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Scroll to the bottom of today’s post for a sample of those discussions — an audio excerpt of our recent conversation with Jeff Sharlet, author of New York Times bestseller The Undertow: Scenes from a Slow Civil War.
TODAY IS PENTECOST SUNDAY, the seventh Sunday after Easter, the celebration of the Holy Spirit and the birth of the church.
More than a decade ago, I preached at Christ Church Cathedral in Vancouver, British Columbia, on Pentecost.
The sermon was well received — and I still remember that Sunday’s service. After worship, an older woman greeted me saying, “That was an excellent sermon in every way. I loved the ecological approach, the subtle feminism, and the sensitivity to the text.”
Rarely are churchgoers quite as specific when chatting to preachers about sermons. I thanked her, and she made a few more incisive comments before heading off.
The next person grabbed my hand and said, “Oh my! I overheard that! Are you OK? If she said that to me, I would have fainted!” I must have looked puzzled. The congregant continued, “Don’t you know who that was?” I shook my head, “No. I’m afraid I don’t.”
“That,” my acquaintance said, “was Sallie McFague.”
That’s when I felt faint. I hadn’t recognized Sallie McFague, one of the greatest Christian feminist thinkers of the twentieth century — whose work synthesized liberation with environmentalism and process theology. And she’d just delivered the most gracious and humbling compliment I’d ever received as a preacher. I was embarrassed, honored, flabbergasted, and surprised all at the same time!
I never got to thank her. Not only did she encourage me on that day, but her comments guaranteed that I never forgot that sermon from June 2011. It meant a great deal to me when it was preached. And it has continued to influence my thinking in the years since — I’ve never stopped ruminating on the ideas presented that day and Sallie McFague’s response.
And so, on this Pentecost, I’m sharing it with you. As far as I know, no recording of it survives. It was preached only once, and it has never been published in any form. There are only rough notes from my files, and my own memory of the event. As is the case with Anglicans, there was no title, just listed as “Sermon” in the bulletin.
I found the old document on my computer and brushed it up a bit. Instead of a formal sermon, you’ll see it has the impressionistic quality of notes that were expounded upon from a pulpit. I share it with you today — a dozen years later — on this Pentecost Sunday.
The musing is below the lectionary readings and the picture.
Acts 2:1-21
When the day of Pentecost had come, the disciples were all together in one place. And suddenly from heaven there came a sound like the rush of a violent 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, "Men 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.' "
John 7:37-39
On the last day of the festival, the great day, while Jesus was standing there, he cried out, “Let anyone who is thirsty come to me, and let the one who believes in me drink. As the scripture has said, ‘Out of the believer’s heart shall flow rivers of living water.’” Now he said this about the Spirit, which believers in him were to receive; for as yet there was no Spirit, because Jesus was not yet glorified.
Just a few weeks ago, I was driving on Highway 101 near San Francisco. South of the city, there were two billboards next to one another, in quick succession. The first proclaimed: JUDGEMENT DAY: MAY 21. Get Ready!
The second announced: Smart Liposuction. Quick Results Guaranteed.
Only in America, I thought, and shook my head. We’ve got to look good for the Last Days.
Flannery O’Connor once famously referred to America as “Christ-haunted.” But I’ve always thought us haunted by apocalypse — the Last Days, with its portents and signs, darkened sun, blood-colored moon, the coming of the Lord. Call on the name of the Lord, BE SAVED! It is the stuff of our nightmares.
In popular culture — the “Last Days” or the “Lord’s Day” — the coming of God’s reign often means the “end of the world,” a judgment day, the day on which everything here ceases to be and we all — or only those who are ready — escape the world and go to heaven.
Pentecost, the great Christian festival we celebrate today — it relates an ancient story, reports a strange speaking in different tongues, and depicts a kind of baptism — is a feast of the Last Days.
Some Christians read this story literally, expecting it to be re-enacted immediately before Jesus’ Second Coming (hence, the billboard).
But this is not a story of escape from the world. Rather, it is a tale of new creation, about God remaking the world in which we live. Pentecost celebrates all things being made as God intends, and the world set a-right.
