We have not ceased praying for you and asking that you may be filled with the knowledge of God’s will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding, so that you may lead lives worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing to him, as you bear fruit in every good work and as you grow in the knowledge of God.
I never cease to be astonished at how many ways we choose to turn away from God. That’s not why we exist. We exist to glorify God. As Thomas Merton once put it, a tree glorifies God simply by being a tree – implying that when we are truly the people God knows us to be, we too will glorify God. A more radical, incarnational view came from the fourth-century bishop Athanasius, defender of the Trinitarian faith: God became man that man might become God. There’s a lot of room to go astray in that statement, which may be why Protestants of Calvinist extraction stress the unbreachable gap between sinful humans and sovereign God. We can strive only to take on God’s qualities, not God’s essence. But an incarnational faith affirms that in becoming ever more Christ-like through grace, we become more God-like as well.
So I am always amazed that we choose to turn away from God. Sometimes the reasons are clearly evil. Amaziah, the priest of Bethel, owed his position to being cozy with King Jeroboam, who had led the people of Israel away from true faith to worshipping idols. When Amaziah threatened Amos for speaking the truth about Jeroboam’s incipient downfall, Amos let him have it. Are you trying to silence God’s word? he asked. You’re going to witness all the carnage, and then you’ll be hauled off into exile. (As an aside, I just love Amos’ self-description as a “herdsman and a dresser of sycamore trees.” Lots of room for the botanical imagination there.)
Sometimes we do evil for apparently good reasons. The priest who passed by a beaten, half-dead man in Luke’s “Good Samaritan” story probably didn’t want to become ritually unclean, which would keep him away from his duties for a week if the man turned out to be fully dead. Likewise with the Levite, although the Greek implies that he at least took a closer look. And the lawyer who asked Jesus the question that got this whole story launched wanted to “justify himself.” Apparently it wasn’t enough to know that he should love his neighbor; he wanted limits on who might be included in that designation.
That’s why we need prayers, unceasing prayers, that we may be filled with the knowledge of God’s will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding and not wander down the wrong side of the road. I have a pack of index cards with the names of all the people in my parish that I keep with my prayer book at home. That helps me do what the Apostle Paul did for his churches. Our diocese has a prayer cycle that includes every parish and its clergy once a month. And, of course, there are the Prayers of the People, which hold those whom we love and remember in prayer. May we continue to pray for one another, day by day and year by year, so that we may lead lives worthy of the Lord and bear fruit in every good work – and glorify God as well as a tree.
Pentecost 7: Amos 7:7-17; Psalm 82; Colossians 1:1-14; Luke 10:25-37.
Wednesday, July 7, 2010
Tuesday, June 29, 2010
What to Wear?
R and I have taken several plane trips in the last year. Because we can’t get anywhere on fewer than two flights, and because the connections may be dicey, we’ve taken to checking our bags. That way we don’t have to lug them around and compete for stowage with passengers who bring more and larger “carry-on” luggage each time. However, we paid $100 in baggage fees on the last trip. So for her next excursion, R is planning to take a suitcase small enough to fit under her seat. That will require some careful packing.
In this week’s readings we have two stories about packing for a trip. Naaman traveled to Israel to be cured of his leprosy, and seventy of Jesus’ disciples were sent on a preaching mission. Naaman, “a great man” and foreign army commander, packed the reward he intended to give his healer: ten talents of silver, six thousand shekels of gold, and ten festal garments. Jesus’ disciples were told what not to take: no purse, bag, or sandals – and presumably no money, given that they were to depend on good will for room and board.
The contrast couldn’t be greater. Naaman exudes wealth and power. The disciples of Jesus are told to embrace poverty. When Naaman isn’t treated the way he expects, he’s furious. When the disciples of Jesus return, they’re filled with joy. Naaman is forced to humble himself before the power of the God of Israel. The seventy discover that they are more powerful than the powers of evil – Satan himself falls from heaven like a flash of lightning.
