Any frustration from the redundancy of John’s lectionary over the past month is now easily forgiven with the reception of an introvert’s Pentecost party this week. While the book of Acts announces Pentecost in a similar fashion of a child’s Chuck-E-Cheese birthday party or a college student’s all-night rave, John’s Pentecost is likely a librarian’s dream. Abiding to the strictest of noise regulations and earliest of curfews, John welcomes the coming of the Holy Spirit with the slightest of whispers. A faint naming, parakletos,resembles less of a launch party and more of a rest stop preparing us for a deeper journey. Though each scriptural variation of the Spirit’s arrival features a message freshly translated, John’s Pentecost, we find, is crafted in a reverent room of reflection replacing the miraculous moment of hearing familiar words with a lifelong process of comprehending and responding to the call of Christ.
The repackaging of the same message from week to week has obviously been an indicator of its importance. More than hear his words, Jesus’ audience must comprehend his message so they can respond in action. Though reading the same words in different orders week after week has at times felt condescending, it turns out there is a purpose in the pattern of saying the same thing in a new way over and over again. For example, marketing research shows that when attempting to move a message from the margins to the mainstream, the general theory is that it takes 151 times for a message to be heard through conversation. The first 50 times people won’t hear you. The second 50 times they won’t understand you. The third 50 times they won’t believe you. And, the 151st time they will hear, understand, think it was their own idea and start to share the message as their own.
That moment of connection, as infuriating and rare as it may be, is actually what discipleship depends on. A community of “believers” requires that this message of Pentecost be played on repeat, reminding us of what we are to believe and who we were created to become. This message, given to us over and over again in the book of John, is the key to understanding our identity and our call in the world. Jesus speaks to God as Father, modeling an intimate relationship with God that reflects both the trust and faithfulness necessary for fruitfulness.
Explaining his relationship to his “Father” functions as an instructional video for our own relationship to the Divine. We too are to be dependent not only on our own intellect or cleverness but ultimately on this spiritual authority guiding us ever closer toward mutuality and love in community. Supporting us in this continual work of discerning divine direction, the arrival of the Spirit in the fresh absence of Jesus establishes John’s Pentecost as a transitional event through which the community inherits the responsibility and resources to continue the work of Christ.
In her commentary on this week’s scripture, Osvaldo Vena writes, “God will be incarnated again, this time not in a person, Jesus (John 1:14), but in a group of people who will continue Jesus’ work to an even greater degree (John 12). The same kind of symbiotic relationship that existed between Jesus and the Father will now exist between the community and the Holy Spirit.” Called and sent out to continue the healing and reconciling work of Christ, the comprehension and ownership of Jesus’ message remains critical to the cultivation of the kin-dom of God on earth.
While I appreciate that this week’s message provides us with a scapegoat for why we are being told the same thing one more time, Philip is far from alone in his hearing but not understanding. Written in a contemporary context, this scripture could easily read as; “Then Stephanie said to him, “Jesus, show us the Father, and we will be satisfied.” Jesus said to her, “Have I been with you all this time, Stephanie, and you still do not know me?” These words a reflection of my own refusal to recognize the Jesus that is still here in place of imagining myself bravely ‘going it alone,’ a pioneer on a self-discovered spiritual frontier.
This week a friend of The Land invited me over for a beautiful morning I will not soon forget. Perhaps the greatest gift of the morning took place during her blessing of the meal she had grown and then cooked for us. Bowing our heads and catching our breath, she prayed over me protection from the enemy of discouragement with a complimentary prayer to stay true to my call. The irony of this moment, of course, is that for all the time I spend trying to be in control, it is the moments when I am reminded that God is in control that I am able to step forward in faith. It is the necessary reminder that I am not called to believe in what I can do or even in what we can do together. I am called to believe in what God can do through us, if we live into our faith.
This responsibility remains fully dependent on comprehending a message still spoken. A message that dissolves fear and heightens our spiritual curiosity just enough to step out into courage. This week, as United Methodist clergy from all over the United States gather for Annual Conferences, a colleague posted this quote from his gathering with the Florida Conference. Spoken by the Reverend Cynthia Weems, the quote reads, “Churches that will be thriving 20 years from now are those willing to make terrifying decisions today.” Too often as congregations do we comprehend our responsibility and neglect to access our resource.
Still, Pentecost gathers us together and reminds us that we are not alone in the work that we do. Pentecost invites us to focus less on all the things that might go wrong so that we can make room for all the things that could actually go right. In truth, failure is the leastfrightening thing that could happen. Success is what jolts us into a new reality. Success is what changes drastically our rituals and routines. Failure, in this context, arrives as an expected relief to a responsibility we were never ready to take on.
Since guest speaking at The Land almost a month ago now, Rose Seeman has been working hard to organize the first ever Aurora Leaf Composting Project. Hopeful that The Land can be a supportive partner in this venture, I was surprised when she brought up a concern that our Board might not partner with the project due to liability issues or other complications. Well versed in the language of liability from years of working in the traditional church, I asked her what risks she saw that perhaps I was not thinking about. Concerns about hurt backs when unloading leaves, leaves unloaded after the collection dates, and a few other scenarios came across my computer screen. While none of the scenarios were impossible, the extent to which they had been thought through was discouraging.
A few minutes staring at my screen and this is the response I typed:
“I don’t want to not do a good thing because people might later do something bad. I can’t control what they do, but I can control what I do and I want to do the right thing which is helping make this project a success.”
Comprehension of Jesus’ message requires a recognition of who we are responsible to over and above any concern for the failure or success of a given responsibility. The question of Pentecost is are we doing the right thing, for the right reasons, remembering that we are conduits for a God of unlimited grace and boundless love that works for justice and surrounds all situations with mercy.
It dawned on me this week, in light of Pentecost, that at The Land we have barely begun our real work. Yes, we have spent five years trudging through mountains of bureaucracy while successfully creating mountains all our own. But our biggest task remains before us; to identify and articulate God’s presence and goodness to all the people we have yet to meet. To offer them the same prayer against discouragement that our friend offered me. To exemplify the fruits of faithfulness. We have held so tightly to what we think should happen that we risk missing out on what is already happening in our midst and there has been so much (albeit unplanned) happening in our midst!!
If each of us are giving as much as we can to this vision; if we are donating as much as our budgets permit, if we are prioritizing our presence here as much as possible, if we are trusting one another and all that remains unknown, then our work becomes to leave the rest to God and trust in a journey to an undisclosed location. We have to get to a place where we embrace our human limitation as that which defines our “best” so that we can wait for and witness the work of God in an experience we call grace. We can exhaust ourselves with trying to be better but in all this exhaustive effort we must stop and ask ourselves who is it that are so we worried about disappointing?
Pentecost reminds us, it isn’t about who is following us but who we are following. While Jesus never abandons those stuck in the seats of conference rooms, paralyzed by scenarios and strategies, it is the people who somehow ‘get’ that arriving anywhere requires faith enough to get lost that Jesus moves forward with. I can say with all honesty that if The Land were gone tomorrow, I would have no regrets. I have donated as much as our family budget permits. I have made this my church and this prairie my parish. I have said what I have wanted to say in the name of justice without reservation and I have held myself accountable to choosing what is right over what is easy. I believe many of you can say this too. And, perhaps, we have reached the limits of our “best” and we are being called to rest. To sit and to wait for God. Believing it will be God to come and fill the gap between where we rest and wherever it ends up being that God calls us to go.