May 15, 2016 (Day of Pentecost) Acts 2:1-21; John 14:8-17, 25-27
Acts 2:1-21; John 14:8-17, 25-27
Controlled Fire
Day of Pentecost C – May 15, 2016
First Lutheran Church – Winnipeg, MB
When I was preparing to preach this week, one of the things I read was about the fire that
appeared to rest on the apostles on the Day of Pentecost.
It talked about how fire is associated with God’s presence in the Bible.
It creates light and warmth in human community when people gather around fire.
It provides safety and comfort against the dark at night.
It provides guidance and the assurance of God’s presence as the Israelites leave slavery in
Egypt and a pillar of fires guides them by night.
It provides the sustenance of cooked food and
allowed the Israelites a way of presenting offerings to God.
It also, though, conveys the sense of God’s awesome power.
Fires consumed vast tracts of forest and were considered signs of God’s judgment.
Fire conveyed not only God’s comforting, heat-filled, light-filled presence but also
God’s power and majesty.
On Mt. Sinai – which may have been a volcano – fire accompanied God’s giving of
the 10 commandments.
“Think fire, think God,” wrote the person writing about all this.
“Think fire, think God.” Right. But also think Fort McMurray.
Like all the gifts of God, fire is great but fire can also be destructive.
Massively, disruptively destructive as we have been witnessing in Alberta.
So what happens to the Apostles on the day of Pentecost is super interesting and
super instructive.
Now what you need to know is this:
Pentecost was a Jewish festival also called the festival of weeks –
it is why all these Jews were gathered in Jerusalem at the time of our story today.
The festival of weeks celebrated the gift of the law given on Mount Sinai, accompanied by fire.
But now what happens on the day of Pentecost is very very interesting!
The fire now is no longer seen on God’s mountain from far off!
The fire now is dispersed among the believers!
The fire is now not so much a sign of God’s mighty, destructive power!
The fire is now a sign of God’s light-filled warming presence carried and conveyed by a
community of love.
It is fire, tamed. It is fire, domesticated. It is power, harnessed.
Can you see and feel the reversal of imagery that Luke gives us?
The fire and the destructive power of nature – that, admittedly, can be regenerative –
is now strictly regenerative. It is focussed.
You know how during the Eater vigil we light a fire when the sun goes down?
The bigger the fire the better! I often want to light a fire outside that will cause someone to
call the fire department! I really wanna light a huge blaze?
And what do we do with that fire?
We take a bit of light from that potentially super destructive fire.
And we focus us it into a single shining flame by lighting the Paschal candle from it.
And we leave the destructive fire behind and we follow that single shining star that
represents the light of Christ into a completely dark worship space.
And then from that single candle every person gathered receives light for
his or her own candle until the light from that single candle is dispersed
among the entire gathered community.
It’s a beautiful and moving sight.
And it conveys such a great and fundamental Christian truth:
that God’s power symbolized by fire can be focussed by Christ into a
single loving flame that the community of believers can share.
The fire of God is tamed and dispersed by the community.
In Acts the community of believers will go on to be the presence of God in their time and place.
They will pool their gifts and share with any in need.
They will care for each other.
They will heal, they will forgive enemies, they will feed the hungry,
they will even raise the dead.
They will be the controlled fire of Christ on earth,
spreading light and warmth, nurturing community, cooking food for the hungry.
That is why they receive the Spirit of Christ on the Day of Pentecost: that is their purpose.
Not to destroy, not to be powerful, not to be the judgment of God:
Jesus leaves those aspects of God’s power behind when it is focussed in his person.
Instead, he tames that power, focusses it for good and for life and for love,
and then gives it to his followers on the Day of Pentecost.
In John’s Gospel you get the same idea.
It’s the night Jesus will be arrested. The next day Jesus will be executed.
The disciples are scared.
Philip is all like, “Uh, Jesus, if you were ever going to show us the Father,
the powerful judgment of God and God’s awesome powerful outstretched arm of
fire and destruction – now would be a good time!”
And Jesus is exasperated, right?
It’s like, “Dude! How thick can you be?