What’s packed does reveal one’s priorities. Naaman in his military finery expects everything to go his way. Ironically, it is people with almost nothing who effect his cure – the young Israeli slave who tipped him off to Elisha’s power, the servant whom Elisha sent to talk to Naaman, and the foreign servants who timidly approached their master and convinced him to do what Elisha commanded. The followers of Jesus were poor to begin with. Yet the power that they carried, a message that the kingdom of God had come near, was enough to send the demons packing. Maybe that’s because the disciples carried the most important baggage inside of themselves, in the form of the Holy Spirit.
On our last trip, besides the hefty luggage fees, one airplane was too heavy. No passenger was willing to take another flight, so some of the bags were left behind. Mine was one of them. For a while it looked like I’d have to attend the Pentecost Solemn High Mass at our son’s Anglo-Catholic church in a day-old polo shirt, but my suitcase finally arrived around 3 a.m. with my clergy duds inside. We were relieved. I suppose I could have gone to church barefoot to proclaim that the kingdom of God had come near, but what would I have done if a bunch of demons had started yelling?
Pentecost 6: 2 Kings 5:1-14; Psalm 30; Galatians 6:1-16; Luke 10:1-11, 16-20.
In this week’s readings we have two stories about packing for a trip. Naaman traveled to Israel to be cured of his leprosy, and seventy of Jesus’ disciples were sent on a preaching mission. Naaman, “a great man” and foreign army commander, packed the reward he intended to give his healer: ten talents of silver, six thousand shekels of gold, and ten festal garments. Jesus’ disciples were told what not to take: no purse, bag, or sandals – and presumably no money, given that they were to depend on good will for room and board.
The contrast couldn’t be greater. Naaman exudes wealth and power. The disciples of Jesus are told to embrace poverty. When Naaman isn’t treated the way he expects, he’s furious. When the disciples of Jesus return, they’re filled with joy. Naaman is forced to humble himself before the power of the God of Israel. The seventy discover that they are more powerful than the powers of evil – Satan himself falls from heaven like a flash of lightning.
What’s packed does reveal one’s priorities. Naaman in his military finery expects everything to go his way. Ironically, it is people with almost nothing who effect his cure – the young Israeli slave who tipped him off to Elisha’s power, the servant whom Elisha sent to talk to Naaman, and the foreign servants who timidly approached their master and convinced him to do what Elisha commanded. The followers of Jesus were poor to begin with. Yet the power that they carried, a message that the kingdom of God had come near, was enough to send the demons packing. Maybe that’s because the disciples carried the most important baggage inside of themselves, in the form of the Holy Spirit.
On our last trip, besides the hefty luggage fees, one airplane was too heavy. No passenger was willing to take another flight, so some of the bags were left behind. Mine was one of them. For a while it looked like I’d have to attend the Pentecost Solemn High Mass at our son’s Anglo-Catholic church in a day-old polo shirt, but my suitcase finally arrived around 3 a.m. with my clergy duds inside. We were relieved. I suppose I could have gone to church barefoot to proclaim that the kingdom of God had come near, but what would I have done if a bunch of demons had started yelling?
Pentecost 6: 2 Kings 5:1-14; Psalm 30; Galatians 6:1-16; Luke 10:1-11, 16-20.
Tuesday, June 22, 2010
Follow Me
What does it mean to follow Jesus? What should be the characteristics of his followers? The Apostle Paul gives a lengthy list of do’s and don’ts in his letter to the Galatians. The fruits of the Spirit, he writes, are love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. He gives an even longer list of things to avoid: fornication, impurity, licentiousness, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, anger, quarrels, dissensions, factions, envy, drunkenness, carousing, and things like these. We do all right in the Church until we get to the enmity and strife part of the list. One of the reasons I don’t read some Anglican blogs is because they contain so much anger, dissension, and factions that I have trouble maintaining any generosity, gentleness, and self-control.
I suppose it should be reassuring that Jesus’ disciples didn’t do much better. After Jesus “set his face to go to Jerusalem,” he had to pass through Samaritan country, where Jerusalem didn’t count for much – so the locals gave him the cold shoulder. James and John, ever ready to earn their Sons of Thunder epithet, want a few lightning bolts to come down on those heathens. Instead, Jesus rebukes them with a Greek word often used to rebuke demons. Clearly the two brothers need to work on their fruits of the Spirit.
