Pentecost A: Numbers 11:24-30, Psalm 104, Acts 2:1-21 “In Praise of the Spirit”
There is a wonderful rendition of the flames of the Holy Spirit on display in our worship space today. Mary Rossi Noonan found a way to enlarge the form with a projector and our kids colored it one year. The pencils they had were not particularly bright or vibrant, so the next year they worked on it again and made it come alive even more. In my own life, I have found that relying on the Spirit, when I can bring myself to do so, makes me more alive, more light, more free. Throughout history, we find that the Spirit can greatly influence people and their abilities to communicate. The Holy Spirit, often characterized by wind, flame or dove, can heal us and rekindle a fire in us, a prophetic fire, a fire that can make even the most ordinary person into a powerful orator, a person who has found his or her “voice.” The point is contained in the poem I read for our invocation and in the life of its writer, Hildegard of Bingen, a 12th Century Benedictine Abbess.
Hildegard of Bingen was born in 1098 near Mainz on the Rhine river in what is now Germany. She became a Benedictine nun at 15 and was eventually elected abbess. As a child, Hildegard was troubled by visual disturbances, seeing people and objects glowing in brilliant light. She continued to have powerful visions throughout her life and drew on them to illustrate theological concepts in her extensive writings. Late in life, in obedience to another of her visions, Hildegard left the seclusion of the convent and embarked upon a preaching tour, an extremely unusual occurrence for a woman of that time. We might say that Hildegard found her voice
We certainly see how the Disciples became orators in the scripture lesson today. We must recall, in our Christian story, that these were people cowering in fear after the death of Jesus on the cross. Would they be next? Would they pay the same price for telling the story of the Kingdom of God, where all are blessed and welcomed? What happened to these frightened folks that turned them into powerful witnesses? We are told that the transformation “came as 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.” People thought they were drunk! They showed such ability to proclaim in every language about “God’s deeds of power.” Peter began his preaching ministry right then and there, quoting the prophet Joel, that God had promised to pour out the Spirit upon all flesh, that sons and daughters would prophesy, that young people would see visions (perhaps like Hildegard’s?), that the old would dream dreams, that even slaves would receive the Spirit and prophesy.
As I was preparing this message, it occurred to me that in the modern age, certainly a descendant of slaves had indeed prophesied. Hildegard saw visions and later preached. Martin Luther King had a dream and through the Spirit’s power became a mighty prophet. Listen to these words from his speech delivered on April 4, 1967 at Riverside Church in New York City. Do you think the Spirit inspired them?
“We as a nation must undergo a radical revolution of values. We must rapidly begin a shift from a ‘thing-oriented’ society to a ‘person-oriented’ society. When machines and computers, profit motives and property rights are considered more important than people, the giant triplets of racism, materialism and militarism are incapable of being conquered.” He also proclaimed that “A true revolution of values will soon cause us to question the fairness and justice of many of our past and present policies… The Western arrogance of feeling that it has everything to teach others and nothing to learn from them is not just. A true revolution of values will lay hands on the world order and say of war: ‘This way of settling differences is not just.”
I tell you these stories of the apostle Peter and the disciples in the first century, Hildegard of Bingen in the 12th century, and Martin Luther King in the 20th Century to make a point. The Spirit is alive and well and eternal. And she desires, in the words of Hildegard, to make us alive, to move in us, to cleanse us and the cosmos of every impurity, to efface our guilt, to anoint our wounds. In a Centering Prayer class, I learned that the action of the Holy Spirit, when we give her our consent, is to go into our deepest psyche and help us illuminate and cleanse a whole lifetime of fears, traumas, injuries and pain. The Holy Spirit has been likened by Father Keating, to a housemaid who will help us scrub the dirtiest floor of the basement of our souls, so that we may shine more brightly to the glory of God.
We hear stories of Peter, Hildegard and Dr. King and we wonder. Could this happen to me? Could the spirit revivify me? Could the Spirit take me, who am perhaps about as colorful as oatmeal, and cause me to burst into brilliant flame to the glory of God? Could the Spirit bring me to know in my deepest heart that I could find a voice for the prophetic work of the Kingdom?
Not all people who have found their “voice” so to speak, use it in public proclamation. My age 70-something former spiritual director, Sister Del Ray Thiemann, allows the Spirit to use her to go to those deep and dark places with people on their spiritual journeys. She is not a public speaker, but she allowed the Spirit to guide her into a “yes” when I asked her to give the message at my ordination seven years ago today. The Holy Spirit will do for us what we cannot do for ourselves.
I have a little parable I’d like to tell you about the Holy Spirit. In the garage of my soul, there sits an old car. It has wheels made out of resentment. It has a steering wheel formed from judgment. The seats are made of well-worn self-pity. The body is constructed of durable and long-lasting fear. Sometimes the Holy Spirit prevails upon me to trade in this old wreck for a model of her choosing. But I’m stubborn and I tend to cling to what I know. The components of this car are like old friends to me. I know them. I have only glimpses of the new model the Spirit is willing to give me for no money. It fairly sparkles with love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. The only price I must pay is the surrender of my fearful, judging self to the will of the Holy Spirit. Sometimes, when I remember, and I notice that I am all worked up, I say “Holy Spirit, help me to see this situation differently.” And when I let go, the transformation begins.
I want this transformation, brought about by the flames of the Holy Spirit! I want the sense of being alive, I want the healing of which Hildegard and Father Keating speak! I call upon the Holy Spirit, who is “lustrous and praiseworthy life”, who will “waken and re-awaken everything that is.”
I close with a poem from a 20th century Mexican pastor, Julian Ibarra Zapata.
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