Literal? I can’t really say. But I do know that it is deeply symbolic, drawing from a vision of the cosmos that those who first heard this story would have recognized.
Pentecost uses four ancient symbols, the four elements believed to make up the universe, to reveal a story of God’s miraculous re-creation: wind, water, fire, and earth.
The four elements of wind, water, fire and earth are among the more pervasive symbols in the world’s spiritual traditions. The Greeks spread this idea throughout the Mediterranean, and many cultures embraced the belief that the whole of creation was composed of these four things.
Luke’s account is a Christian reweaving of this Greek creation story, a story of deep human connection, of how God recreates each one of us, and the recreation of the world through the Holy Spirit.
WIND:
The dominant image in Pentecost is wind—the clouds and storms that brood and threaten yet give life. The wind rushes in, not gently or as a breeze, but violently as a storm, a tornado.
Be praised, my Lord, through Brothers Wind and Air, and clouds and storms, and all the weather, through which you give your creatures sustenance.
— Francis of Assisi, Canticle of the Sun
The image of Pentecost’s wind harkens back to the Book of Genesis, in the opening of the biblical creation story, where the wind of God hovers over the waters. We can imagine that it, too, was a roaring wind, that wind of creation, stirring all things, whipping at the waters below, separating the sky from the earth. God’s wind is a storm of creativity, the roar and rush of divine breath, bringing forth life. Breath is life.
The wind announces that Pentecost is the moment of recreation. God breathes divine intention upon the world, God’s breath extends God’s life to us, among us, upon us, enabling us to experience God’s power and presence.
WATER:
The next image is that of water, as St. Francis sang, simple, humble, useful, precious and pure.
Be praised, My Lord, through Sister Water; she is very useful, and humble, and precious, and pure.
— Francis of Assisi, Canticle of the Sun
Water is the main element of baptism; water is an image for Jesus, the living well, the one who quenches our thrist: On the last day of the festival, the great day, while Jesus was standing there, he cried out, "Let anyone who is thirsty come to me, and let the one who believes in me drink. As the scripture has said, `Out of the believer's heart shall flow rivers of living water.'"
Pentecost is not only a day of wind, it is a day of water. Water cleanses, water quenches. The waters are necessarily for human survival in so many ways, from the daily act of going to a well for water (or the modern one of turning on a tap) to the provision of fish, generating power, to the balance water provides in the eco-system of the planet. Water is, indeed, humble. Yet she is precious, irreplaceable, and the fountain of life.
The water of Pentecost is the river of God, the water poured out by God that washes us clean and relieves our thirst.
FIRE:
Fire is the most dramatic element of the Pentecost story, with tongues of flame appearing above the heads of those gathered as God’s wind rushed in. Fire is the element of illumination, of purification, of passion.
Be praised, my Lord, through Brother Fire, through whom you brighten the night. He is beautiful and cheerful, and powerful and strong.
— Francis of Assisi, Canticle of the Sun
Fire burns everything in its path, but, as those of us who live in the west understand, it is a necessary part of nature’s cycle. Even as fire destroys, it clears what is overgrown forest that a new forest may grow. The conflagration consumes and makes room for new creation. Fire is beautiful and compelling as well as dangerous, frightening and cheerful, capable of both destruction and necessary for warmth and for preparing food. In creation, fire forced itself from the center of earth, pushing upward toward the heavens, making the very land on which we stand today, creating the soils in which we grow our food.
The fire of Pentecost is God’s passion, burning and creating, purifying and illuminating, the flame that both frightens us and yet invites us to experience the power of God.
EARTH:
Earth may be the most elusive of the elements in Pentecost, but represented by the crowd, the people of the earth, who are gathered from many nations at the feast.
Be praised, my Lord, through our sister Mother Earth, who feeds us and rules us, and produces various fruits with colored flowers and herbs.
— Francis of Assisi, Canticle of the Sun
All the people mentioned in the story — Jews, Libyans, Egyptians, Persians, Romans — are all of the earth, made of dust. Like everyone, they are the stuff of earth, made of dust, as told in Genesis and what we know through science. And they all return to dust, return to the earth in the shared fate of every creature.
