Acts 2:1-21
May 28, 2023
Chihuly is the artist, Dale Chihuly.
He was born in Washington State, and he is known for making blown glass, an art
form which resulted in pretty pieces that you might display in your home and
creating instead large works of modern sculpture. To be honest, I have seen
pictures of Chihuly glass, and there was an exhibit at the art museum in
Oklahoma City for a while, and I wasn’t convinced that Chihuly glass was my
style. I love blown glass, and I have been fascinated with glass blowing since
I was a kid, but Chihuly glass was so different from any other blown glass I
had ever seen. It is so big and ultra-modern, it intimidated me. But folks had
urged us to see the museum when we were there, and we thought that we should
take a chance on it.
When we first walked in, neither
Brent nor I was sure we had made the right decision. The first pieces that we
saw were as big and different and ultra-modern as I remembered. But then we
walked through a hallway where the ceiling above us was all glass sculptures of
reds and oranges and yellows. I had to admit to myself, it was incredibly cool.
But it was the next exhibit that overwhelmed me.
It was called “Mille Fiore,” a
thousand flowers in Italian. And it looked like a long rectangular garden of
thousands of the most beautiful, strange, wonderful, surreal, fantastical
flowers, in the most vivid colors I had ever seen, and they were all created
from blown glass. The colors and shapes stood out like jewels against the room
which was black from floor to ceiling. I felt as though we had been transported
underwater and stumbled upon a garden in the deepest, darkest part of the sea. It
was breathtaking.
At the last stop of the museum, there
was a theatre showing several films of the artist narrating his work, the
different exhibits, and speaking to his many inspirations. In one of the films
he talked about when he realized that with just human breath and fire, he could
take glass and push the boundaries of shape and size. With human breath and
fire, he could make it thinner than ever before, and larger and more
spectacular than what had previously been done in glass blowing. Sometimes his
attempts failed – we saw a large piece being blown and shaped that fell and
smashed into thousands of shards of glass. But he didn’t stop trying. From
breath and fire something new was created, something beautiful was born. From
breath and fire, transformation was embodied. I leaned over to Brent and
whispered, “That’s Pentecost!” Which proves that you can take the preacher out
of the pulpit, but you can’t take the constant need to find sermon
illustrations out of the preacher.
Now, with blown glass – any blown
glass – it is as Chihuly said and Brent reminded me, human breath and fire. And no matter
how beautiful the result, human breath and fire can only go so far. Anything
human is limited and finite. But on Pentecost the people gathered witnessed the
infinite possibility of God. They witnessed the breath of God, the Holy Spirit,
which rushed and blew like a mighty and wild wind, stronger and greater than
any storm we have experienced. Along with this awesome rushing wind, the Spirit
revealed itself in fire and flame. Tongues of flame appeared in their midst,
and these dancing tongues of flame divided one from the other until an
individual blaze stopped and flickered above the heads of each apostle. The
Spirit coming did more than transform glass into sculpture, it caused these
common Galileans to speak in the native language of every person gathered! The
people who were there, experiencing this, were astounded. They were confused.
They were bowled over and bewildered. Some greeted this with great expectation,
but others were skeptical about what their senses were witnessing.
Debi Thomas, in an essay for Journey
with Jesus, pointed out that it was not the message of God itself that
astounded the people gathered, it was the fact that they comprehended what was
being spoken in their own language. God chose to speak to them in their
own language, in their native tongue, in their particular idiom and linguistic
style.
As Thomas and other commentators
have pointed out, some interpretations of the Spirit’s coming at Pentecost
state that this is God’s reversal of what happened with the Tower of Babel. In
that story from Genesis, God took the people’s one language and made it many,
scattering them in every direction in what seemed like a punishment. But as
Thomas wrote, the story of Pentecost doesn’t reverse the Tower of Babel.
Instead, it completes it. It “blesses it.” She wrote.
“When the Holy Spirit came, he
didn't restore humanity to a common language; he declared all languages holy
and equally worthy of God's stories. He wove diversity and inclusiveness
into the very fabric of the Church. He called the people of God to be at once
the One and the Many.”
Have you ever studied another
language? Maybe some of you are bilingual? I would love to speak another
language fluently. It’s on my ever growing bucket list. I’ve studied other
languages since I was a kid, and I have yet to realize my goal, because
learning another language is hard. Nothing translates exactly word for word. The
grammar is different and sometimes confusing. And some phrases and idioms don’t
translate at all. Currently, I’m trying to learn modern Greek on the Duolingo
app on my phone. But no matter how well I do on a lesson, when I try to say
something to my sister in Greek, I can’t remember anything I’ve learned. And my
sister, who I think is fluent in Greek, still says that after 40
plus years living in Greece, she hasn’t gotten it down yet. Her 10-year-old
grandsons like to correct her Greek because she still makes mistakes.
So, for the Holy Spirit, through
breath and fire, to give the apostles the ability to speak fluently in all the
languages represented in that place was not just a neat trick. It was, as
Thomas wrote, a declaration by God that every language is worthy of the good
news. Every language can bear the holy word of God.
Breath and fire. Human breath and
human fire has the potential to take sand and create the most beautiful glass
I’ve ever seen. God’s creative and creating breath and divine fire transformed
simple fishermen into linguists who could speak the good news of God to every
person around them in their own language. Yes, there were some folks there who
heard but were skeptical, who could not believe what they were seeing and
hearing. But others believed. Others felt the power of the Spirit and were
transformed by that breath and fire just as the disciples were. That
transformation did not begin and end in this story from Acts. We celebrate
Pentecost as the birthday of the church, not just because of the coming of the
Holy Spirit in this particular story, but because of what continued to happen
from this moment on.
The good news of the gospel, the
good news of Jesus the Christ, spread like wildfire. People believed and began
to gather in house churches. Hearts were converted and lives were transformed.
The Holy Spirit may not have appeared like tongues of fire dancing above the
heads of others, but it continued to blow and move through the world and
through the hearts and minds of people everywhere.
So, Pentecost isn’t just one day on
the church calendar, or one season. It is a way of thinking and doing and
living. It seems to me that truly being Pentecostal – which is an unnerving
word for many of us, including me – is not about one specific expression of
faith, but the recognition that we are people who claim in our creeds and our
confessions that the Holy Spirit is still alive in the world. It is God’s power
that continues to create and transform. We believe that the Holy Spirit has the
power to make change, to bring about new life. We believe that our church –
this church, every church – began through breath and fire.
So,
if we believe this, then let’s live this.
Let’s live as though we expect and
trust that the Holy Spirit is transforming us, creating us into something new,
minute by minute and hour by hour. Let’s live as though we believe that God
calls us to be both one and many. Let’s live as though we trust that the Holy
Spirit can breathe life into what seems lifeless. Let’s live as though we
expect that the Holy Spirit is moving through us and in us and among us, now
and always, giving us the courage to do what is hard and increasing our faith
so that we can follow wherever God calls. Let’s live as though we want and pray
each day that the Holy Spirit will come among us, bringing change and
transformation and newness even when that requires us to change, transform, and
become new as well. Let’s live as though we pray now and always, come, Holy
Spirit, come. Come, Holy Spirit, come. Come, Holy Spirit, come. Come, Holy
Spirit, come.
Let all of God’s children say,
“Alleluia!”
Amen.
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