Connected

The Rev. Dr. Whitworth Ferguson III
Manassas Presbyterian Church
Manassas, Virginia
May 31, 2009: Pentecost

Connected
Acts 2:1-12
Galatians 5:22-26

What happens when we live God’s way?
This is the question Paul asks us
in Peterson’s paraphrasing of the text
that Ashlie just read.

Our first reaction to that question might well be,
“well, isn’t that how we are living?”
After all, we here are in church,
here in God’s house, to worship and praise God.
We could be sleeping in,
or we could be puttering around the garden,
or out on the golf course or tennis court,
or sitting at the kitchen table
drinking a cup of coffee and reading the newspaper.
We’ve got lots of choices on Sunday morning,
but to paraphrase Joshua’s bold statement,
as for you and me
we’ve chosen to be here in the presence of God.

But being here in the presence of God
doesn’t necessarily mean we live God’s way,
at least not all the time.
Sunday morning may be one of our high points during the week,
the time of the week when we are most likely to live God’s way.
Other times during the week may see us
slip and slide far from God’s way.

Failing to live God’s way
doesn’t mean we are out robbing banks,
or stealing cars, or doing criminal things
that might land us in jail.
Not living God’s way means simply
that we are not living as Jesus taught us to live,
as Jesus calls us to live:
living in service to others,
living lives of selflessness,
of thinking of others more than we think of ourselves;
of focusing more on what can give,
than what we can get;
on what we can share,
than on what we have.

Living God’s way means we trust God
in all parts of our lives:
we don’t worry,
we are at peace,
our hearts, minds, strength and soul
focused on God, on following Jesus.
We understand what Jesus means when he says,
“take my yoke upon you, and learn from me…
and you will find rest in your souls.”
(Matthew 11:29)

Last week we talked about how we live in this world,
yet like our Lord Jesus Christ,
we are not part of the world.
We talked about how hard living this way can be,
how in the early years of Christianity
many followers of Christ chose to live
separate and apart from the world
so their lives would not be filled with distractions
that would cause them to turn from God.
Living a hermit’s life in the desert seemed easier for some
than trying to navigate all the complications of life
that for us includes family, school,
work, community,
and other obligations.

But Jesus doesn’t want us to live behind cloistered walls,
set apart from the world.
He lived in the world, the real world,
and found great joy in being with people,
all kinds of people,
as he traveled from town to town throughout his ministry.
And he sends us out to be part of the same real world.

Still, though: Jesus teaches us that even as we live in this world,
we are not of this world.
We are called to align our wills,
our hearts and our minds,
with God, with God’s will.
We are called to put aside our concerns
for “earthly” matters, “earthly” concerns,
“earthly” worries.

Now of course, we cannot do this all by ourselves.
Jesus could do it, but then,
he was the Son of God.
We need help, all of us,
ministers, too.
And we have help, help that Jesus promised us we’d have:
powerful help in the form of the Holy Spirit.

God’s Spirit, the Spirit of Christ that fills us,
that nourishes us,
that picks us up when we are tired,
that gives us courage,
that calms us and reassures us
even in the Valley of the Shadow of Death.

The Spirit helps us as we make decisions throughout our day,
helps us to make the right decisions,
helps us to hear the “still, small voice of God”
so we can choose the right path,
and avoid the wrong the path,
especially when the wrong path can often look
so much more inviting and so much more attractive
than the Godly path.

The story from Acts that Reece read,
of the Spirit coming upon the Disciples,
coming upon them like a wind blowing through them
paints such a vivid picture.
Peterson puts it so colorfully:
“Without warning there was a sound like a strong wind, gale force –
no one could tell where it came from.
It filled the whole building.
Then, like a wildfire, the Holy Spirit spread through their ranks…”
(The Message)

Wow! No wonder we love to observe Pentecost!
But the Spirit probably has not come through the Sanctuary
of the Manassas Presbyterian Church
in such a dramatic and wild way
in any of the more than 140 Pentecosts
this church as observed.

It doesn’t matter, though.
We still have the Spirit;
We are still filled with the Holy Spirit.
The Spirit fills us in the same way
it filled the Disciples 2,000 years ago --
without the drama, of course:
the Spirit that is the breath of God,
the Spirit that was the wind that first blew across the waters
right at the beginning of the Bible in Genesis,
the breath of God that brought life to all creation.

