Hope in a Troubled Time

When the day of Pentecost had come, they were all together in one place,

and suddenly from heaven there came a sound like the rush of a violent

wind. Take a deep breath of Pentecost wind, Church, and let it

go. Take another deep breath of God's disruptive Holy Spirit, wind, and

let it go. And let's pray. Joy of Heaven. The indwelling of

your Holy Spirit is our blessing and our power to day. Keep filling us

with your spirit, that this community of faith would be able to hold the

fiery plans and the surprising hopes that you have for us. May the words

of my mouth and the meditation of all our hearts be acceptable in your sight,

O God, You are our rock and our redeemer. Amen. Easter

is not the end of our story Church. Easter is always driving us towards

today, towards Pentecost and the power of the Holy Spirit that fills the room.

Pentecost, the marvelous feast day of the Church, when we celebrate the

life changing, earth shaking, seismic and surprising gift of the Holy Spirit.

I heard a marvelous preacher years ago, doctor Jazz Scurlock, who said that

our churches are full on Easter Sunday because people think Easter is the end of

our story, the highlight, the pinnacle, when in fact, Easter is

just the beginning. If we stay in Easter, doctor Jazz said, we

stay at the empty tomb. But we have to get from that empty tomb

to the upper room, because the upper room is where the spirit comes,

like a rush of wind, like tongues of fire. It is in the

upper room where the Church is born, the upper room where God's power is

poured into us. The upper room where Paul says, we have died to

sin and come alive to God in Christ Jesus. That is our good news

story, dying to sin and coming alive to God in Christ Jesus through the

power of the Holy Spirit poured into us at Pentecost. So happy Birthday,

Church, I'm so glad you made it here online and in the sanctuary.

To celebrate the continuation of the resurrection story. We plant our feet in the

second chapter of Acts this morning, where without warning the Bible says, suddenly

there came a sound like a violent wind. Violent winds force us to seek

shelter. They shake windows and tear up buildings, They make trees double over,

toss around anything not fastened down without warning. The Bible says, suddenly

God's Pentecost Spirit comes and shakes things up, and the people never see her

coming. The spirit is surprising, disruptive, unexpected. The people full of

this spirit begin to speak in other languages as the spirit gives them ability.

So the day of Pentecost is disruptive and beautiful. We in our own multicultural,

multi ethnic, multi lingual Riverside church, we resonate with the beautiful diversity

inherent in the Pentecost story. Multiple language is spoken, people from every tribe

and creed, universal peace and harmony and understanding that is Riverside and that is

who Riverside aspires to be. We spoke last week about the right now and

the knot Yet, the in between place where followers of Jesus both exist in

a groaning world, even as the Spirit is here filling us and keeping us

upright. We live in the right now and the knot Yet, And so

we lay this beautiful Pentecost story from the Book of Acts alongside by Paul's letter

to the Church at Rome, because both stories invite us confront us with the

reality that we are being filled with the spirit, even as the creation is

groaning. We are always between the right now and not yet. The church

in Rome was diverse for its time, made of Jewish and non Jewish followers

of Jesus, and for a period of about five years the Emperor Claudius kicked

all the Jewish people out of Rome. When they were allowed to return,

the Jewish followers of Jesus found a church that was no longer Jewish, not

in custom, not in practice. The Church in Rome had changed, and

it had changed for good. Think of all the ways the Capital Sea Church

has changed in the past five years, and then think of all the ways

the Riverside Church in particular has changed in the last five years. Beloved members

have transitioned to be with God. Virtual worship is available and growing, allowing

members to participate from anywhere in the world. We have half as many clergy

on staff as we once did and a smaller membership roster. Folk we love

have moved away and new ways of doing and being church. Well. Some

of those ways are starting to irritate us, maybe rub some of us the

wrong way, but we are not unique in our irritation. Church. The

changes in the Church at Rome created a lot of tension. They experienced division

and deep disagreement about who could follow Jesus and what would be the proper way

