Acts 2:1-21
We call Pentecost the “birthday of the church” and in fact, some churches go all out and have cake to celebrate the day. It is indeed the church’s birthday today. Because Pentecost is when the disciples got their act together and took the show on the road, as it were, infused with the Holy Spirit.
That account we all just read together is an important narrative, so important that, as you saw, artists throughout the ages have been attempting to recreate this event on canvasses, in sculpture and even in quilts. It’s filled with movement and excitement, isn’t it? It’s a story that grabs you and even that long list of where everyone was from builds in anticipation.
That list, by the way, serves a function: It lets the original readers and hearers of this book know that everyone was there. It covered the known world and even a few countries that no longer existed. The list runs the gamut and Luke, the author of Acts, was letting us know.
Luke fills this account with fulfillment: “they were all together;” “it filled the entire house;” “a tongue [of fire] rested on each of them;” “all of them were filled with the Holy Sprit.” And that’s just the first paragraph.
Luke, who wrote his gospel account of Jesus’ life as well as this book of Acts of the Apostles, uses an interesting word choice too in this account. Remember his narrative of Jesus’ baptism, when God’s voice tells him “you are my beloved son.” Well Luke chooses the same Greek word for voice when he talks about the sound like the rush of a violent wind. That’s God’s voice we’re hearing as the Spirit rushes in.
If you’ve ever been in a major wind storm, you understand how the sound of the rushing wind could be mistaken for God’s voice. There amongst the flailing tree branches and objects blowing about, if you listen closely you can hear God’s voice.
But I’m getting distracted. We’re talking about the birthday of the church which may not actually be the best metaphor. I was reading online about this particular holiday and one preacher said that she thought that graduation was a better way to describe it.
And if you think about it, it’s true. Since Easter, it’s been six weeks of sightings of Jesus and the Disciples fumbling about trying to make sense of what’s happened. Now they’re equipped to go forth into their world and proclaim that good news that needed to be heard then and still needs to be heard now.
And it’s true: if one thinks of graduation as we call it as a commencement rather than a conclusion, it is the start of a new period of time. And Peter knew exactly what he was talking about in his commencement address. No one is drunk--it’s too early for that. But watch out because things are going to get worse before they get better.
Before the Lord’s great and glorious day arrives the sun will turn to darkness and the moon will become like blood. And that’s exactly what the folks gathered in the year 33 or so needed to hear. And it’s exactly what the folks gathered in 2010 need to hear. Things are going to get worse before they get better and we’d better just prepare for that and hold onto our faith through the roller-coaster ride that’s coming.
We have car bombs in Times Square and an ecological disaster of huge proportions in the Gulf of Mexico. Terrorists remain tenacious in their attacks and an unending war grinds on. Immigrants live in fear and good people lose their homes and their savings daily. The sun will turn to darkness and the moon to blood before it’s all over, we’re told.
But Peter, in his sudden burst of wisdom and clarity, doesn’t leave us bereft. Peter quotes Joel, a prophet who spoke to another age of dis-ease and turmoil. And both Peter and Joel remind us that all sorts of people are going to have dreams and visions that will guide us out of this mess. We just have to listen and hang on as the roller-coaster speeds along the tracks and we’re tossed about.
There in the midst of the wind storm, as we wake up daily to fresh distress, we are called to be the people God would have us be and do whatever it is we can. We can listen to the visions of today’s dreamers and we can act to change our own lives. We can seek out the modern day prophets while keeping a close eye on the sun and the moon.
Pentecost is a time of beginnings, indeed. Our church is begun over and over, for two thousand years; amidst the wind and the seemingly drunken ones speaking in languages for everyone on earth. According to Walter Brueggemann, a Biblical scholar, our call is “to stand free and hope-filled in a world gone fearful…and to think, imagine, dream, vision a future that God will yet enact.” As we grasp our faith, all the while imagining, dreaming, visioning, we know we aren’t in charge; God is. And with that thought on this Pentecost Sunday, we can face the future free and hope-filled.
