The Renewal Of HopeDr.
James Mayfield
PENTECOST May 30, 2004 Text: Acts 2:1-12 There are times when hope and joy are so alive within us all of life is full of color. Regardless of the season of the year, it is spring time within us and in all things and in all people we see the blooming of flowers. Then, there are those times when we are full of heartache and grief. Plans and dreams we had made fall apart and disintegrate like dead dry leaves. In those times, even when we are surrounded by people who genuinely love us, we feel alone, and God seems very far away. I think this is something like what the disciples were going through after the death of Jesus. They had had such hope and dreams and plans. But it was all torn apart on an awful Thursday and a terrible Friday. Certainly those who are grieving Diana Henry's death know what it is like to endure an awful Thursday and a terrible Friday. Any who have suffered sudden, terrible tragedy, know first hand, something of what the disciples went through. The disciples could not believe what was happening -- what had happened. Little wonder the Gospel writers described them as being afraid. Their fear was more than just a fear for personal safety. Their future, somehow seemed frightening. It is frightening when plans and dreams in which we placed great hope are dead and buried. Then came Easter, and the proclamation of resurrection. But what does resurrection mean after hopes and dreams have died? Does it mean the old dreams that are dead and buried will somehow be resuscitated and everything can go on as it had before? Or does resurrection have to do with new hope coming from the tomb of dead dreams? If this is the case, and I believe it is, this too is scary. It is fearful to have to face a future we know will be very different from the past to which we were so accustomed. As Luke tells the story, the disciples lacked clarity and had a lot of questions. They more or less stood around just looking at one another, perhaps holding hands, hugging one another and telling and retelling stories. They prayed; they went through the motions of administrative reorganization. After all there was the vacancy created by Judas' betrayal and death. "Wait in Jerusalem," Jesus had told them. "Stay together and wait." All their lives they had heard passages of scripture telling them "to wait on the Lord." They were probably remembered the passage from Isaiah telling us that those who wait on the Lord shall mount up with wings, like eagle. So, the disciples waited. It is not easy to wait. We have a tendency to want to move on. Waiting, especially waiting on the Lord, is not the long suit for most of us. We have a hard time sitting still; we want to go and do and "fix" or at least be busy. One of the truths about life we see played out in Bible story after Bible story is God's timing is not the same as ours. When God feeds us, God does not use a fast food service nor is the nourishment we receive from God a hurried microwave meal. Waiting is involved. We can try to guess why it is this way; we may even have profound insights about the wisdom in this being the way it is; but whether it makes sense or not, whether we like it or not, this is the way it is. There are times in life, when all we can do is wait on the Lord. Jesus told the disciples to go to Jerusalem and wait. And then came Pentecost. Pentecost was a Jewish celebration of God giving Moses the Commandments. It was the celebration of Israel becoming a covenant people. To celebrate this special, holy day Jews from all over the world came to Jerusalem. I suppose it was much like Christians from all around this planet making a pilgrimage to Bethlehem at Christmas or to Jerusalem at Easter. People from many countries were in Jerusalem for this special celebration of God making a covenant with the Jews in the giving them the God's Holy Law. In the midst this celebration, something special happened among the disciples and it attracted the attention of many of the foreign pilgrims in Jerusalem. The disciples became aware of God's presence in a very special and profound way. The experience was overwhelming, and they understood the meaning of Christ as they had never understood before. They experienced an empowerment they had never experienced before. These people who had been afraid and felt all alone became aware that they were not alone. They were aware of the presence of God in their lives. Once again they had a sense of hope, and their fear evaporated. And this was not merely a personal experience; it was a group experience. They were a community of faith who shared an amazing experience of the presence of God. And that experience infused them with hope, and they discerned a new purpose in their living. They realized this new purpose was the purpose Jesus had been trying to enable them to grasp throughout his ministry. Now, by the grace of God's Holy Spirit moving among them, they at long last "got it." It was a sort of "holy gestalt" experience. It was a grand and glorious: "Aha - now I see" experience. They saw as they had never seen before that their primary purpose in life was to share what they had to share -- the awareness of God's transforming love at work in all of life -- even in and through crucifixions. Even torturing the Son of God to death does not defeat God and God's love. God is able to take the worst we humans do, the very worst that can happen to us, and use it for good. This is not to say God wants the worst to happen in order to demonstrate the amazing power of God and God's grace. But it is to say, that even when terrible events happen -- experiences that grieve even God - even then, God is not defeated. Somehow God uses even the terrible experience to accomplish good. This is why there is hope - real hope, In Pentecost, the disciples became aware as never before, that their primary purpose in life was to share the hope they had been given. And to this day, whenever and wherever we find people who have profoundly experienced God's redeeming, transforming love and are aware they have experienced God's love, we find people who live with hope. Whenever and wherever we find people who have profoundly experienced God's redeeming, transforming love and are aware they have experienced God's love, we find people who know their lives will be incomplete if they do not share what they have to share -- faith and hope in God's transforming and redeeming love. In other words, whenever and wherever we find people who have profoundly experienced God's redeeming and transforming love and are aware they have experienced God's love, we find people who are really and truly being the Church. The great miracle of Pentecost is not to be found in the descriptions of the mighty wind or the mysterious flames or the miracle of communication beyond the limits of human language. The great miracle of Pentecost is that the confused followers of Jesus were enabled to see Christ with a clarity they had never had before. They saw, as they had never seen before, that God who had raised Jesus from the dead was also bringing new life into their lives, and in this, they discovered hope -- hope for themselves and hope for the world. There are times when we feel hope is dead and our plans and dreams have crumbled like dead, dry flowers. Then we are told about Easter and we hear the proclamation of resurrection. But what does that mean? We are confused. We are afraid of what might happen. We are afraid of being hurt again. We have had all the heartache we think we can stand. As we struggle with our confusion, grief and fears, we hear the old message from the scriptures: "wait on the Lord." Then, perhaps because we do not know what else to do, or perhaps because we trust the message, we wait. We gather here and pray and wait -- wait on the Lord. And as we know, from time to time Pentecost does happen. From time to time God's Holy Spirit moves in us and among us and when this happens, we know we are not alone; we are able to live trusting God, and because we are able to live trusting God, we are no longer the same. We are aware of God's presence and of God's transforming love at work among us and in us -- even in the midst of tragedy. And because we are aware of this, we have hope. It is living in this hope that we discover the deeper purpose in our living. We are to share what we have to share with the whole world -- faith and hope in God's transforming love we have come to know through Jesus Christ. God, help us wait, expecting and anticipating your Holy Spirit to come among us, giving us hope so that we will live our lives with the holy purpose we see in Christ. Amen. Pastoral
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