Being a follower requires commitment, also. As the group heads on toward Jerusalem, several would-be followers try to join in. To the first Jesus says that he doesn’t have any idea what he’s in for. Another who is invited to follow wants to first mourn the loss of his father, a reasonable request. Yet Jesus is so determined to keep to his schedule that he’s not about to wait, although he does tell the man to go out and proclaim the kingdom of God (presumably after the funeral). The third fellow, like the first, invites himself, but he also has a few things to do first. To him Jesus says, if you’re not ready, don’t act like you are, or you’ll walk as crooked a line as someone who isn’t paying attention to where his plow animal is going.
If it’s so much trouble to follow Jesus, why bother? The best answer is the one Peter gave after Jesus offended a lot of people by talking about eating his flesh and drinking his blood. Noticing that the crowd had suddenly gotten a lot smaller, Jesus said to the twelve, “Do you also wish to go away?” Peter answered for all of them, “Lord, to whom can we go? You have the words of eternal life.” That’s really it, isn’t it? Jesus may not be the only game in town, but he’s the best one there is. I, too, struggle with those fruits of the Spirit, yet I recognize that they are the only way to go. They end in life. The other list ends in death. It’s as simple as that. I just wish the journey itself were as easy to follow as a straight, well-planted row.
Pentecost 5: 2 Kings 2:1-2,6-14; Psalm 77:1-2.11-20; Galatians 5:1, 13-25; Luke 9:51-62. The dialogue between Jesus and Peter is in John 6:67-68.
I suppose it should be reassuring that Jesus’ disciples didn’t do much better. After Jesus “set his face to go to Jerusalem,” he had to pass through Samaritan country, where Jerusalem didn’t count for much – so the locals gave him the cold shoulder. James and John, ever ready to earn their Sons of Thunder epithet, want a few lightning bolts to come down on those heathens. Instead, Jesus rebukes them with a Greek word often used to rebuke demons. Clearly the two brothers need to work on their fruits of the Spirit.
Being a follower requires commitment, also. As the group heads on toward Jerusalem, several would-be followers try to join in. To the first Jesus says that he doesn’t have any idea what he’s in for. Another who is invited to follow wants to first mourn the loss of his father, a reasonable request. Yet Jesus is so determined to keep to his schedule that he’s not about to wait, although he does tell the man to go out and proclaim the kingdom of God (presumably after the funeral). The third fellow, like the first, invites himself, but he also has a few things to do first. To him Jesus says, if you’re not ready, don’t act like you are, or you’ll walk as crooked a line as someone who isn’t paying attention to where his plow animal is going.
If it’s so much trouble to follow Jesus, why bother? The best answer is the one Peter gave after Jesus offended a lot of people by talking about eating his flesh and drinking his blood. Noticing that the crowd had suddenly gotten a lot smaller, Jesus said to the twelve, “Do you also wish to go away?” Peter answered for all of them, “Lord, to whom can we go? You have the words of eternal life.” That’s really it, isn’t it? Jesus may not be the only game in town, but he’s the best one there is. I, too, struggle with those fruits of the Spirit, yet I recognize that they are the only way to go. They end in life. The other list ends in death. It’s as simple as that. I just wish the journey itself were as easy to follow as a straight, well-planted row.
Pentecost 5: 2 Kings 2:1-2,6-14; Psalm 77:1-2.11-20; Galatians 5:1, 13-25; Luke 9:51-62. The dialogue between Jesus and Peter is in John 6:67-68.
Tuesday, June 15, 2010
Testing the Spirits
One of the great advantages of being a priest with a science background is that it frees me to take the spiritual world seriously. I know the value and limits of science, and I also know that there are forces within and without that can lead us toward or tempt us away from God. Those forces that take us further from God can conveniently be labeled demons; giving them a name makes them easier to confront. And not all are internal. There is evil greater than any one human could accomplish (the Holocaust and Gulag come to mind), and so one can talk of Satan as well, not as a figure with a long tail and horns, but rather as an evil power greater than ours (though not equal to God’s power).
