Day of Pentecost
May 11, 2008
Acts 2:1-21; Psalm 104:24-35; I Corinthians 12:3-13; John 20:19-23
Ok, let’s try this again. I had tried to save this earlier, but it disappeared into cyberspace. This coming Sunday is Pentecost Sunday. It follows fifty days after Easter. Because Easter was so early, the earliest in our lifetime, Pentecost also comes early. Last year, Pentecost Sunday fell on the Sunday before Memorial Day, which could have caused a conflict. This Pentecost Sunday falls on Mother’s Day. It’s interesting to see that most of the media companies have really been putting out resources for Mother’s Day, but none for Pentecost.
Lest you think, we are skipping Mother’s Day this year, we are not. We will honor all women at Preston Wesleyan Church, even those who aren’t mothers. I like to be sensitive to these issues, especially when you have women who may have lost a mother in the last year — two in our congregation have, including Pam. The other reason is because some couples have tried to have children, but were unable — this could cause stress. That’s why all women get a gift. We will start our service with a little Mother’s Day video countdown that has various quotes about motherhood. Then we have a little Mother’s Day tribute video using a poem from Oliver Wendell Holmes. Following that, we move into our call to worship using the Psalm listed above and we will sing “For the Beauty of the Earth.” From that point one we will turn our focus toward Pentecost and the coming of the Holy Spirit.
Like I said earlier, I had this all typed once tonight, but somehow I lost it. As I was typing it, it helped bring into focus where the sermon would go. This is part of the reason I blog on the weekly lectionary texts. There are times during the year that I use them — mainly from Advent to Pentecost. So, writing this post has allowed me to put into focus this week’s message. I have preached from Acts 2 for Pentecost for several years now, so I’m going to take a break from that scripture and look at I Corinthians 12 and John 20. The lectionary texts have been preparing us. This Sunday we celebrate the Holy Spirit coming on the church. I call it a celebration of the birthday of the holy, catholic (universal), apostolic church. This is when the gospel began to spread throughout the Roman Empire and throughout the world. This is the Holy Spirit that was promised by Jesus back in John and again as Jesus left his disciples in the first chapter of Acts.
It is this same Holy Spirit that grants gifts to believers. Two things that come from this passage. One is that spiritual gifts are not given to believers benefit of the individual believers. No, spiritual gifts are given for the benefit of the church or for all of us working together. The Holy Spirit gives each believer different gifts. Sometimes we get upset that the Holy Spirit doesn’t give all of us all the gifts. But what would be the good in that. If all of us have the same gifts, some of us are unnecessary. One of the things of which I have become increasingly aware is that the Body of Christ is a diverse group of people. My good blogging friend Mark Wilson wrote in Wesleyan Life magazine, that so many times we like to assimilate people into our congregations. Assimilate means to make similar. If we are similar, we can get a little bland. The body of Christ has been made diverse for a purpose. God has made us so that we can each reach a different segment of the population. Each of us has different gifts, talents, abilities, and personalities. Together we can build the Kingdom if we each use the gift, talents, and personalities that God has given us and we can use these to magnify Christ.
