At this time of the year, I enjoy celebrating
Pentecost which is the birthday of the Christian community. And today I am
celebrating with millions of others to commemorate this birth of the church and
its growth in numbers and witness. Not always have I celebrated Pentecost
Sunday, although spiritually maturing in a Pentecostal denomination which founded
it’s birth on the records of the events surrounding the momentous day recorded
in Acts 2: 1 - 4: the violent wind from heaven, the appearance of tongues of
fire, and the miraculous gift of languages that caused the Jews who had come to
Jerusalem for the Feast of Harvest to wonder if the disciples were drunk.
The ancient feast of Pentecost celebrated by the
nation of Israel, however, was a celebration of harvest. The weeks of sowing
were completed and now it was time to reap the gifts of the land. That the
Spirit would be poured out during this Hebrew festival is no coincidence. As I
read further, I understand that Jewish pilgrims from many different lands had gathered
for this feast and were astounded as they heard their native dialects and
languages being spoken by a small group of Jesus-followers. These were the
languages representing every region of the known world. The harvest was not
just of crops, but of peoples—peoples far beyond the boundaries of Jerusalem.
And as I recognized many years ago, this is
exactly what Jesus had promised would happen with the coming of the Holy Spirit
at Pentecost. The good news of the Messiah would go out beyond the capital of
Israel to the "remotest parts of the earth." What is often not
realized—as modern people living in a pluralistic and multicultural world—is
that taking the gospel to the remotest parts of the earth would have been bad
news for those who believed the Messiah was only for Israel. This is my
reasoning why I believe that the Assemblies of God denomination has been used
of God mightily, during the twentieth century, especially as the greatest
missionary force on the face of the earth.
I believe the denomination can and will remain an integral part of the mission
of the Holy Spirit.
In understanding why this mission of the Holy
Spirit was so radical in those early days of Christianity, I’ve had to understand
how the religious Jews viewed the Gentiles of that first century. Gentiles were unclean and Jews had absolutely
nothing to do with them. How many times
was Jesus criticized for ministering to Gentiles or to Samaritans—half-breeds—who
were also despised by the Jews? Having seen this backdrop is the help in
understanding for a conflict in the earliest Christian community in which the
Hellenistic Jews (Jews from Greece) where, in Acts 6, were angry at the native
Hebrews for overlooking their widows in the serving of food. Outsiders in
general were treated with inferiority.
I’m also helped to understand the strange vision
of the great sheet covered with unclean animals that appeared to the disciple
Peter. In the vision, Peter is commanded to "kill and eat" what would
have defiled him according to Jewish law. Peter cries out when he is told to
kill and eat, "By no means, Lord, for I have never eaten anything unholy
and unclean!" This was not merely a protest against a new dietary law;
Peter could not conceive of bringing the gospel to those he would have
considered unclean. The narrative tells the reader that at the same time of
this vision, Cornelius, a Roman solider was praying—praying as it turned out
for Peter, his own reluctant evangelist.
As a result of this vision, Peter later declares in
Acts, chapter 10, about the Gentiles, "I most certainly understand now
that God is not one to show partiality, but in every nation the one who fears
God and does what is right is welcome to God. The word which God sent to the
sons of Israel, preaching peace through Jesus Christ...of him all the prophets
bear witness that through his name everyone who believes in him receives
forgiveness of sins."
Peter ministered to those who were considered
outside the bounds of God's grace. And when he returned to Jerusalem, the Jews
took issue with him over his "eating with the uncircumcised." Peter
explained the events and the Jews eventually declared, "God has granted to
the Gentiles also the repentance that leads to life." The gospel was had
taken root and was not producing fruit further and further from its root base!
The words of the prophet Joel in his book the second chapter, were being
fulfilled: "In the last days, God says, I will pour forth my Spirit on all
people. Your sons and daughters will prophesy, and your young men will see
visions, and your old men will dream dreams."
Father, God, I be rejoicing today with
millions of others who love the gospel and the spread of it! Thank You for the overt opportunity it gives me to express marvelous ruminations and outward joy at the irony of Your calling
Peter, and later Paul (who was Saul of Tarsus a "Hebrew of Hebrews")
to be "apostles to the Gentiles." Thank You that my eyes were opened
years ago as a young teen to Your calling me, also, to reach out with the good news that You were
saving those, like me, deemed unlikable, unworthy, and far outside Your promises and plan.
I further pray that whether or not my family or friends celebrate the season of
Pentecost, we all might wonder about the ones in our lives we might be tempted
to consider "Judeans or Samarians" or those "who dwell in the
remotest parts of the earth." Thank You, Father for making me acuity aware that the same Spirit who
changed the world by changing the minds of a handful of disciples, two thousand years ago, still beacons and pushes me outward beyond my home, this community of Stecoah and my church. Amen