Broken Chains
Acts 16:16-34
Last week, I made the comment after reading the passage from Acts, that perhaps this book should be known as “The Adventures of the Apostles” rather than “Acts of the Apostles.” Today’s reading bears that out once again. Maybe even moreso. Where else are you going to get an exorcism, crime and punishment, hard time in the stir, a natural disaster in the nick of time, and a conversion all wrapped up in one beautiful narrative?
We begin this week’s passage though a bit differently from last week’s. Last week, some of you will remember, we were introduced to Lydia, a woman whose name was actually put into the account, something that doesn’t always happen in scripture. Well, this week we go back to the usual manner of reporting by meeting a slave girl whose name is not given. In fact, we aren’t given any names of the actors in this account: the slave girl, her owners, the magistrates, the jailer. We only know about Paul and Silas in this story.
So, to recap, Paul and his companions are in Philippi, planting the seeds that will become the first church in Europe. He’s already converted and baptized Lydia and her household and is no doubt still enjoying the fruits of that positive event. But there’s one problem: a slave girl and her constant haranguing of Paul and the others with her yelling.
No, she wasn’t just any slave girl. She was what was called a mantic, which meant that she had special powers of divination. People would come to mantics for advice from their trance-like state...and, in her case, would pay her owners for the privilege, of course. It sounds quite exotic to us, but according to scholars she would not really have been that unusual in that time and place.
So we have this mantic, following Paul and the others around town and proclaiming that they are “Slaves of the Most High God who proclaim … a way of salvation.” It sounds odd to us, doesn’t it? First off, she uses the word “slave” to describe Paul and the others, which, considering she herself is a slave, seems jangling. (Is it a case of “it takes one to know one?”) Then she says that they serve “the Most High God,” which seems unusual again since that God wouldn’t have been her God. There is some evidence though that that term, “Most High God” was used by Gentiles when referring to the Jewish God.
Then what happens gives us some insight into Paul’s personality, I think. Paul has had it with this slave girl’s heckling. He reacts and does so peevishly, in fact. We can see him turning and, flying off the handle, casting the demon out of the slave girl which has given her those powers of divination.
Now we don’t really need it spelled out what happens next. Talk about peeved… I doubt that begins to describe how the slave girl’s owners felt when they found out that their source of income had been forcibly dried up. Who are these Jewish strangers who drive out the cash cow that has kept them comfortable for who knows how long? How dare they interfere?
So they do what can only be expected: they complain to the authorities, having them arrested, publicly beaten, and thrown in jail. Everyone thinks that the end of the story. Everyone except God that is; well, and probably Paul and Silas who always knew they’d be going at it again soon enough.
One does have to wonder why at midnight Paul and Silas were singing and praying so loudly while in prison. But that’s exactly what they were doing when of course an earthquake struck; an earthquake which opened all the doors of the jail and broke the chains shackled on their legs. It sounds a little too miraculous, doesn’t it? I mean, if this was a movie, wouldn’t you think that Hollywood got it a little too convenient? But that’s exactly what happened, according to the narrator who wrote all this down.
The jailer, thinking his career is over because all the prisoners have escaped, is ready to do himself in when Paul calls out that if he’d just check, he’d find that they’re all there. This throws the jailer, so much so, that he starts to talk with his charges about salvation and the next thing you know he and his household are baptized on the spot, becoming converts to this new way of being in the world.
As I said before, it’s a story with everything you could ask for, including a happy ending… well, except for the owners of the slave girl and perhaps for her as well. We’ll never know what happened to her.
Well, where does it leave us though? Sure, it’s a good story, but what does it mean to us almost 2,000 years later? This tale, along with the passage that immediately precedes about the purple cloth dealer Lydia, reminds us of the wide scope that God’s grace covers. It’s an inclusive gospel that Paul preaches, which he’ll write about in the third chapter of Galatians. As the commentator Paul Walaskay writes in Feasting on the Word, “Our narrator has skillfully expanded Paul's groundbreaking statement in Galatians 3:28 into an elegant story. ‘There is no longer Jew [Paul and Silas] or Greek [Lydia, the mantic, the jailer], there is no longer slave [the mantic] or free [Lydia, Paul], there is no longer male [Paul, Silas, the jailer], or female [Lydia, the mantic]; for all of you are one in Christ Jesus.’”