Many of us grew up speaking not of the Holy Spirit,
but of the Holy Ghost.
We still sing hymns from time to time
that use that term, Holy Ghost.
The traditional Gloria Patri sings out,
“Glory be to the Father,
and to the Son, and to the Holy Ghost.”

The term “ghost” in place of “spirit”
was the result of a translation mistake in the Bible
made hundreds of years ago,
a mistake that became institutionalized.
Go back to the original Hebrew of the Old Testament,
and the original Greek of the New Testament
and you will see the language is clear:
the reference is clear:
the word is “Spirit”:
it is the “Breath” that blows over us,
the “Wind” of God that refreshes us,
the Spirit of God that fills us.
The are no ghost stories in the Bible.

It is the Spirit that gives us the ability to proclaim;
proclaim the gospel of Jesus Christ
in every language, every dialect, every tongue,
to all the world.
When our young folks offered the Call to Worship
in different languages,
they were doing just what the Disciples did 2000 years ago,
speaking the word of the Lord to all,
reminding us that language is no impediment to the gospel,
language is no impediment to God’s love.
The gospel of Jesus Christ translates easily to any language.

Once we open ourselves to the power of the Spirit,
oh what a life we can live!
“God will really bring gifts into our lives!”
extending from “exuberance about life”
to “serenity”.

The struggle we Presbyterians have, though,
is with that word “spiritual”.
We may sometimes refer to a person as being “spiritual”,
but we tend to think that “spiritual” men and women
are the exception, rather than the rule.
We are generally quicker to embrace the term “frozen chosen”,
to describe ourselves than we are to embrace the word,
“spiritual”.
Yet the reality is that every one of us is spiritual,
simply by definition: we all have the Holy Spirit within us,
given us by God, by the grace of God, by God’s love for us.

God calls us to embrace the Spirit
to grow in spirit, to grow in spirituality
as we grow in Christ,
as we grow in discipleship.
That’s what Paul was trying to explain
to the men and women in the churches in Galatia.
He thought they were doing well,
unlike those wicked men and women of Corinth.
He looked at the Galatians and saw men and women
who readily embraced the Spirit.
But there was also a word of warning to the Galatians:
of how easy it is to turn from the Spirit, turn from God,
to slip and slide away.
Paul wanted them to remember how important it was for them
to work constantly at growing in Spirit and in faith.

As we grow in spirit, in spirituality,
wonderful things happen:
we develop a greater affection for others
a genuine love, even for those who are “different”
or for those who don’t see things our way.
We learn more than just acceptance;
We learn empathy, that ability to put ourselves
in the shoes of another person.

We learn what real joy is.
We also know serenity and peace.
We know the Spirit fills us with assurance,
even in the midst of difficult times.

Living a spiritual life is to become connected,
connected with the world all around us.
It is to be more deeply connected with one another
as brothers and sisters in Christ.
It is to come out of the little rooms, the little boxes,
the silos where we put ourselves.
and embrace the community we are part of,
in all its richness and diversity.

At Thursday evening’s Bible study
we were talking about the passage in the gospel of John
in which Jesus says, “I am the vine, you are the branches”.
We are not tree branches,
each of us going off in our own direction.
That’s not the analogy Jesus uses.
He says we are “vine branches”,
and vine branches intertwine,
wrapping around each other, growing together,
not separately.

Paul reminds us that,
“the fruit of the spirit is love”.
From a foundation of love we build community,
all of us together,
bound by the Spirit, fed by the Spirit,
growing in the Spirit, each of us individually,
and all of us together.

When we live Spiritual lives,
we understand that “God is closer to us than our breath”,
We see holiness in everything,
we see holiness in every person.

So, now we know the answer to the question:
what happens when we live God’s way?
We become spiritual, deeply spiritual.

Are you ready for that?
Ready to become more spiritual?
Ready to let the Spirit guide you, move you,
stir you, lead you,
lead you even to places
you would not go on your own?

Are you ready to become the Spiritual person
God wants you to be?
God hopes you will be?
God created you to be?

Are you ready,
for the wind is blowing through this Sanctuary
and through our lives, here and now,
the Spirit...
the very breath of God.
AMEN