Some denominations, such as the Assemblies of God and Pentecostals key into this moment of the Spirit moving through the disciples as central to our being and calling as the Church. Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox traditions celebrate it with solemn liturgy. But until the 80s mainline Protestants were pretty blah about it, even though it is right on the hinge of history, the pivot point of God’s interaction with the world transitioning from Jesus to the Church, the corner of the Gospels and the Acts of the Apostles written by Luke. It is theologically and historically important.
The Greek word “Pneuma” is used almost 400 times in the New Testament. It is a kind of cosmic pun: pneuma means wind, breath, spirit. It comes from the simple human observation that breath is the indicator of life, and when you die you stop breathing. The non-visible force of you exhaling moves a leaf like the wind does, so that all seemed to prehistorical people to be the animating principle of life. You can’t see wind, breath, or life-force, but you can tell they are there.
On the desk in my office there is a trio of Lego figures from The Brick Testament lined up as The Trinity, the first of a white-robed Ancient of Days, the second a bearded young man, and the third a little Casper-like Holy Ghost. English (long ago) used “ghost” as the thing that makes us alive, and “he gave up the ghost and died” is an old phrase. So when identifying the swirling animating force inhabiting Jesus’s body and then the newborn Church, the phrase was “The Holy Ghost,” as we sing in the traditional doxology. So the ancients used one word for the interrelated concepts. Unless we are being technical, we still do, although sometimes preachers and theologians have tried to reimagine God’s Spirit as life force, life energy, the energy of being, or other more non-religiousy analogs for generations unaccustomed to the Biblical language. The animating force of human life is the “spirit;” likewise the animating force of the Church is the Holy Spirit.
The Gospel of John goes deepest on the Holy Spirit, keying in on how what made Jesus the Word of God, his animating holy principle, was given to the church. John is very clear: for the church to receive that holy life-giving principle, Jesus had to leave, and then send the Holy Spirit down to them for them to breath in and give them life and wisdom and power and Christ’s spirit living within them (us). A modern metaphor would be giving someone artificial respiration, the helper breathing life-giving oxygen into the recipient. Just like the delivery room cliché of doctor spanking a newborn who suddenly cries and starts breathing and “comes alive,” Jesus breathes the Spirit of Truth down from heaven in a spectacular jump-start for the newborn church. This is why we often say that Pentecost is the birthday of the Christian Church. (And despite the recent Pew religion research, we are still kicking!)
So I invite one and all (and hope you invite one and all of your family and friends and neighbors and coworkers and….) to put on your brightest red clothes (the traditional church color of the holy holiday), gather in the big room, and breathe deeply of the Holy Spirit, Pentecost 2015, and get a big lungful of oxygen and a big soulfull of Holy Spirit!
In Christ,
David
Texts For Sunday Worship:
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