to follow Jesus. There were disagreements about practices and power. How many people

were unhappy enough people that Paul wrote this letter after the beautiful and disruptive Day

of Pentecost in an effort to unify the church. Paul was concerned because he

had a vision. He knew this amazing, powerful, one of a kind,

multicultural community of faith could be the launch pad for the spread of the

Gospel if they could live upright and spirit filled lives in a world groaning with

labor pains. If the Church at Rome could pull together and allow the vision

of the not yet to supersede the reality of the right now. Paul believed

the message of the good News of Jesus Christ could get as far as Spain,

but he needed this church at Rome to be what he knew they could

be. The Creation is waiting on us, he wrote in verse nineteen,

waiting with eager longing for the children of God to reveal themselves. Waiting on

us, Paul wrote, to be who God created us to be. Jesus

became human so that we might become what he is. Jesus became human so

that we might reveal ourselves as children of God. In the early pages of

his letter, however, Paul records the right now reality, and that reality

said that the nations and the people were trapped, trapped in a spiral of

sin and selfishness. Paul said, we find our ultimate significance in things we

have created, rather than in God. But because of what Jesus did with

his life, death and resurrection, we have another choice. We have another

chance at a place in God's family, and a chance and a new future

if we want it. The Spirit comes to disrupt sin and selfishness. On

Pentecost, we recognize that we've been rescued and set free to be part of

God's multi ethnic family. Paul's message to the church is a message about how

to be God's multi ethnic family. To take a deep breath and settle your

body. Because family might be a loaded word for some of us, it

can be difficult to hear Paul lift up right relationship using the language of family.

Family is challenging and beautiful, safe and not safe, calm and stressful.

But these family images are used so often in this book that we love

that I've come to believe the writers knew exactly what they were doing in leaving

us with this emotionally charged metaphor. With these labels of family, siblings,

parents, and children. Paul must have known that these labels would invite us

to struggle with our own feelings about family, what worked, what didn't work,

and what is still hurting. What's important to know about God's family is

that every day we get a chance at a new and transformed life. Every

day we get a Pentecost invitation to be filled with God's spirit. The question

is will we be part of the family, the one that Paul describes.

Will we live in upright and spirit filled obedience to God following the example of

our big brother Jesus, the one Paul calls the first born within our large

family. Paul is inviting the children of God, the Family of God,

the Church, the New Church, into the fullness of new life, despite

our pattern of sin and despite the truth of evil in a groaning world.

How because we've got Jesus, Not because we have a particular title or role,

or lead a certain committee or ministry, but because we've got Jesus Jesus

who took on a human body and tied his life to our life. Jesus

who set us free and gave us life, Jesus who sent the Spirit to

shake u loose and fill us up. The Day of Pentecost opens us to

the new movement of the Holy Spirit, a movement where we know all of

the delicious things the readers shared with us. We know that nothing will separate

us from God's love. We know we are more than conquerors. We know

that we've been adopted, and we know the Spirit will help us in our

weakness. But and this is the part I love about the Spirit, we

do not know specifically or precisely what any of it will look like in the

end, and we hate that. Oh my God, we don't know where

she will blow us or where we will land when the wind dies down.

But if we are feeling caught in the sound of something like a violent wind,

if we are experiencing disruption, in the fires of unanticipated opportunities to be

God's church, if our astonishing past is taking hands with an indescribable future,

then we just might want a check to see if the Spirit is moving.

We just might want to cultivate our joy in the unexpected. We just might

want to pray to God for increased comfort in being tossed around, because the

creation is aching, it's groaning, it's actually in pain waiting for us,

waiting for the children of God to take their place. And while Paul is

counting on the church in Rome, God is counting on the church on Riverside

Drive, and on every follower of Jesus to reveal themselves as the children of

God. May we be filled this Pentecost Sunday with enough of God's Holy Spirit

to hang on and see what the end will be in the midst of her

disruption. Maybe, just maybe we will help shake some stuff up to then

to God be the glory. Amen.