Discerning whether a particular “voice” or spirit is or is not from God can be tricky – so much so that the desert fathers and mothers of Egypt never trusted the appearance of an angel. One could never be sure of its source. Elijah did not have that problem, it appears, perhaps because the evil he faced was so transparent in Ahab and Jezebel. By contrast, the angel that appeared to Elijah fed him and led him to Mount Horeb, where he had a chance to encounter God directly. A rock-shattering wind, earthquake and fire nearly overwhelmed him before there was “a sound of sheer silence” (a more elegant translation than “a still, small, voice”). Out of this great silence God spoke the Word to Elijah.
It’s just as clear that the spirit residing in the Gerasene man is an evil one. And not just one, either, but an entire Roman legion’s worth! Whether we take that at face value or not, it certainly expresses how he felt, as though inhabited by many evil spirits. No wonder the man couldn’t be controlled. And no wonder that the people of the region were petrified when they found this uncontrollable man in his right mind, clothed and sitting at Jesus’ feet. Besides, they couldn’t afford to lose any more pork chops. So they rejected the One who is greater than any evil spirits.
How do we test the spirits in our own time? How do we know which lead us toward God and which lead us away? Here we come to a real problem, not only because the spirits are difficult to determine, but also because it’s hard to see our own complicity in what the spirits are doing. Take the Gulf oil spill, for instance. I don’t own BP stock and I don’t usually buy BP gas. Yet I drive fifty miles back and forth to work every day. I use plastic bags all the time, the more so because I have a dog. I eat food that isn’t grown locally, but must be trucked in from large farms that use fossil fuels for machinery and fertilizer. We fly out to Connecticut to visit our son. All of that is possible because there are oil wells, including offshore ones that can fail catastrophically. Surely it is an evil spirit that entices humans to put profits before safety – but when we allow that to happen, are we not also subject to that same evil spirit?
And that reveals one of the limits of science. Scientific knowledge is not value-neutral, as some think. Out of our values we decide what will be researched and how that knowledge will be used, and in doing so we follow the spirit of good or evil. We study how to drill deep wells, but not what will happen if and when they fail. We devise ever more uses for fossil fuels, but only after decades of use do we consider what the global consequences of such use may be. The spirits of our time are not as obvious as a Jezebel or Gerasene demoniac. Fortunately, one part of the picture still hasn’t changed: Jesus can still command the unclean spirits. It is for us to ask that they be cast from us.
Pentecost 4: 1 Kings 19:1-15a; Psalms 42, 43; Galatians 3:23-29; Luke 8:26-39.
Discerning whether a particular “voice” or spirit is or is not from God can be tricky – so much so that the desert fathers and mothers of Egypt never trusted the appearance of an angel. One could never be sure of its source. Elijah did not have that problem, it appears, perhaps because the evil he faced was so transparent in Ahab and Jezebel. By contrast, the angel that appeared to Elijah fed him and led him to Mount Horeb, where he had a chance to encounter God directly. A rock-shattering wind, earthquake and fire nearly overwhelmed him before there was “a sound of sheer silence” (a more elegant translation than “a still, small, voice”). Out of this great silence God spoke the Word to Elijah.
It’s just as clear that the spirit residing in the Gerasene man is an evil one. And not just one, either, but an entire Roman legion’s worth! Whether we take that at face value or not, it certainly expresses how he felt, as though inhabited by many evil spirits. No wonder the man couldn’t be controlled. And no wonder that the people of the region were petrified when they found this uncontrollable man in his right mind, clothed and sitting at Jesus’ feet. Besides, they couldn’t afford to lose any more pork chops. So they rejected the One who is greater than any evil spirits.
How do we test the spirits in our own time? How do we know which lead us toward God and which lead us away? Here we come to a real problem, not only because the spirits are difficult to determine, but also because it’s hard to see our own complicity in what the spirits are doing. Take the Gulf oil spill, for instance. I don’t own BP stock and I don’t usually buy BP gas. Yet I drive fifty miles back and forth to work every day. I use plastic bags all the time, the more so because I have a dog. I eat food that isn’t grown locally, but must be trucked in from large farms that use fossil fuels for machinery and fertilizer. We fly out to Connecticut to visit our son. All of that is possible because there are oil wells, including offshore ones that can fail catastrophically. Surely it is an evil spirit that entices humans to put profits before safety – but when we allow that to happen, are we not also subject to that same evil spirit?
