heaven, leaving them with his promise that soon and very soon they will be "clothed with power from on high" (Luke 24: 49), whatever that may mean; until that time, he says, they are to remain together and remain in Jerusalem.

Neither of which they are really too inclined to do, seeing as their leader has been tortured and killed. Sure, he was later raised, but now he's just plain gone, and it's likely the religious authorities are looking to finish the job and finish them. But against their better judgment, they do stay, and they are still together when the festival of Pentecost, a kind of Jewish bank holiday, rolls around, and, well, all heaven breaks loose.

Suddenly, the whole house where they are gathered is rocked back on its heels by the rush of a mighty wind, a sound like God's own deep breathing, and it fills them. And there is fire in the wind, tongues of fire that lick around their ears and eyes like St. Elmo's fire, and the fire fills them, too. And they are so filled with the power of this Holy Spirit that they overflow like the mouths of fountains. They begin to speak and sing and shout in words they never knew they ever knew. They come pouring out of the house and are poured out into the streets.

And then, a miracle happens: God goes wireless.

You see, Jerusalem was filled with travelers from every corner of the empire for the holiday, Parthians and Medes and Elamites and lions and tigers and bears, oh my. Forget the ancient geography lesson—there won't be a pop quiz. Just know that it was a whole lot of people from a whole lot of places and spaces of life, all of whom thought all the others sounded funny, looked funny, ate funny food, and smelled funny, too. Though nominally all Jews, it's really more their mutual disdain that unites them, and then just barely. Noses of all shapes and sizes are wrinkled, held, held up, and put out of joint all week long. You see, Egyptians just don't talk to Romans, Romans don't talk to Cretans, Cretans don't talk to Arabs, and Arabs don't talk to Egyptians. Can't and don't and don't really want to. So they wander about the city, seeing the sites and going about their business in clumps, little knots of barely mutual intelligibility, talking with each other about each other.

Then they, too, are rocked back on their heels. They hear the mighty rush of wind and smell the sharp ozone of the flames and look around. Then they see them, these men and women come bursting out of the front door of one house to flood the streets around them. And they are all speaking at once, speaking and singing and shouting in... in... well, in Egyptian and Latin and Cretan and Arabic, in Parthian and Medish and Elamitanian. The point is, each one of that messy, mingled polyglot crowd understood all the speaking and singing and shouting as though the apostles were speaking in their own native language, the very words their mothers used to use to call them in to supper and their fathers to tell them their favorite bedtime stories. "What does this mean?" they exclaimed, too amazed to even notice that in that moment, they could understand one another, as well.

At Pentecost, God goes wireless.

In the midst of all this chaos, Peter stands up and says, "If you can hear the sound of my voice, clap three times. If you can hear the sound of my voice, clap three times." And a hush falls over the crowd. They can hear him, and, what's more, they do understand and, amazingly, they want to listen. Into this eye of the storm, Peter speaks—no, Peter preaches:

"Now, good people, perhaps you're asking yourself just what's going on here? Mass hysteria? Some sort of hypnotism? Are we drunk? Well, no, we're not drunk, and you're not crazy, either. This is what the prophet Joel meant we he wrote, "In the last days it will be, God declares, that I will pour out my Spirit upon all flesh, and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, and your young men shall see visions, and your old men shall dream dreams. Even upon my slaves, both men and women, in those days I will pour out my Spirit; and they shall prophesy... before the coming of the Lord.s great and glorious day. Then everyone who calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved.' This is that day!"

God goes wireless. This is the miracle of Pentecost, the promise that, unlike any limited and limiting community we may manage to cobble together out of a shared language or ethnicity or class or sexual orientation or history or nation or religion, the realm of God announced by Jesus, preached by Peter, and being built among us even today through the power of the Holy Spirit, that realm is not founded on any human unity, but the unity that comes from God alone.

In the presence of God's Spirit, our human diversity will no longer disintegrate into division, nor our differences need to be melted down to forge the false god of uniformity. The Spirit will be enough. The Spirit will move among us and in us and through us, all of us, from the least to the greatest, the haves to the have-nots, the ins to the outs to the in-betweens, bridging the gaps between us in great showers of sparks. And we will be changed. We will be released at last from our ugly hardwired fractiousness to float free in God's gracious Spirit. In that day, all the world will dance in beautiful shifting circles of relationship, no longer closed circuits but constellations, forming and reforming according to our deep needs and best desires and God's good pleasure. God is wireless, and in the realm of God, we will be, too.

Now at this point, having heard all these fancy phrases, perhaps you're asking yourself just what's going on here? Is this preacher hysterical? hynpotized? drunk, even? No, and not just because it's still early in the morning, either. No, this is the same promise of God that Peter preached, and just because we're not all the way there yet—and I know we're not—does not mean that day is not coming. God will not be bound by our faults and frailties. This boundless, boundary-less, wireless salvation is the will and the work of God among us.

Which means, of course, we have no excuse not to respond. Going wireless means going whine-less, too. <whiney voice> "Loving other people is just too hard—especially different people, you know, weird people, people like __________"—fill in the blank. "Can't we start with something easier, like loving popular, beautiful, intelligent, rich people? Or famous people, maybe? I'm sure we could handle that."

I'm sure we could, but that's not the point. It's not about loving people just like us, or people we want to love, nice, familiar, easy people, but all people. The world of the Spirit is not a gated community but a city teeming with so many living so much life in so many ways we can scarcely begin to comprehend it all. It's scary. But despite their fear, the disciples couldn't stay cooped up in their little room. God called them apostles and sent them out into the city to preach. And in the same way, God calls us to leave the supposed safety of our hermetically sealed little lives and take to the streets to engage the world in the work of justice, peace, and compassion. This is the work of the church—their work then and our work now. And it's fueled by the power of the same Holy Spirit.

Though we may not be able to see the Spirit at work, we can feel its effects. Every time we lower our defenses to regard one another with respect, regardless of our differences and our fear, the Spirit is there. Every time we learn to appreciate one another because of our differences, the Spirit is there. Every time we cross the aisle to greet a stranger, the Spirit is there. Every time we cross borders seeking to build peace rather than bring war, the Spirit is there. Every time we tear down the walls, unlock the doors, open our hearts, the Spirit is there. Every time we clash and disagree but continue on in loving relationship because we trust our unity is in God, not ourselves, the Spirit is there. Every time we preach God's extravagant welcome for all persons and then follow through with an hand outstretched and a kind word, God's Pentecost Spirit sings around us like wind in the rigging, we are moved, the church is born again, and the world is transformed.

The promise of the story of Pentecost is that "everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved;" in other words, when God goes wireless, salvation—that is, freedom, wholeness, liberation, restoration, reconciliation—is an open network, an open table, accessible to all people. All people. All people. All people. All people. All people. All people.

Can you hear me now? All people. This is Pentecost, and this is word enough to build a church on and to change a world with. And with our help, God is, and with God's help, we will. Thanks be to God.