Paul and Silas weren’t the only ones who were liberated in these stories. There is freedom enough for all and the good news is that we are all found in them as we seek to break free from those things which hold us chained and imprisoned. We may not realize that we are chained down at times by the evils of our age: classism, and racism, and greed, and egotism, and heterosexism, and idolatry of money, and, xenophobia, and, and…and the list goes on…you can fill in the remainder of the list yourselves with your own particular chains that keep you from living fully and freely.
This story reminds us that we need not be imprisoned. We can be like Lydia and the jailer and their households and fully accept the gospel we hear and fully give of ourselves. If we don’t break the chains that hold us down though, we certainly cannot respond fully to the call to ministry that is certainly given to each of us. Our calls to healing, to caring, to responding to sorrow and sadness, our calls to gospel ministry cannot be carried out completely, no matter how hard we try, if we remain enchained and imprisoned.
Don’t wait for an earthquake, a metaphor all too real in our part of the world, to free you. You have the power to break the chains which bind you.
Last week, I made the comment after reading the passage from Acts, that perhaps this book should be known as “The Adventures of the Apostles” rather than “Acts of the Apostles.” Today’s reading bears that out once again. Maybe even moreso. Where else are you going to get an exorcism, crime and punishment, hard time in the stir, a natural disaster in the nick of time, and a conversion all wrapped up in one beautiful narrative?
We begin this week’s passage though a bit differently from last week’s. Last week, some of you will remember, we were introduced to Lydia, a woman whose name was actually put into the account, something that doesn’t always happen in scripture. Well, this week we go back to the usual manner of reporting by meeting a slave girl whose name is not given. In fact, we aren’t given any names of the actors in this account: the slave girl, her owners, the magistrates, the jailer. We only know about Paul and Silas in this story.
So, to recap, Paul and his companions are in Philippi, planting the seeds that will become the first church in Europe. He’s already converted and baptized Lydia and her household and is no doubt still enjoying the fruits of that positive event. But there’s one problem: a slave girl and her constant haranguing of Paul and the others with her yelling.
No, she wasn’t just any slave girl. She was what was called a mantic, which meant that she had special powers of divination. People would come to mantics for advice from their trance-like state...and, in her case, would pay her owners for the privilege, of course. It sounds quite exotic to us, but according to scholars she would not really have been that unusual in that time and place.
So we have this mantic, following Paul and the others around town and proclaiming that they are “Slaves of the Most High God who proclaim … a way of salvation.” It sounds odd to us, doesn’t it? First off, she uses the word “slave” to describe Paul and the others, which, considering she herself is a slave, seems jangling. (Is it a case of “it takes one to know one?”) Then she says that they serve “the Most High God,” which seems unusual again since that God wouldn’t have been her God. There is some evidence though that that term, “Most High God” was used by Gentiles when referring to the Jewish God.
Then what happens gives us some insight into Paul’s personality, I think. Paul has had it with this slave girl’s heckling. He reacts and does so peevishly, in fact. We can see him turning and, flying off the handle, casting the demon out of the slave girl which has given her those powers of divination.
Now we don’t really need it spelled out what happens next. Talk about peeved… I doubt that begins to describe how the slave girl’s owners felt when they found out that their source of income had been forcibly dried up. Who are these Jewish strangers who drive out the cash cow that has kept them comfortable for who knows how long? How dare they interfere?
So they do what can only be expected: they complain to the authorities, having them arrested, publicly beaten, and thrown in jail. Everyone thinks that the end of the story. Everyone except God that is; well, and probably Paul and Silas who always knew they’d be going at it again soon enough.
One does have to wonder why at midnight Paul and Silas were singing and praying so loudly while in prison. But that’s exactly what they were doing when of course an earthquake struck; an earthquake which opened all the doors of the jail and broke the chains shackled on their legs. It sounds a little too miraculous, doesn’t it? I mean, if this was a movie, wouldn’t you think that Hollywood got it a little too convenient? But that’s exactly what happened, according to the narrator who wrote all this down.