Have I been with you all this time and you still don’t get it?
Whoever has seen me has seen the Father! We are one!
The Father is in me and I am in the Father.
How can you say “Show me the Father!”???? Ahhhh!!!!!
Poor Jesus.
Yes, there is a great great power at work in God, but Jesus is saying in no uncertain terms that
that power is always intended to be focussed in loving mercy and compassion
just the way he has done throughout his ministry.
Well, the disciples are dismayed.
There will be no judgment from God on their enemies.
No fire from heaven raining down on them.
Just an executed leader – and forgiveness from the cross.
But then Jesus says No! That is not all! There is more! Wait!
I am going to send you another Advocate, another person to walk alongside you.
And encourage you.
And empower you to do all the things I have done.
And together you will do even greater things than me!
The Spirit – my Holy Good Loving Spirit – will be dispersed among you as a community.
The power of God shown on Sinai all those years ago,
the power of God focussed in me and my ministry in works of love and
compassion and hospitality will now be focussed in you!
And you will do greater things than these! You will be my body reaching out into the
whole world, into every nook and cranny of hurting, and you will bring my
controlled presence of love and care to all people and all creation.
I’m just one guy – but you, now are 3 and half billion. So do something!
And the disciples do. Amazingly, they do.
Despite their fear, despite their awareness of their own shortcomings, they do.
The Spirit comes to them on the Day of Pentecost, and keeps on coming to them.
Encouraging them and empowering them to nurture life in one another and
nurture life in the world.
Jesus says it is an Advocate that comes to them.
In the ancient world this was a person who walked through a legal process with you.
It was one who walked alongside of you. One who comforted you. A companion.
Yes: as of the Day of Pentecost,
you now are called now to be the loving body of Jesus in the world.
You are called to do something.
But you are not alone.
You have a power and a light and a controlled fire that is now in you, says Jesus,
given to you just as it was to the disciples on Day of Pentecost.
And you can give it to each other, just the way you share the light at the Easter Vigil
in a darkened room until it is filled with the light of one another.
You can encourage each other and you can know that you are not alone.
That there is one walking alongside of you, encouraging you in the life you were born to live.
When you are overwhelmed at work, you are not alone.
When you are frustrated by family, you are not alone.
When you are feeling alone and isolated, you are not alone.
When you are feeling as if life is meaningless you are not alone: it is why we gather!
It’s true that communities can be dangerous and destructive.
Religious communities certainly can be – and congregations are no exception.
The fire they have can be the fires of power and judgmentalism.
But Jesus gives us a controlled fire, the fire of care and light and warmth and welcome.
The fire of gentle justice.
We can use our power for good – in our workplaces, in our homes, in our communities.
I was talking with one of you this week about our Community Meals.
And of all the things you can use your power and your light and your fire for,
that is one of the best.
“It is such a great thing,” you said. “Such an awesome thing.” It is awesome – but also loving.
And it is. To feed people, to offer hospitality, to treat people with dignity,
to do something out of pure love for people you don’t even know,
to create community in this neighbourhood.
And then you remember that Jesus says that with the help of the Advocate you will do
even greater things than him. Hmmmm. You are!
And then you think of the Wildfires in Fort McMurray, and you realize that
as part of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Canada you are fighting fire with fire:
you are fighting the destructive fires that rage with the loving controlled fire of
God in our partnership with Canadian Lutheran World Relief –
CLWR will use all funds it raises to assist in the rebuilding effort:
The rebuilding of physical facilities for sure, but more than that,
it will use its resources for rebuilding the lives of those affected
through grief and trauma counseling.
And then you remember again that Jesus says that with the help of the Advocate you will do
even greater things than him.
And you are. You really are.
So be filled with the Holy, Good, Nurturing light-filled Spirit again this morning.
Jesus brings it again and gives it to you, the controlled fire of love that was at work in him,
first given to his people on that Day of Pentecost long ago: the fire of companionship and
and love and light and advocacy. Given to you again.
You are not alone. You are a people on fire. So together let us say, “Amen.”
Pastor Michael Kurtz
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