And that reveals one of the limits of science. Scientific knowledge is not value-neutral, as some think. Out of our values we decide what will be researched and how that knowledge will be used, and in doing so we follow the spirit of good or evil. We study how to drill deep wells, but not what will happen if and when they fail. We devise ever more uses for fossil fuels, but only after decades of use do we consider what the global consequences of such use may be. The spirits of our time are not as obvious as a Jezebel or Gerasene demoniac. Fortunately, one part of the picture still hasn’t changed: Jesus can still command the unclean spirits. It is for us to ask that they be cast from us.
Pentecost 4: 1 Kings 19:1-15a; Psalms 42, 43; Galatians 3:23-29; Luke 8:26-39.
Monday, June 7, 2010
Great Love
Every once in a while I abandon my usual reading of non-fiction and pick up a novel. R, who is used to seeing me wading through medieval monastic texts, invariably says, “You’re reading fiction?” I’ve learned not to be offended at her reaction, because she’s had to suffer through my self-important pronouncements that there are too many good works of antiquity for me to waste my time reading modern novels. To make matters worse, I sometimes pick up a book she is still reading, and we have to compete for its pages.
This time, however, I have followed my mother’s lead and turned to Agatha Christie. I’ve read two of her murder mysteries in the last few days, and will probably read a couple more before I reluctantly come to the conclusion that dwelling on the evil side of human nature is probably not the best spiritual discipline. And Christie, like A. Conan Doyle, presents me with British class distinctions and bigotries that I’d rather not remember. Even aspiring actresses have a maid, and the butler, of course, is always a suspect.
The U.S. certainly does not have the same class distinctions. We like to think of ourselves as an egalitarian society. Yet that is simply not true. All it takes for me to realize that is to sit in my office each day and watch students arrive for the G.E.D. class down the hall. Unlike our son, who had the support and resources to put him in the position where he is, these children of God never finished high school. They are still struggling in their twenties and thirties and beyond. Without education and probably without stable families behind them, they are in a very different socioeconomic class from most of those who come to this building for church each Sunday.
I’d like to think that if a G.E.D. student did show up on a Sunday, we’d be more welcoming than the Pharisee was to the “sinner woman” who just wandered right into his dinner party and poured out her tears on Jesus’ feet. It’s pretty clear that even if the Pharisee was holding his nose, Jesus knew she was a child of God. Interestingly, when Jesus dresses down the Pharisee for his hard-heartedness, he doesn’t completely turn him aside. The man may not be forgiven much, compared to the woman, but he is still forgiven. And one gets the distinct impression that if he would stop judging other people, he might be forgiven more.
That’s really the trick, isn’t it? It’s a habit to judge others, to consider if someone is really good enough to be associated with. Jesus just blasts through all that. True, such behavior eventually got him killed. Yet it also showed us how we are to be – more grateful that we are forgiven than concerned with what someone else has done. Maybe that’s why the lure of Agatha Christie’s novels, as well-written as they are, will eventually peter out. They aren’t about grace; they’re about judgment. And I, for one, need all the grace I can get.
3 Pentecost: 1 Kings 21:1-21a; Psalm 5:1-8; Galatians 2:15-21; Luke 7:36-8:3.
This time, however, I have followed my mother’s lead and turned to Agatha Christie. I’ve read two of her murder mysteries in the last few days, and will probably read a couple more before I reluctantly come to the conclusion that dwelling on the evil side of human nature is probably not the best spiritual discipline. And Christie, like A. Conan Doyle, presents me with British class distinctions and bigotries that I’d rather not remember. Even aspiring actresses have a maid, and the butler, of course, is always a suspect.
The U.S. certainly does not have the same class distinctions. We like to think of ourselves as an egalitarian society. Yet that is simply not true. All it takes for me to realize that is to sit in my office each day and watch students arrive for the G.E.D. class down the hall. Unlike our son, who had the support and resources to put him in the position where he is, these children of God never finished high school. They are still struggling in their twenties and thirties and beyond. Without education and probably without stable families behind them, they are in a very different socioeconomic class from most of those who come to this building for church each Sunday.