The jailer, thinking his career is over because all the prisoners have escaped, is ready to do himself in when Paul calls out that if he’d just check, he’d find that they’re all there. This throws the jailer, so much so, that he starts to talk with his charges about salvation and the next thing you know he and his household are baptized on the spot, becoming converts to this new way of being in the world.
As I said before, it’s a story with everything you could ask for, including a happy ending… well, except for the owners of the slave girl and perhaps for her as well. We’ll never know what happened to her.
Well, where does it leave us though? Sure, it’s a good story, but what does it mean to us almost 2,000 years later? This tale, along with the passage that immediately precedes about the purple cloth dealer Lydia, reminds us of the wide scope that God’s grace covers. It’s an inclusive gospel that Paul preaches, which he’ll write about in the third chapter of Galatians. As the commentator Paul Walaskay writes in Feasting on the Word, “Our narrator has skillfully expanded Paul's groundbreaking statement in Galatians 3:28 into an elegant story. ‘There is no longer Jew [Paul and Silas] or Greek [Lydia, the mantic, the jailer], there is no longer slave [the mantic] or free [Lydia, Paul], there is no longer male [Paul, Silas, the jailer], or female [Lydia, the mantic]; for all of you are one in Christ Jesus.’”
Paul and Silas weren’t the only ones who were liberated in these stories. There is freedom enough for all and the good news is that we are all found in them as we seek to break free from those things which hold us chained and imprisoned. We may not realize that we are chained down at times by the evils of our age: classism, and racism, and greed, and egotism, and heterosexism, and idolatry of money, and, xenophobia, and, and…and the list goes on…you can fill in the remainder of the list yourselves with your own particular chains that keep you from living fully and freely.
This story reminds us that we need not be imprisoned. We can be like Lydia and the jailer and their households and fully accept the gospel we hear and fully give of ourselves. If we don’t break the chains that hold us down though, we certainly cannot respond fully to the call to ministry that is certainly given to each of us. Our calls to healing, to caring, to responding to sorrow and sadness, our calls to gospel ministry cannot be carried out completely, no matter how hard we try, if we remain enchained and imprisoned.
Don’t wait for an earthquake, a metaphor all too real in our part of the world, to free you. You have the power to break the chains which bind you.
Purple Fabric
Acts 16:9-15
Poor Paul. He has his plans and they get all mucked up. You might know what it’s like: your itinerary is set, your bags packed for the climate to which you’re heading and then something happens to call off the trip. Or to send you in a completely different direction.
Paul and his companions had no plans to go to Macedonia. In fact, in the verses just prior to what we heard this morning from the 16th chapter of Acts, Paul had been trying to go towards Asia but “the Spirit of Jesus did not allow it”, (v. 7).
We need a little understanding of the geography of that place and time to really get an idea of what’s going on here. We have to remember that Judea sat at the edge of Asia, near to Europe, but not quite in it. So when Paul had wanted to take the gospel into Asia, he was referring to Asia Minor, where we now find Turkey.
Macedonia, on the other hand, is Europe. Macedonia, in present-day Greek, was the home to Alexander the Great, who conquered much of the known western world at the time, spreading the Greek language and culture throughout Europe, Asia, and Africa. Alexander went east with his armies and might. Paul, on the other hand, traveled west without armies, without military might; just the word of God.
Heading to Europe meant going to the Gentiles. Christianity was primarily a Jewish sect, don’t forget. Paul did his best conversion work in synagogues. Who knew what he’d find in a place as unusual as Europe?
But there he was--a man of Macedonia appearing to Paul in a vision. “Come to Macedonia” this vision said, “we need you.” So Paul, being the obedient one, set out for Macedonia, arriving, as we heard in Philippi.
