SPECIAL DAYS: Pentecost Sunday

LESSONS: Acts 2.1-21; John 14.8-17

SERMON TITLE: Wind and Fire

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INTRODUCTION:

  1. It was late in the evening when the fire siren sounded.
    1. The word quickly spread that the church was on fire.
    2. The members gathered to watch in shock dismay as the volunteer fire fighters sought to wash out the blaze.
    3. The pastor noticed a man standing nearby and said, I'm sorry, I do not recognize you.
    4. The man replied, "I am not a member of your church."
    5. "Why did you come here?" Asked the pastor.
    6. "Oh, I had to come", the man responded, "It's the first time I've ever seen this church on fire."
    7. Pentecost is a picture of a church on fire.
      1. Well I guess that you can't rightly call it a church.
      2. But it will be.
  2. It seems like something out of a Ray Bradbury or a Steven King novel.
    1. A mighty wind, tongues of fire, speaking in other languages.
    2. Its not science fiction, it is the work of the Holy Spirit.
    3. It is Pentecost.
    4. How may we obtain similar power?
    5. We obtain it the same way the disciples did.

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MAIN BODY:

  1. You can summerize Pentecost with three words.
    1. Passion
    2. Purpose
    3. Proclamation
  2. So we talk about passion
    1. I do not apologize for the expression of emotions during my presentation at the Arena Memorial Day Observance.
      1. If you asked me, I could not tell you exactly why this occurred.
      2. I believe that it has to do with the contrast between the vision of America developed in America the Beautiful and the horrors of war which are necessary to protect the dream and keep it alive. 
      3. (In the late 60''s or early 70's I preached a sermon titled, "Painted Fingernails, Bleeding Hearts."
        1. It appear to me back then that the Christian community was more often than not more interested in appearances than it was in internal reality.
        2. What was being done rather than why it was being done.
        3. I cried during that sermon as I attempted to reach out to the members of that particular congregation.
        4. After the service was over, and I was greeting the people at the door, I overheard to members in conversation.
          1. One was saying to the other, "the pastor is a fine actor, isn't he?"
          2. I was not acting.
        5. I believe that this member did not want to have to relate to what was being said.

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      4. Have you ever sat amidst a congregation who was committing inhibited singing?
        1. People who were technically correct in pitch and pronunciation.
        2. Who sing with no passion.
        3. Are you inspired.
        4. It like a choir attempting to sing a black spiritual, white.
    2. We recognize that the disciples are a passionate bunch.
      1. We might expect that from their cultural and ethnic setting.
      2. Their passion needs to be guided into channels that are positive and constructive.
      3. They were passionate about their positions.
        1. Passion needs to be guided.
        2. Unguided passion can turn to extremism or zealotry.


          3. ILL- Two children were in the kitchen fighting over the one orange in the house.

          Each needed the orange for a recipe.

          Mom came in, saw the problem, and with great apparent wisdom, cut that orange in two and handed one half to one, one half to the other.

      4. In this case no one was satisfied.
        1. You see, one recipe called for the meat of the orange, the other called for the skin.
        2. BOTH could have had what they wanted...if (1)

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      5. In the Upper Room, the disciples probably were passionate about their own position and place.
        1. They were fighting over the orange.
          1. Something happened.
          2. Common sense intervened.
      6. In the upper room they became passionate not about position but about Christ.
  3. Out of their passion came a purpose.
    1. Purpose is always at the bottom of everything that anyone at anytime does.
    2. The disciples learned their true purpose.
      1. They came to better understand the commands of Christ.
      2. Confined to a room, they learned to love and accept one another and to work for the common purpose.
      3. Jesus has said they would do greater works than he had done.
        1. Not greater in height, length, or depth.
        2. Greater in this, they would reach more people.
      4. This became their purpose.
      5. To, well that's the next and last step.
  4. They were led from passion and purpose to proclamation.
    1. The result of passion and purpose is always proclamation.
      1. The time had come.
      2. The Holy Spirit had been received.
        1. Fire
        2. Doves
        3. Languages
      3. The word went forth with power.

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        4. There was once an ice cream vendor who got caught in a monumental traffic jam on a hot, humid afternoon. He finally got out of his truck, went to the back and got himself a cold ice cream bar.

        As he munched, he realized that in the car idling behind him four young children were watching his every bite. On impulse he once more opened the back of his delivery truck and got out ice cream for those children.

        Of course, in moments he was surrounded by a crowd of youngsters, as refugees from the other stalled vehicles mobbed him.

        By the time traffic began to move again, the ice cream man had given away four boxes of ice cream bars, which he had already decided to pay for himself.

        When he returned to the factory, he was called into the manager's office. But instead of being fired, the manager smiled and told him it was the best public relations they had received in years.

        Grateful parents had been calling in all afternoon to praise the kindness of the man who had changed a frustrating situation into a moment of delight.

    2. The disciples are not giving away free ice cream.
      1. They are offering something as refreshing, but longer lasting.
      2. The freedom that one may obtain in and through Jesus Christ.
    3. A faith that came alive, surprising alive and explosively experimental.

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CONCLUSION:

  1. Near Marietta, Georgia, where Dean Reynolds, Rector, Christ Church Cathedral in Houston, Texas grew up, are Kennesaw Mountain and Kennesaw Mountain Battlefield, now a National Park and the site of the Battle of Kennesaw Mountain which was a major part of the Battle of Atlanta in the Civil War. (2)


    2. There is a group - mostly men, though there may be women as well - who re-enact scenes and particular battles from the Battle of Kennesaw Mountain.

    They have authentic uniforms and equipment. There are a lot of them, and they are organized into the proper formations of regiments and companies.

    They fire cannons and carry out the same maneuvers that were executed more than a hundred years ago.

    And, there may be some value to that. It carries on a tradition and preserves a memory. It may provide a sense of tradition that gives us a feeling of firmness in our lives.

    It is, of course, perfectly predictable.

    Each battle is always the same.

    The outcome of the story is already known.

    The victor must be victorious and the vanquished must lose.

    We re-enact it to tell the story - to remember it and to teach it to others, especially our children, so they can have the same tradition.

    Christian faith can become like that.

    It is sort of a re-enactment of ancient battles.

    The lessons are already set.

    We - the grown-ups - always know the outcome.

    We know the end of the story.

    We know how God is.

  2. Pentecost teaches something very different.
    1. The Holy Spirit is the same, yet different.
    2. The story is still being written.
    3. If we anticipate the expected ending we may be very surprised.
  3. For the Christian faith can become alive, surprising alive and explosively experimental.
    1. This can be out upper room.
    2. We are called to passion
    3. We are called to purpose
    4. We are called to proclamation.
  4. We are called to a new Pentecost so that we may live within the power of the Holy Spirit.

    1. David Leininger, in a sermon, "The real force be with you," May 23, 1999. Quoted in Homiletics, June 3, 2001, How Did These Guys Get So Smart? Used with permission.

    2. Dean Reynolds, Christ Church Cathedral, Houston, Texas, in a sermon June 11, 2000. Quoted in Homiletics, June 3, 2001, How Did These Guys Get So Smart? Used with permission.

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