To these children of Mother Earth, Pentecost comes. This God — the one of wind, water, and flame — is also the God of earth’s children, the Creator Mother God.
Pentecost is a story of the Last Days, but not a “THE END” kind of ending. Some Christians use this as a passage of escape, that Pentecost signals the time in which we will prepare ourselves to leave the earth and make a new home in heaven. But reading Pentecost through the lens of these ancient symbols it employs reveals the opposite story: God has escaped the reaches of heaven and has come to make a home with us, here on earth.
Pentecost is a story of creation, wherein wind, water, fire, and earth form a new world. Thus, these last days are not days of violent destruction of earth; the last days are only the days of violent destruction of all that God opposes — oppression, injustice, violence, cruelty, poverty, and inequity — they are the last days of God’s distance from us. God with us. The body of God, Jesus’ own people. The Spirit indwells. God is near, with, and within.
They are the First Days of new creation, toward a new wholeness in human community and in and with the world, the long-hoped-for reign of God on earth.
As the Wind is your symbol, so forward our goings. As the dove, so launch us homeward toward a new earth. As water, so purify our spirits. As fire, so purge out our dross. Amen.(Christina Rossetti).
Happy Pentecost. Happy Day of New Creation.
American Christian radio host Harold Camping stated that the Rapture and would take place on May 21, 2011 and that the end of the world would take place five months later on October 21, 2011. A supporter of Camping, who believed the prophecy, put up more than 5,000 such billboards across the United States, Canada, and other nations.
INSPIRATION
The Irish poet, John O’Donohue, wrote a series of blessings for earth, fire, water, and air. Below are excerpted selections from each, with links to the entire blessings found on various sites across the internet. These poems can also be found in his two of his books, To Bless the Space Between Us and Four Elements: Reflections on Nature.
Let us bless
The imagination of the Earth,
That knew early the patience
To harness the mind of time,
Waited for the seas to warm,
Ready to welcome the emergence
Of things dreaming of voyaging
Among the stillness of land. . . .
Let us thank the Earth
That offers ground for home
And holds our feet firm
To walk in space open
To infinite galaxies.
— John O’Donohue, from In Praise of the Earth
Let us praise the grace and risk of Fire:
In the beginning,
The Word was red,
And the sound was thunder,
And the wound in the unseen
Spilled forth the red weather of being.
In the name of the Fire,
The Flame
And the Light:
Praise the pure presence of fire
That burns from within
Without thought of time.
— John O’Donohue, from In Praise of Fire
Let us bless the grace of water:
The imagination of the primeval ocean
Where the first forms of life stirred
And emerged to dress the vacant earth
With warm quilts of color. . .
The courage of a river to continue belief
In the slow fall of ground,
Always falling farther
Toward the unseen ocean.
—John O'Donohue, from In Praise of Water
Let us bless the air,
Benefactor of breath,
Keeper of the fragile bridge
We breathe across.
Air waiting outside
The womb, to funnel
A first breath
That lets us begin
To be here,
Each moment
Drawn from
It’s invisible stop. . .
— John O’Donohue, from In Praise of Air
We were born into a farming family and our first lessons were learnt through the medium of nature . . . The interplay between farmers and the elements was a poem without words, the echo which would always return to him.
The air could hold the "breeze of the rain" or the "wind of warmth" to the discerning nose.
The stone carved its memory deep into the hands that chiseled it.
Fire was life in the hearth which was the center of home.
Water introduced itself to us from its most natural source in streams and wells.
— Pat O’ Donohue regarding his brother, John O'Donohue
An audio excerpt from Jeff Sharlet at The Cottage.
We’re talking about his book, The Undertow: Scenes from a Slow Civil War. This selection is about how “hipster” churches (like Vous Church in Miami) cleared the way for a far more sinister kind of white evangelicalism, that of the “warrior Christ.”
The entire video recording (not just audio) is available to paid subscribers.
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A beautiful way for me to start this Sunday. I often reflect on your messages and talk to my husband about how wonderful it is to expand my views. Or rather blow up my old literal understandings if these familiar passages of scripture. I can’t tell you enough what a gift your ministry is to me. Thank you Diana.
Great message!