I’d like to think that if a G.E.D. student did show up on a Sunday, we’d be more welcoming than the Pharisee was to the “sinner woman” who just wandered right into his dinner party and poured out her tears on Jesus’ feet. It’s pretty clear that even if the Pharisee was holding his nose, Jesus knew she was a child of God. Interestingly, when Jesus dresses down the Pharisee for his hard-heartedness, he doesn’t completely turn him aside. The man may not be forgiven much, compared to the woman, but he is still forgiven. And one gets the distinct impression that if he would stop judging other people, he might be forgiven more.
That’s really the trick, isn’t it? It’s a habit to judge others, to consider if someone is really good enough to be associated with. Jesus just blasts through all that. True, such behavior eventually got him killed. Yet it also showed us how we are to be – more grateful that we are forgiven than concerned with what someone else has done. Maybe that’s why the lure of Agatha Christie’s novels, as well-written as they are, will eventually peter out. They aren’t about grace; they’re about judgment. And I, for one, need all the grace I can get.
3 Pentecost: 1 Kings 21:1-21a; Psalm 5:1-8; Galatians 2:15-21; Luke 7:36-8:3.
Tuesday, June 1, 2010
Refreshment
R and I were able to get away for a weekend recently to attend our son’s graduation in Connecticut. As it turned out, we spent more time in church “on vacation” than usual. He had to find a pick-up choir to sing Mozart’s Mass in c minor for a funeral, so he recruited us as well as whatever students were still in town. It’s been a while since I had to sing long fugue runs on the fly, and it showed, but there’s nothing quite like singing for your son. I’m just glad that we were doubled by a small orchestra and that the other three basses had a better sense of what they were doing.
The break was good, and so was the day off on Memorial Day. One of my biggest adjustments right now is not having the summer open before me. Between being in school and teaching, I lived on the academic calendar for fifty years. I know how privileged that was, and I never complained about time (except to other teachers, of course). I don’t think I’m complaining now, either, just reflecting on how hard it is to adjust to how most people live their lives. And the life of a parish priest makes it even more difficult; the burdens of the people are always on one’s mind. On the other hand, the great joy I experience on Sundays tells me that I’m doing the right thing.
Time away prepares one for the time ahead. Being enveloped in clouds of incense and the triumph of form over feeling (our son is in a very high church) helps me appreciate even more a place that has very real people with very real issues, some of which I can only approach with the faith that God will provide. We are all inadequate for what we are asked to do, and that is good. It keeps us from thinking that it’s all about us, when it should be all about God. But it still would be nice to have a little more time off now and then.
The break was good, and so was the day off on Memorial Day. One of my biggest adjustments right now is not having the summer open before me. Between being in school and teaching, I lived on the academic calendar for fifty years. I know how privileged that was, and I never complained about time (except to other teachers, of course). I don’t think I’m complaining now, either, just reflecting on how hard it is to adjust to how most people live their lives. And the life of a parish priest makes it even more difficult; the burdens of the people are always on one’s mind. On the other hand, the great joy I experience on Sundays tells me that I’m doing the right thing.
Time away prepares one for the time ahead. Being enveloped in clouds of incense and the triumph of form over feeling (our son is in a very high church) helps me appreciate even more a place that has very real people with very real issues, some of which I can only approach with the faith that God will provide. We are all inadequate for what we are asked to do, and that is good. It keeps us from thinking that it’s all about us, when it should be all about God. But it still would be nice to have a little more time off now and then.
Tuesday, May 18, 2010
What About Philip?
“Philip said to Jesus, ‘Lord, show us the Father, and we will be satisfied.’”
Seeing is believing. Philip had spent all of that time with Jesus, even bringing his reluctant friend Nathanael along, and he still didn’t get it. He couldn’t understand that in seeing Jesus he was seeing God. Jesus had to make it really, really plain to him. Then two chapters later, when the disciples said that they finally got it, Jesus immediately told them that they would be scattered in spite of their belief. Indeed they were, as soon as he was arrested.
