PENTECOST C
May 27, 2007
Psalm Response: Psalm 104:24-34, 35b Praise to God for the
vast variety of all creatures, a parallel of praise for people of all nations
who are regathered in Christ at Pentecost.
Romans 8:14-17. The Holy Spirit bears witness with our spirits that
we are free, adopted as God's own children, and heirs of God's promises as we
suffer with Christ as his body.
John 14:8-17 (25-27). In the coming of the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of truth, disciples of Jesus will continue the works of Jesus and even greater works than these.
-Nothing but fire kindles fire.
-The word for God in the Old Testament is “Ruach” which means breath. God breathed into Adam and gave him life
-In the Gospel reading, the Spirit does not come to the disciples under the guise of a mighty wind, as in the first reading. Rather, Jesus breathes on them and they receive the Spirit. Here too, it is the power of the Spirit working through them that is important
- If you want to set someone on fire, you have to buuurn a little bit yourself.
-“The Spreading Flame.”
- Look what blew into town?
- The birthday of the church.
-With God, adoption is everything. Our "natural" birth is redeemed by adoption
- No one is a natural child of God--all are adopted. No birthright Christians
- Contemplate (with temple)
--aging is more important as a spiritual process than a physical shock
-- All things created twice...mentally and physically creation spirit
-Spiritually, we are illegitimate children, invited despite our paternity to join God's family.
-The continuing presence of the spirit in Jesus is the true beginning of the kingdom of God. (Jurgen. Moltmann)
-Spirit is another word for "God Present" (Tillich)
-"Inspired"....God breathed \
- "Mystical moxie"
-Christ left us that he may never leave us. spirit paradox.
-For holy spirit we substitute: holy bible, holy church, holy father! Too bad1
-We are blind -sided to the Presence beside us and within us.
-Everyone is a house with four rooms: physical, spiritual, mental and emotional. We tend to live in one room . We need to live in all (Indian)
-Life is really only a spiritual foreign-exchange program.
- Read "Happy Birthday, Church!" by Ann Weems
- Use the color red in any ways you can imagine. Balloons, crepe paper, clothes, etc.
-Fire is a metaphor for enthusiasm and spirit.
-Tower of Babel (God comes to us, not the other way around)
- Little fish asks his Mother, "Where is the ocean?" Mother replys, "It's all around you, it fills your holes." Little fish doesn't believe her and spend his life asking others fish
-If you stand on six inches of rubber, 5,000 volts will refuse to go through you. Spirit is like that...won't work unless it can go through you.
-A scientist walked through the jungle and saw piles of wood as if someone was going to start a fire. He discovered that the apes, mimicking man, laid the pieces of wood down. The only trouble was the apes were missing the spark needed to finish the act.
Appropriate the spirit!
-Take the Holy Spirit out of the church and 95% of what we are doing will go on. Are we willing to hand over our religiosity to the Holy Spirit within us?
-"The spirit remains in the humdrum of our daily lives, hidden and mostly unnoticed by us." Paul
-The river that never runs dry.
- We are comfortable with Pentecost as a noun. but when you make the word an adjective ("Pentecostal"), we become nervous. I find it odd that churches that observe Pentecost don't like the word "Pentecostal," and churches that like to be called "Pentecostal" don't observe Pentecost! Mickey Anders
- (true but funny) Celtic Christians chose the wild goose as a symbol representing the Holy Spirit. A wild goose is one noisy, bothersome bird. I like this image of the Holy Spirit as a wild goose because it jars us out of our complacency.
QUOTES
-Are we human beings having a spiritual experience or are we spiritual beings having a human experience. Tielliard du Chardin)
-We age physically; we grow spiritually Lindy
-Mankind are earthen jugs with spirits in them. (Nathaniel Hawthorne)
-John Macintyre, speaking at the Edinburgh Festival on art of religion, spoke of Pentecost as, “wholehearted expression of the almost unlimited imagination of God.”
-Just when we get all settled down, comfortable with present arrangements, our pews bolted securely to the floor, all fixed and immobile, there comes a rush of wind, or a still small voice, a breath of fresh air, tongues of fire and.....the Holy Spirit prevails! Willimon
ILLUSTRATIONS
- Using balloons and
mobiles remind us of God’s invisibility.
-
Orchestra playing Beethoven's Ninth Symphony everyone working towards same end. No in fighting, To glory of God. No discord, one purpose, following the leader. Inspired.- If you stand on six inches of rubber 5,000 volts will refuse to go through you. Spirit is like
that will not work unless it can move through you
-Holy Spirit Holes: Holes were punched in the ceiling /roofs of churches in the Middle Ages
symbolizing openness to God. On Pentecost doves were released through the holes and bundles
of rose petals were dropped from them onto the people gathered inside. Choirboys moved
through the congregation making whooshing sounds and playing drums to remind everyone of the
rush of the Spirit.
- Birth Date: Pentecost 27 AD
Size: 120 people (the membership of that congregation)
Older Sister: Nation Israel
Growth Potential: Millions
Ethnic: All races
Mid-Wife: Holy Spirit Bass Mitchel
-A
young man named Frank Mason North was led into the worst of the poverty, an area
of New York known as “Hell’s Kitchen.” There he worked among the poor, devising
new structures for the uplift of the poor, giving them hope. He wrote one of our
favorite hymns in this setting — “Where Cross the Crowded Ways of Life.” Again,
despite all, the Holy Spirit prevailed.
HUMOR
-Morgan's piping voice can be heard
through the church in that little preface to prayer we often use;
when the priest says, "The Lord be with you," and we all answer "And
also with you."A couple of years ago, Morgan and his family went to see the movie Star
Wars As with everything else Morgan does, he was caught up in the
story and hung upon every word. And at the point when the wise old man
Obi-wan Kenobi says to young Luke Skywalker, "May the Force be with
you," Morgan stood up and boomed out, "And also with you!"
Good News, Liturgical Publications,
CHILDREN
- Have birthday cake for birthday of the church. Church will not be extinguished. (Use candles that will not blow out
- Tell story of Eskimo who saw light built for the first time in a store. Bought the bulb, a lamp and some wire
and went back to his home town and screwed bulb into lamp but light wouldn't go on.
He had all the right equipment but was not hooked up to the source of power. You might say
the Holy Spirit was the source of power that "turned on" those first apostles, on the day of
Pentecost and ever since.
PRAYER PHRASES
-Come, Holy Spirit.
Come as mighty wind or gentle breath. Blow on the embers of our faith. Empower
us to speak and to act so that there might come a day when there is not a needy
person among us. Amen. Rev. Dr. Barbara K. Lundblad