+ In nomine Domini.  Amen.

We are at the end of the Season of Easter, the last day of these 50 days wherein we celebrate, proclaim, and live out the meaning of following a crucified-risen Jesus and all that it means to do so.

We have been singing our hymns of resurrection, we have been reading the stories of the risen Jesus, we have been praying as a community of the faithful to receive not only the wisdom, not only the insight, not only the skill, not only the mandate, but especially the Spirit to do the Gospel … to live individual lives and just so a community life that loves God and loves neighbor. 

Whatever personal meaning the risen Jesus has to us, to our hearts and minds and souls … Jesus risen is without any meaning at all unless that meaning comes into us as an infusion of love and compassion and understanding and forgiveness and inclusiveness and welcoming to our neighbors … that is, unless we understand and accept that to be church is to be a community that works endlessly for peace and justice for our neighbors in the world, then we have missed completely what it means to be church.

Three pilgrimage festivals prevailed in Judaism: Pesach (Passover), Shavuot (Harvest), and Sukkot (Tabernacles, or the building of shelters).  Three festivals when the Jewish people living in ancient Israel and Judah would make a pilgrimage to Jerusalem according to the Torah.

Shavuot, the Harvest Festival, falls 50 days after Passover, and we know it by its Greek name as it is found in the Acts of the Apostles, our First Reading for today: τὴν ἡμέραν τῆς πεντηκοστῆς (tein hemeran teis pentekosteis) … “the day of Pentecost”.

It is also called the Feast of Weeks, a time to celebrate the gathering in of the harvest, and in time it became a moment to celebrate the coming of the divine Law on Sinai.  Legend has it that on that occasion a flame came down from heaven and divided into 70 tongues of fire, one for each nation of the world.  Everyone could understand, but only one nation promised to keep the Law, and that was Israel.[1]

And so it is – in the Acts of the Apostles (written by Luke, the Gospel Writer) – that this first pilgrimage festival after Jesus’ execution at Passover and his disciples acclamation of is resurrection became a special moment for the little community of his followers. 

At least in his most dramatic and embellished style, Luke portrays it that way.  As with the rest of his story, Luke paints canvases vividly coloured with symbolism.  He has Jesus appear to his followers for 40 days after his resurrection before ascending … those who heard this story read aloud in their midst in the latter part of the 1^st Century would make the connection to the 40 years in the wilderness.  He has 120 believers (which we know from chapter 1) assembled in the room on the Day of Pentecost … those who heard this Gospel read aloud would do the math quickly … the 12 tribes of Israel, now multiplied by 10 each … aha, the true Israel is here.  Then comes the Spirit, the harvest, the wind, the tongues of fire … none of this would be lost on those who knew the stories told about Sinai. 

And … the word itself … the word for Spirit, both in Hebrew and in Greek means: wind, breath, Spirit.

Luke’s story is like a well staged drama, or a movie.  Luke the Movie Director creates the scenes with wind and fire and the meaning flows from the scene to the people … the God of Sinai, the Giver of the Law, is acting once again … those with flames shooting from their heads are again the true Israel, committed to obedience before God.  History is repeating itself, but in a new way.  Luke brings together in Jerusalem at Shavuot Jews from all over the world … a festival of God and God’s people.

And there is humor when the speaking begins.  Peter comes to center stage, the camera is upon him in close-up “What’s that you say?  Drunk!?  It’s too early in the day, why it’s morning! No, not drunk, but this is the very thing the prophet spoke about, the prophet Joel … God’s Spirit poured out on everyone, like liquid breath, sons and daughters beginning to prophesy, and old and young dreaming dreams and seeing visions.”

It’s the realm … the Realm of God.  It’s what happens when we are infused with Spirit.

It’s not a day of doctrine.  “Doctrines are nothing but the skin of truth set up and stuffed,” said that great 19^th Century liberal theologian, social reformer and abolitionist, Henry Ward Beecher.

It’s not a day of pretending to be deaf.  “Spirit is another word for ‘God Present”, said Paul Tillich, that great 20^th Century German-American theologian.

It’s not a day of letting the fire go out.  “We are all sparks of the Divine flame,” said Hildegard of Bingen, that great 12^th Century German mystic.

It’s a day of being the church, of knowing our history … the agenda of ourselves living with the vision of the Realm of God coming into being, surrendering control and power (like when we go to war and dominate others) surrendering … to love.  It’s when we turn to Spirit and pray, “Your Kingdom Come.”

And by the offering of that petition, we mean, we understand, we more than imply that the Kingdom, the Realm of God is what we do in this world … that we do not tear it apart by our selfishness, demean it’s inhabitants by our prejudice, destroy it by our anger … but rather build it up by our sharing, engage brothers and sisters – even those whose language we do not speak, by our compassion, and repair it by our love.

There is so much happening in our city today on this Day of Pentecost.  Musica Antigua will perform at our church this afternoon, the Future Farmers of America are having a Plant Sale at the south campus of Santa Fe High School, it’s Mother’s Day and beginning this year and continuing now every Mother’s Day in our city, there is a Mother’s Day Peace Rally on the Plaza, where supported by our local faith communities, with music and art and the gathering of so many diverse people … a kind of Pentecost experience itself, we could say, the original Mother’s Day Proclamation of 1870, written by Julia Ward Howe, will be read aloud.  I can think of no better way to end this sermon and the season of Easter than by reading it also in this place:

Arise, then, women of this day! Arise, all women who have hearts, Whether our baptism be of water or of tears!

Say firmly: "We will not have great questions decided by irrelevant agencies, Our husbands will not come to us, reeking with carnage, for caresses and applause. Our sons shall not be taken from us to unlearn All that we have been able to teach them of charity, mercy and patience. We, the women of one country, will be too tender of those of another country To allow our sons to be trained to injure theirs."

From the bosom of the devastated Earth a voice goes up with our own. It says: "Disarm! Disarm! The sword of murder is not the balance of justice." Blood does not wipe out dishonor, nor violence indicate possession. As men have often forsaken the plough and the anvil at the summons of war, Let women now leave all that may be left of home for a great and earnest day of counsel.

Let them meet first, as women, to bewail and commemorate the dead. Let them solemnly take counsel with each other as to the means Whereby the great human family can live in peace, Each bearing after his own time the sacred impress, not of Caesar, But of God.

In the name of womanhood and humanity, I earnestly ask That a general congress of women without limit of nationality May be appointed and held at someplace deemed most convenient And at the earliest period consistent with its objects, To promote the alliance of the different nationalities, The amicable settlement of international questions, The great and general interests of peace."

May it be so.

Deo Gratia
The Rev. Benjamin Larzelere III