Pentecost

The Church calendar’s red-letter days obliterate division. All Saints’ Day erases the division between the living and the dead. Transfiguration Sunday pulls back the veil between heaven and earth. And this coming Sunday, Pentecost Sunday, unites all tribes, tongues, and nations in one voice. How can this be? What could possibly unify the living and the dead, heaven and earth, and disparate tribes, tongues, and nations?

Pentecost – Image by Holger Schué from Pixabay

Those among us who observe culture, even passively, recognize seemingly irreconcilable divisions all around us. There is hardly a more potent example of this than the conflict between Israel and Palestine, which has reached a fever pitch in the last several days. The New York Times reported today (Tuesday), “Many Israeli and Palestinian leaders have given up on the idea of lasting peace, such as a two-state solution in which Israel and a sovereign Palestine would coexist. They are instead pursuing versions of total victory.” Two opposing sides, each pursuing versions of a total victory in a Cold War-esque standoff of mutually assured destruction. What could possibly unify such division?

As Dr. Tim Smith faithfully preached on Ascension Sunday, it is only the power of God that can reach into our feeble circumstances and restore order where there is disorder, bring peace when there is conflict, and arouse faith where there is no faith. And on Pentecost Sunday, the power of God comes in the form of an Advocate, who Jesus says will be with us forever (John 14:16). The same Advocate who descended upon Jesus at his baptism descends on the Church at Pentecost, giving the nations one voice to worship one King. This we proclaim each Sunday in our profession of faith: “We believe in one holy, catholic, and apostolic Church.”

This Advocate, the Holy Spirit, is God’s gift to the Church. St. Augustine writes, “Since that day [of Pentecost], showers of carisms and streams of blessings have watered every desert and every wilderness (cf. Is 35:6), for in order to renew the face of the earth (cf. Ps 103:30), ‘God’s Spirit hovered over the waters’ (Gen 1:2), and to dispel the old darkness flashes of a new light appeared, while from the splendour of sparking tongues sprang the ardent word of the Lord and his fiery destiny (cf. Ps 18:9), in which is found efficacy to enlighten and strength to burn in order to form minds and conquer sin.”

If the works of the world and the powers of darkness seek to divide us, the Spirit, whom Jesus says abides in us, seeks to unify, enlighten, and strengthen us. It is the love of God, demonstrated to us through the person of Jesus Christ, continually dwelling in us by the Holy Spirit, which enables us to gather each Sunday to worship in Word and Sacrament. There is no other power, no other unifier, no other Advocate who can renew the face of the earth. It is because of this that we can cry out in one voice, in a united tongue with the choir of angels in heaven: Blessing and glory and wisdom and thanksgiving and honor and power and might be to our God forever and ever! Amen.

Yours in Christ,

Bree Snow
Minister of Formation and Catechesis