June 8, 2003
By Diane Bourgeois

Narrator:    Today we celebrate the Day of Pentecost -- the fiftieth day after Easter for those of us who honor the Resurrection of Jesus Christ and the day the Holy Spirit came to the believers gathered in Jerusalem.  But why had those Jewish people gathered?  Why was the city filled with those who had come to the Temple of the Hebrews on pilgrimage?  The answer can be found in the early history of the Jews, in Deuteronomy, the fifth book of the Old Testament.

Chuck:       You shall count off seven weeks [after the Passover], computing them from the day when the sickle is first put into the standing grain.  You shall then keep the feast of Weeks in honor of the Lord, your God, and the measure of your own freewill offering shall be in proportion to the blessing of the Lord, your God, has bestowed on you.  In the place which the Lord, your god, chooses as the dwelling place of [God's] name, you shall make merry in his presence together with your son and daughter, your male and female slaves, and the Levite who belongs to your community, as well as the alien, the orphan, and the widow among you.

Deuteronomy 16: 9-11

Narrator:    The disciples and other followers of Jesus, those Jews who believed the Messiah had come to fulfill the prophecies of the ancient scriptures gathered, in obedience to the Law, for the feast of Weeks, fifty days after the end of Passover Week.  They came for a purpose, and God showed them another purpose.

Karen         When the time for Pentecost was fulfilled, they were all in one place together.  And suddenly there came from the sky a noise like a strong driving wind, and it filled the entire house in which they were.  Then there appeared to them tongues as of fire, which parted and came to rest on each one of them.  And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in different tongues, as the Spirit enabled them to proclaim.

                 Now there were devout Jews from every nation under heaven staying in Jerusalem.  At this sound, they gathered in a large crowd, but they were confused because each one heard them speaking in his own language.  They were astounded, and in amazement they asked, "Are not all these people who are speaking Galileans?  Then how does each of us hear them in his own native language?  We are Parthians, Medes, and Elamites, inhabitants of Mesopotamia, Judea and Cappadocia, Pontus and Asia, Phrygia and Pamphylia, Egypt and the districts of Libya near Cyrene, as well as travelers from Rome, both Jews and converts to Judaism, Cretans and Arabs, yet we hear them speaking in our own tongues of the mighty acts of God."

                 Acts 2:1-11

Narrator:    The story of the Pentecost and the rest of the New Testament tell us of the fulfillment of the prophecies of Isaiah - the Law long-cherished on parchment was now written on the hearts of those who were filled with the Holy Spirit.  There were healings, knowings, and manifestations of many gifts of the Spirit.  There was the melting of past barriers - no Jew or Greek, no male or female, no rich or poor, no insider or outsider.  . . . It's tempting to contain that phenomenal life to the pages of the Bible.  But how, say two hundred years later, did these people, these believers, appear to others?

Rob           Christians are indistinguishable from other people by nationality, language or customs.  They do not inhabit separate cities of their own, or speak a strange dialect, or follow some outlandish way of life.  Their teaching is not based upon reveries inspired by curiosity.  Unlike some other people, they champion no purely human doctrine.  With regard to dress, food, and manner of life in general, they follow the customs of whatever city they happen to be living in, whether it is Greek or foreign.

                 And yet there is something extraordinary about their lives.  They live in their own countries as though they were only passing through.  They play their full role as citizens, but labor under all the disabilities of aliens.  Any country can be their homeland, but for them their homeland, wherever it may be, is a foreign country.  Like others, they marry and have children, but they do not expose them.  . . .  They live in the flesh, but they are not governed by the desires of the flesh.  They pass their days upon earth, but they are citizens of heaven.  Obedient to the laws, they yet live on a level that transcends the law.

                 Christians love all, but all persecute them.  Condemned because they are not understood, they are put to death, but raised to life again.  They live in poverty, but enrich many;  they are totally destitute, but possess an abundance of everything.  They suffer dishonor, but that is their glory.  They are defamed but vindicated.  A blessing is their answer to abuse, deference their response to insult.  For the good they do they receive the punishment of malefactors, but even then they rejoice, as though receiving the gift of life.

                 Letter to Diognetus, Second century

Narrator:    Sometimes we believe with our heads, we focus on learning and understanding.  The aspects of God we speak of as The Father and The Son are useful to us, but The Holy Spirit is . . . well, that's a mystery.  For someone like Catherine of Sienna who lived in the fourteenth century, how would it feel to learn of God?

Ginny         You are a fire always burning but never consuming;  you are a fire consuming in your heat all the soul's selfish love;  you are a fire lifting all chill and giving light.  In your light you have made me know your truth.  You are that light beyond all light who gives the mind's eye supernatural light in such fullness and perfection that you bring clarity even to the light of faith.  In that faith I see that my soul has life, and in that light receives you who are Light.

                 Catherine of Sienna

Narrator:    For those of us who still struggle with understanding, who wrestle with fitting our minds around God, we offer the words found in writings by a British monk in the thirteen-hundreds, a book known as "The Cloud of Unknowing."

David:        Now you say, "How shall I proceed to think of God as he is in himself?"  To this I can only reply, "I do not know."

                 With this question you bring me into the very darkness and cloud of unknowing that I want you to enter.  A [person] may know completely and ponder thoroughly every created thing and its works, yes, God's works, too, but not God himself.  Thought cannot comprehend God.  And so, I prefer to abandon all I can know, choosing rather to love [the One] whom I cannot know.  Though we cannot know him we can love him.  By love he may be touched and embraced, never by thought.  Of course, we do well at times to ponder God's majesty or kindness for the insight these meditations may bring.  But in the real contemplative work you must set all this aside and cover it over with a cloud of forgetting.  Then let your loving desire, gracious and devout, step bravely and joyfully beyond it and reach out to pierce the darkness above.

                 The Cloud of Unknowing

Narrator:    We gathered here today for one purpose, but might God have another purpose to show us?  Where will God lead us from here?  What might be written next month of this people and the manifestation of the Holy Spirit in this place?  Tomorrow night, what might you write in your journal of the Spirit's breath in you?

Will you join me in prayer?

                 Pastoral Prayer:     Three-personed God, knowable and unknowable, let your Holy Spirit fall fresh upon us.  Help us to open ourselves to you as Creator, Incarnation, and Inhabitor.  As we come to you with our purposes, surprise us with your purpose.  Inhabit us as we inhabit you.  Open us to a world without boundaries, and breathe us into the people you call us to be.  --- Amen.