Pentecostal Hope [Acts 2:1-21 & Romans 8:22-27 - Pentecost B]

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 The Rt. Rev. Jeremiah Williamson

Acts 2:1-21 & Romans 8:22-27

 

Pentecostal Hope

St. Ann's, Amsterdam, NY

 

All they had was unseen hope.  Because Incarnation had faded into invisible right before their startled eyes.  In a matter of weeks, these disciples had witnessed death and then life and now out of sight.  In a matter of weeks, they experienced impossible pain and unexpected joy and…what now?  Maybe both?

 

Jesus left again.  Not on a cross but on a cloud.  This was not the sting of death but also this time it was chosen, and so it still stung.  And anyway, he was gone.  And together they were alone. 

 

Once again, for the second time in as many months, the future was hazy.  And in the dizzying presence of change, they reverted to old patterns.  Every time Jesus was gone, they locked up in a room.  They were disciples and, by nature, disciples follow.  They were followers of Jesus and Jesus wasn’t there to follow - not after Good Friday and not after Ascension Day.  And so, in both cases, with no Jesus in sight, they just stopped walking.  They stayed put.  Behind locked doors.  And they waited. 

 

Nick Cave says, “Hope is optimism with a broken heart.”[1]  And that means those first followers of the Risen Christ were very much people of hope; because they had both.  Neither death, nor disappearance could convince them to give up on Jesus.  They stuck together, a community of broken hearts, believing, without proof or evidence, that better lived somewhere beyond the horizon.  Hope.

 

The Bible proves time and time again that hope is made of the strongest stuff.  Hope should never survive in this world – there is too much violence and pain and death, there is too much disappointment and despair – and still it does.  Hope has the audacity to imagine that this broken world could one day feel like Heaven.  Hope acknowledges the atrocities and still believes in “Thy Kingdom come, Thy will be done.”  Hope feels the seeds of the Kingdom stirring just beneath the parched places of this planet.  Hope plants flowers where the bombs burst.  Hope breathes through the labor pains.

 

One-hundred and twenty people gathered in the Upper Room following the Ascension.  Jesus was gone from sight and still they gathered – with no idea of what the future held – because of hope.  There was nothing to see; no evidence of Pentecost.  But like the Apostle Paul, they understood that hope that is seen is not hope.  And they were people of hope.  And they hoped that their unseen God was able to do the impossible.

 

And while they were praying and preparing for that impossible future, their papers started rustling.  And the walls started shaking.  And the wind kicked up the dust that had long settled in the corners.  And the room started swaying.  And the fire set their heads ablaze.  That unseen hope was coming to life.  And they could see it.  And then their mouths began to chatter with new words in new languages.  And then those locked doors opened because it was no longer the time to stay put.  It was time to follow.

 

The one hundred and twenty were disciples.  And follow is what disciples do.  And now they were following the Spirit.  Out of the room and into the streets. 

 

And in those mysterious tongues they spoke of a mysterious hope – a hope that has the power to overcome the curse of despair, a hope that tells the salvation story, a hope that dares to dream impossible dreams.

 

There were a lot of miracles happening on that first Pentecost.  But the most important miracle of all is that 3000 people were, on that day, consumed by that hope.  The Spirit wasn’t about the show; the show was about the work of the Spirit – sealing two-hundred and fifty dozen souls in the waters of baptism and branding them in the name of the Risen and Ascended Jesus.  I’m not sure what exactly those Upper Room disciples were hoping for, but God had a salvation miracle in mind. 

 

And still does.  I know that much of the conversation around church these days is stained with despair.  We hear talk of declining attendance and limited resources.  Social prophets predict the demise.  The numbers are discouraging. 

 

But I read a story like this Pentecost story and it makes me think that decline and disaster is are not where this story is heading.  Maybe the evidence for the happy ending is not obvious.  But I hear that hope that is seen in not hope.  And we are a people of hope. 

 

The Church in the Upper Room was small, heart-broken, and out of options.  They were not much to work with.  But they had hope.  And God set that hope on fire.  And it spread.

 

God has a future for us, for you – an amazing future.  So say your prayers.  Dream your dreams.  Plant the Gospel in the broken spaces of this world.  Pentecost is not over, because the same Spirit that set fire to the Upper Room is alive in you and in me and in this place.  In this age of despair, burn with hope.  Carry the torch of Pentecost and light this world on fire.

 

               

 

 

 

 

 

 

 


[1] The Christian Century, February 2023, 93.

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