Pentecost

Today is the birthday of the Church. One would think that an observance of this magnitude would be noticed around town, just like Christmas or Easter. But if you went in to any stores this past week, not one of them indicated that there were just a few shopping days left till Pentecost!

The closest thing I have ever seen approaching even a hint that this special day was soon to arrive was one spring in the garden section at Home Depot. I noticed there were pentas on sale (and for those of you who might not know, pentas are bushy, rounded plants with hairy, bright green leaves and dense clusters of many small, star-shaped, tubular flowers in shades of red, pink, or white that do well in the hot Florida summers.) So then, the question must be asked, “How much does a penta cost?”

Pentecost was a high-energy event. You’ve got your flames of fire, and some fierce winds ripping through the area. And whenever you have unexplained sources of energy, you’re going to attract a lot of attention.

The search for energy is a history of humankind. So important is energy to human survival that myths were written to explain how we came to have it (Prometheus and fire, for example). To have energy is to have power and control – a truth that seems self-evident in the geopolitical climate of Middle Eastern diplomacy.

That’s why we’re always interested in alternative sources of energy – whether biomass, geothermal, nuclear, hydroelectric, solar, or even the methane gas produced by cow manure. The cow pies dropped globally in the pastures of the world produce millions of metric tons of methane gas, but research appears to be a moooot point; to date, no efficient method of passing gas from cows to our homes and automobiles appears to be in the offing.

Speaking of wind, however, reminds us that many communities, especially in the western United States, are farming wind to harvest an unexpected source of energy. These wind farms appear as miles upon miles of large wind turbines, not unlike windmills, installed on farmland where there is a strong and steady breeze. The rotor blades of these turbines spin in the wind and generate electricity for homes, businesses and utilities, and they do so in an incredibly clean and efficient manner without disturbing the agricultural use of the land around them.

The potential of these turbines is staggering. Wind energy may be able to supply about 20 percent of the nation’s electricity, and this energy is everywhere – wind resources useful for generating electricity can be found in nearly every state. North Dakota alone is theoretically capable of producing enough wind-generated power to meet more than one-third of U.S. electricity demand.

That’s a lot of cold air.

Of course, there are still a few bugs to work out. Quite literally. Workers at wind farms have long noticed that electricity-generating wind turbines are plagued by strange and unexpected fluctuations in their power output. The reason was unknown, until scientists at last identified the mystery substance: smooshed bugs. Insects accumulate on the turbines’ propellers, adding aerodynamic drag and siphoning off up to a quarter of the windmills’ energy production each year.

Go back now to the upper room at Pentecost and the special effects that went with it. The church is also a wind farm, powered by the Spirit which blew in on that first Pentecost “like the rush of a violent wind” (Acts 2:2). The Holy Spirit filled the gathered apostles and gave them the ability to speak in other languages, which they used to preach the Gospel to all the peoples of the world.

What’s more, the Spirit inspired Peter to stand before a hostile crowd and preach with newfound courage and conviction. He promised that “everyone who calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved” (v. 21), and within minutes this news spread like electricity through the mob. Jolted by this offer, 3,000 people quickly repented and were baptized in the name of Jesus Christ. Wind-generated church growth.

The wind of God is a powerful thing – it’s a Spirit that can fill and teach and inspire and convert people in any age and in any nation. But like the large turbines on wind farms today, we American Christians of the 21^st century don’t always make good and efficient use of this holy power. We don’t move smoothly and swiftly when we feel the breath of God. We don’t allow the Holy Spirit to flow at full power into our community of faith.

Bottom line: We’re suffering from bug buildup.

So, what are these infernal insects? Just what are the nasty little swarmers that are clogging up our turbines and preventing us from making full use of the wind power of the Holy Spirit? Let’s spot ’em and swat ’em before they get us too gummed up.

First, there’s Christianus comfortablus – the bug of comfortable Christianity. These insects don’t want to venture outside their narrow comfort zones and speak to others about the Good News of Jesus – they’re perfectly comfortable keeping their church friends separated from their non-church friends.

As a result, the gospel goes nowhere, fast.

Then there’s stupor intellectualis – the bug of intellectual laziness. Bug buildup with this pest creates a situation in which the Christian, while interested in studying the Word of God, never seems to get around to it. When the church is populated with people whose intentions are only pretensions, the windmills of the faith are going to come to a slow, grinding halt along with its power.

Bugged by this bug, we don’t know Abraham from Andrew, Daniel from Dorcus, Matthew from Mark. And because of this we would never realize – as Peter did – that the coming of the Holy Spirit on Pentecost was nothing less than a fulfillment of the prediction of the Old Testament prophet Joel: “In the last days it will be, God declares, that I will pour out my Spirit upon all flesh” (v. 17).

There’s also solo individualus – the bug of the individual only. Here, a person’s personal faith is a strictly private affair not to be complicated by faithful connections to a community of any kind. This is a subtext of the “I believe in God but have no time for the church” syndrome. Jesus and the apostles do not make community an option. It is very difficult for a Christian to grow in isolation. The practice of the early church is clear: The early Christians “devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers …. Day by day, as they spent much time together in the temple” (vv. 42, 46). Fellowship, the breaking of bread, much time together in worship – without these aspects of community life, the Christian faith just isn’t complete.

You also run into neglectum supplicationis – the bug that neglects to pray, to lift up our joys and concerns and requests to God in prayer. The early church was a praying church (v. 42), lifting up pleas for healing, as well as prayers for boldness. Just imagine praying today as the first apostles did, saying to God, “grant to your servants to speak your word with all boldness, while you stretch out your hand to heal, and signs and wonders are performed through the name of your holy servant Jesus” (4:29-30). We just might find the walls of this place beginning to shake, as they did around the first believers (4:31).

With bug buildup removed, we can then move like the wind.

A businessman in South Africa once ordered a Rolls Royce, with which he was immensely impressed. One day he went to the car dealer and asked him what its horsepower was. The dealer said that the Rolls Royce company never stated the horsepower of their engines. The businessman specifically asked the dealer to find out. Because the man was an important customer, the dealer sent a long cable to the Rolls Royce works in Derby, England, setting out the exact specifications of the engine, asking them to cable immediately the exact horsepower. Shortly the reply arrived, bearing one word: Adequate.

When we’re bug-free and spinning with the Spirit, we are an electrifying church, a powerful church that can adequately spread the good news wherever we go.