“And suddenly there came a sound from
heaven . . . and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit”
(Acts 2:2-4).
“. . . but ye know him, for he dwelleth
with you, and shall be in you” (John 14:26).
On
the day of Pentecost after Jesus’ ascension, the divine power of the
Spirit came upon the disciples gathered in that upper room in
Jerusalem, and both filled and inspired them. On that day God
revealed himself, and the presence of the Spirit was given to the
apostles in a sudden, dramatic, and astounding moment. On that day
the power of the Spirit appeared, in visions, signs and wonders: the
sound “as of a mighty rushing wind,” and “cloven tongues,
like as of fire”; and in prophecy for “they began to speak
with other tongues as the Spirit gave utterance”—such were the
wondrous, and perhaps bewildering, manifestations of the Holy Ghost
on that day. This was of course recognised by the early Church as a
fulfillment of the oracle of the prophet Joel: “And it shall come
to pass in the last days, saith God, I will pour out of my Spirit
upon all flesh: and your sons and daughters shall prophesy, and your
young men shall see visions, and your old men shall dream dreams;
and on my handmaidens I will pour out in those days of my Spirit;
and they shall prophesy” (Joel 2:32). And thus was the church
born: in an immediate, sudden, powerful experience of the divine—an
experience, one might say, of religious ecstasy.
Some today are perhaps doubtful of this kind of language, as indeed
there were those observers then who supposed the disciples to be
merely drunk with wine. But our meditation this morning must
neither brush aside nor become overly preoccupied with these images
of divine power, and of the disciples’ experience of ecstasy. For
we must not fail to grasp the meaning of all this noisy wind,
dancing flames, and drunkenness in the Spirit—lest we fail to
understand what lies at the very source of the Church’s existence,
her life, and soul.
Our Collect today instructs us about the nature and purpose of the
miracle which we solemnly commemorate on this Festival of
Whitsuntide. God’s sending of his Spirit, the third Person of the
Holy Trinity, is the gift of light to “teach the heart of his
faithful people.” And so we ask in the Collect: “Grant us by the
same Spirit to have a right judgement in all things” (BCP, p.
205).
According to St Luke in the Acts of the Apostles, after the
resurrection and before the ascension, Jesus continued teaching his
disciples about the kingdom of God. But his closest disciples, who
for the past three years followed him in his ministry, seem still to
misunderstand what kind of kingdom Jesus was talking about. Nor in
this connection do they grasp the significance of the Cross, the
memory of which would still be terribly vivid in their minds. Jesus
indeed had revealed the power of this kingdom most decisively in the
weakness of his crucifixion. Yet prior to Pentecost, before
receiving the Holy Ghost, they do not seem to have the right
judgement as to what kind of power and kingdom this is. They lack
discernment, and the good news is still obscure to them. For they
ask: “Lord, wilt thou at this time restore the kingdom to Israel?”
(Acts 1:6). Such a question betrays their nationalistic hopes to
reestablish the political dominion once enjoyed by David. The
Spirit was given to the Apostles as their teacher, because the
power, glory, and mightiness of God’s kingdom which the Christ-event
authorised and revealed turns all of our expectations upside down.
As we read in St John’s Gospel, Jesus himself anticipated the
ministry of the Holy Ghost, promising to his disciples that “he
shall teach you all things, and bring all things to your
remembrance, whatsoever I have said unto you” (John 14:26). The
Holy Ghost, the Spirit of truth, descended on the day Pentecost, “to
teach the Apostles and all other men, that it is he which giveth
eloquence and utterance in preaching the Gospel; that it is he which
openeth the mouth to declare the mighty works of God; that it is he
which engendereth a burning zeal toward God’s word, and gives all
men a tongue, yea, a fiery tongue, so that they may boldly and
cheerfully profess the truth in the face of the whole world” (Certain
Sermons or Homilies, “For Whitsunday”). Today we celebrate, as
our hymn declares, the “Day when first the light divine/ on the
Church began to shine.”
The Holy Ghost imparted not only illumination, but also authority.