Macedonia had once been big and significant and Philippi had been one of the important cities there. So Paul and companions weren’t necessarily downgrading by going to Philippi. This was still a big deal, even if it wasn’t what Paul wanted. (Just goes to show--if the Spirit of Jesus wants you to do something, you may as well do it!)
Once there, Paul seeks to find the God-believers in the city. There evidently isn’t a large enough gathering of Jews to form any sort of synagogue because he just meets with a group that gathers at the river outside the city gate. And the surprising thing about this group is that they’re all women. We may not have even noticed that particular detail when the scripture was read this morning, but assuredly Paul and his companions noticed. They weren’t used to dealing with women so directly, but with the Spirit of Jesus prodding him on, he met with them and proclaimed the good news of the Christian Gospel.
Among them was Lydia, one of the women who is actually named in the Bible, so many of them going nameless through the ages. Lydia must have been important. Because she was a business woman; she sold cloth. Not just any cloth though; Lydia was a dealer in purple cloth. Purple was the most expensive and rarest of all cloth colors. So Lydia dealt with the richest and loftiest folks of the time. Though it’s not specified exactly what was meant, her household was baptized with her. Clearly there were other members of her household and Lydia had the power to make decisions for them. Lydia was a big deal.
And think about it: Lydia’s conversion, in fact, is the first conversion of a European. Even though it was a man of Macedonia who appeared to Paul in his dream, the first European to embrace Paul’s preaching and be converted to Christianity was a woman, Lydia, the dealer in purple fabrics.
Lydia invites Paul and his company to stay with her, which they accept. And, several verses later, after they’ve been imprisoned, Paul returns to Lydia’s and finds a house church there. Lydia is truly one of the Mothers of the church, though we so infrequently hear about her.
It’s a great story, isn’t it? But if you think about it, you realize that Lydia didn’t need to do what she did. She was comfortable as a trader in purple cloth. She had her household, her business, and her standing in the community. She didn’t need to do what she did. But yet, she did it. And did it first out of everyone in Europe. And went on to do the first new church start in Europe.
This story is one about mission and perseverance and discernment and hospitality and about women’s experience in the early church. Thus it’s an important story; one which we should pay attention to.
Certainly, we’re not in the same position as Lydia. None of us is going to be the first anything probably, on the grand scale that Lydia was first. But yet (there’s always a ‘but yet’, isn’t there?) we have amazing and wonderful opportunities before us all the time.
Like Paul, we might have to change our well-held plans and head off in a completely new direction. Like Lydia, we may do so at some risk to our livelihood and standing in the community.
But if we are to be faithful to our calling, we need to think about the mission, perseverance, discernment, and hospitality that runs through this narrative and reflect on it as we examine our own stories and how they are progressing.
We may feel like that small gathering at the river that Paul and the others found there in Philippi thousands of years ago, surrounded by the great and mighty Roman empire. But from those seeds that were planted there that day, converting the first woman, the first person in Europe, a mighty church has sprung. I imagine that we, as our own small group of journeyers, have more in common with that riverside group that we can guess.
We have to remember that that small group, too small to be a synagogue even, was the start of Christianity in Europe, going on to meet in Lydia’s home, as she welcomed in her companions on the journey of faith and from there into the church that Paul wrote to in his letter to the Philippians. When you see purple fabric, I hope you’ll remember Lydia and give thanks for her courage and ministry as you continue your story in the faith.
Poor Paul. He has his plans and they get all mucked up. You might know what it’s like: your itinerary is set, your bags packed for the climate to which you’re heading and then something happens to call off the trip. Or to send you in a completely different direction.
Paul and his companions had no plans to go to Macedonia. In fact, in the verses just prior to what we heard this morning from the 16th chapter of Acts, Paul had been trying to go towards Asia but “the Spirit of Jesus did not allow it”, (v. 7).
We need a little understanding of the geography of that place and time to really get an idea of what’s going on here. We have to remember that Judea sat at the edge of Asia, near to Europe, but not quite in it. So when Paul had wanted to take the gospel into Asia, he was referring to Asia Minor, where we now find Turkey.