Philip went and hid like the rest of them. Through the trial and passion of Jesus only Peter hung around, apparently so he could deny knowing Jesus three times. Even so, the group stayed in touch after Jesus died. They were all together behind closed doors three days later when the risen Christ suddenly appeared in the room. Philip’s eyes probably popped. This wasn’t the Father he had asked for; this was something totally unexpected.
Fifty days later they were still together on Pentecost, the traditional Jewish celebration of the wheat harvest. Suddenly there was a sound “like the rush of a violent wind…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.”
What would it have been like to be in that group, to have a tongue of fire sitting on top of you and suddenly be filled with words that were a mystery to you? What would it be like to be totally consumed by the Holy Spirit? They must have seemed out of their minds, those disciples, for the people around them thought they were drunk. Peter managed to find words that everyone could understand so he could preach, and assure the crowd that they hadn’t hit the bars that early in the day.
What about Philip? He ended up getting a lot more than he bargained for. He wanted to see and be satisfied. Instead he saw little but was filled to overflowing. The ironic thing is that we often ask for little when God wants to give extravagantly. We think we know what we want, but God gives something else that is so much greater. We want to see the Father – and discover that we have been made joint heirs with Christ, as the Apostle Paul puts it. Ask for a little, get a lot.
And what about those who don’t get what they ask? What about the apparently unanswered prayers for health and safety in the midst of death and destruction? Is the love of God limited to a few chosen people, the inner circle? That’s a gospel that is sometimes preached, but not by me. I have no doubt that human sin can thwart the effect of God’s grace, and that a fallen world waiting for its final redemption can bring pain and suffering. But I cast my lot with Philip. I’ll keep asking, and try my best to hold on when the wind and fire arrive.
Pentecost: Acts 2:1-21; Psalm 104:25-35, 37; Romans 8:14-17; John 14:8-17, 25-27.
Seeing is believing. Philip had spent all of that time with Jesus, even bringing his reluctant friend Nathanael along, and he still didn’t get it. He couldn’t understand that in seeing Jesus he was seeing God. Jesus had to make it really, really plain to him. Then two chapters later, when the disciples said that they finally got it, Jesus immediately told them that they would be scattered in spite of their belief. Indeed they were, as soon as he was arrested.
Philip went and hid like the rest of them. Through the trial and passion of Jesus only Peter hung around, apparently so he could deny knowing Jesus three times. Even so, the group stayed in touch after Jesus died. They were all together behind closed doors three days later when the risen Christ suddenly appeared in the room. Philip’s eyes probably popped. This wasn’t the Father he had asked for; this was something totally unexpected.
Fifty days later they were still together on Pentecost, the traditional Jewish celebration of the wheat harvest. Suddenly there was a sound “like the rush of a violent wind…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.”
What would it have been like to be in that group, to have a tongue of fire sitting on top of you and suddenly be filled with words that were a mystery to you? What would it be like to be totally consumed by the Holy Spirit? They must have seemed out of their minds, those disciples, for the people around them thought they were drunk. Peter managed to find words that everyone could understand so he could preach, and assure the crowd that they hadn’t hit the bars that early in the day.
What about Philip? He ended up getting a lot more than he bargained for. He wanted to see and be satisfied. Instead he saw little but was filled to overflowing. The ironic thing is that we often ask for little when God wants to give extravagantly. We think we know what we want, but God gives something else that is so much greater. We want to see the Father – and discover that we have been made joint heirs with Christ, as the Apostle Paul puts it. Ask for a little, get a lot.
And what about those who don’t get what they ask? What about the apparently unanswered prayers for health and safety in the midst of death and destruction? Is the love of God limited to a few chosen people, the inner circle? That’s a gospel that is sometimes preached, but not by me. I have no doubt that human sin can thwart the effect of God’s grace, and that a fallen world waiting for its final redemption can bring pain and suffering. But I cast my lot with Philip. I’ll keep asking, and try my best to hold on when the wind and fire arrive.
Pentecost: Acts 2:1-21; Psalm 104:25-35, 37; Romans 8:14-17; John 14:8-17, 25-27.
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