For in light of Christ’s redemption—whose peculiar power is
manifested in self-emptying love, and whose kingdom is ruled by the
Lamb who was slain for us—in light of this and only this, the Spirit
authorises the Church’s own peculiar power and mission. As the Acts
of the Apostles records, once inspired and taught by the power of
the Spirit given on Pentecost, St Peter is bold then to proclaim the
good news that Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified, dead, and
buried, has been raised and exalted, and is now sitting at the right
hand of the Father. Authorised by the Spirit of truth he can
exclaim: “God hath made Jesus, whom ye have crucified, both Lord
and Christ” (Acts 2:36).
The Holy Ghost’s descent upon the apostles, which we celebrate
today, teaches and so reveals the meaning of the Cross; and the
power and authority which the Holy Ghost gives to the Church is
never apart from this truth: the Church is united with and
participates in Christ’s work of redemption.
The gift of the Spirit of Pentecost to the apostles was certainly a
miraculous and powerful event. And it is of this singular event
which we have been reflecting on. But such discreet experiences of
ecstasy, inspiration, and abrupt vision of God as the apostles had
on that day are perhaps uncommon, exceptional . . . and certainly
not regarded as a normal or regular part of Prayer Book
spirituality! Thankfully, the gift of the divine presence was not a
mere momentary shock, which passed away from the disciples just as
quickly as it came upon them: “for he dwelleth with you, and
shall be in you” (John 14:17). So long as one is a true
disciple who keeps our Lord’s commandment of love, Jesus promises of
himself and his Father: “we will come unto him, and make our
abode with him” (John 14:23). And this is the reason why we ask
God in our Collect to grant us, by the Spirit “evermore to rejoice
in his holy comfort.” For the Holy Ghost, our Comforter, was given
to us to be an abiding, continuing presence which is the active
agent of our conversion to the truth; and the divine cause of our
purification from following “too much the devices and desires of our
own hearts” (BCP, p. 4).
What a comfort it is that the Church does not direct its own
projects, but rather follows the motion of the divine Spirit; and
that our devotion and piety do not in the first place depend upon
us, and the frailty of our nature, but upon the Spirit of God which
abides in us. His presence and power in us is in fact the condition
which enables us to be converted to God at all, and enables our
prayers to ascend to the Father. Progress in spiritual life is not
without discipline and strenuous training on our part, but, thank
God, it does not begin, does not depend on, and is not measured by
our own brilliance, understanding, or emotional fervour in prayer:
for the Holy Ghost is active to inspire all our prayer. Likewise,
the only possibility of our keeping Christ’s commandment of love, to
both God and our neighbour, is the Holy Ghost, the eternal bond of
Love himself which unites the Father and the Son. As St Augustine
teaches, “without [the Spirit] we can neither love God nor keep His
commandments” Indeed, without his divine presence within us we have
no power to love at all. Therefore, he continues, “he who loves has
already the Holy Spirit, and by what he has becomes worthy of a
fuller possession, that by having the more he may love the more.” (Tractate
on John 14).
And what is the “peace” with which Jesus promised to leave his
disciples, other than the tranquility of soul which is possible only
through our lives being rightly ordered to God, who is our true
good, and the end of our desire. Which ordering by the Spirit was
most famously and eloquently captured by St Augustine: “to praise
Thee is the desire of man, a little piece of Thy creation. Thou
stirest man to take pleasure in praising Thee, because Thou hast
made us for Thyself, and our heart is restless until it rests in
Thee” (Confessions 1.1).
The Holy Ghost inspires whatsoever religious ecstasy we may
experience, floods us with the light of all heavenly wisdom, bestows
us with of all charity and peace, and is the primary agent in our
progress in sanctification, our disciplines of prayer and habit of
contemplation. And so God’s Spirit, which Jesus promised unto his
disciples “to be with you forever,”—this same Spirit we invoke to
rouse up the divine presence within us: “O Lord, open thou our lips,
and our mouth shall show forth thy praise” (BCP, p. 6).
In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost. Amen.