Macedonia, on the other hand, is Europe. Macedonia, in present-day Greek, was the home to Alexander the Great, who conquered much of the known western world at the time, spreading the Greek language and culture throughout Europe, Asia, and Africa. Alexander went east with his armies and might. Paul, on the other hand, traveled west without armies, without military might; just the word of God.
Heading to Europe meant going to the Gentiles. Christianity was primarily a Jewish sect, don’t forget. Paul did his best conversion work in synagogues. Who knew what he’d find in a place as unusual as Europe?
But there he was--a man of Macedonia appearing to Paul in a vision. “Come to Macedonia” this vision said, “we need you.” So Paul, being the obedient one, set out for Macedonia, arriving, as we heard in Philippi.
Macedonia had once been big and significant and Philippi had been one of the important cities there. So Paul and companions weren’t necessarily downgrading by going to Philippi. This was still a big deal, even if it wasn’t what Paul wanted. (Just goes to show--if the Spirit of Jesus wants you to do something, you may as well do it!)
Once there, Paul seeks to find the God-believers in the city. There evidently isn’t a large enough gathering of Jews to form any sort of synagogue because he just meets with a group that gathers at the river outside the city gate. And the surprising thing about this group is that they’re all women. We may not have even noticed that particular detail when the scripture was read this morning, but assuredly Paul and his companions noticed. They weren’t used to dealing with women so directly, but with the Spirit of Jesus prodding him on, he met with them and proclaimed the good news of the Christian Gospel.
Among them was Lydia, one of the women who is actually named in the Bible, so many of them going nameless through the ages. Lydia must have been important. Because she was a business woman; she sold cloth. Not just any cloth though; Lydia was a dealer in purple cloth. Purple was the most expensive and rarest of all cloth colors. So Lydia dealt with the richest and loftiest folks of the time. Though it’s not specified exactly what was meant, her household was baptized with her. Clearly there were other members of her household and Lydia had the power to make decisions for them. Lydia was a big deal.
And think about it: Lydia’s conversion, in fact, is the first conversion of a European. Even though it was a man of Macedonia who appeared to Paul in his dream, the first European to embrace Paul’s preaching and be converted to Christianity was a woman, Lydia, the dealer in purple fabrics.
Lydia invites Paul and his company to stay with her, which they accept. And, several verses later, after they’ve been imprisoned, Paul returns to Lydia’s and finds a house church there. Lydia is truly one of the Mothers of the church, though we so infrequently hear about her.
It’s a great story, isn’t it? But if you think about it, you realize that Lydia didn’t need to do what she did. She was comfortable as a trader in purple cloth. She had her household, her business, and her standing in the community. She didn’t need to do what she did. But yet, she did it. And did it first out of everyone in Europe. And went on to do the first new church start in Europe.
This story is one about mission and perseverance and discernment and hospitality and about women’s experience in the early church. Thus it’s an important story; one which we should pay attention to.
Certainly, we’re not in the same position as Lydia. None of us is going to be the first anything probably, on the grand scale that Lydia was first. But yet (there’s always a ‘but yet’, isn’t there?) we have amazing and wonderful opportunities before us all the time.
Like Paul, we might have to change our well-held plans and head off in a completely new direction. Like Lydia, we may do so at some risk to our livelihood and standing in the community.
But if we are to be faithful to our calling, we need to think about the mission, perseverance, discernment, and hospitality that runs through this narrative and reflect on it as we examine our own stories and how they are progressing.
We may feel like that small gathering at the river that Paul and the others found there in Philippi thousands of years ago, surrounded by the great and mighty Roman empire. But from those seeds that were planted there that day, converting the first woman, the first person in Europe, a mighty church has sprung. I imagine that we, as our own small group of journeyers, have more in common with that riverside group that we can guess.
We have to remember that that small group, too small to be a synagogue even, was the start of Christianity in Europe, going on to meet in Lydia’s home, as she welcomed in her companions on the journey of faith and from there into the church that Paul wrote to in his letter to the Philippians. When you see purple fabric, I hope you’ll remember Lydia and give thanks for her courage and ministry as you continue your story in the faith.
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