Words of Welcome

Acts 2:14a, 36-47 Brett will often ask me “what’s going on in church-land today?” Even if his question is job-related, it is a good question. What is happening in church-land? What does it mean to be church? To use the words of a song by Bill Thomas, do you “see a church with a vision; ... a church with a mission?” [ Chalice Praise , 133.] Although we are still in the season of Easter, the reading from Acts 2 takes us to the Day of Pentecost and beyond. Easter is awe-inspiring, because it invites us to celebrate the resurrection of Jesus. It invites us to take hold of the promise that in Christ life conquers death. But the story of resurrection continues in the life of the new community which was commissioned to share the good news of Jesus Christ with the world, as Jesus directed on the day of his ascension(Acts 1:8), and then formed into a dynamic missional church by the Spirit on Pentecost. 

Acts 2:1-21 The reading from Acts 2 should be familiar, especially since it defines the meaning of Pentecost Sunday. Since it is so familiar, the worship committee decided to present it in a more dramatic fashion. In this reading we’ve heard about fire and wind and movement. We’ve also been invited to envision the work of God’s Spirit in the world. It is a work that involves God’s people.    The book of Acts focuses on the movement of the Holy Spirit. This movement begins with the commission Jesus gives the disciples in  Acts 1:8:   “But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.”   The rest of the Book of Acts flows out of this commissioning. That movement of the Spirit gets underway in Acts 2 and it continues to this day. That means we’re part of this movement of the Spirit.  Our story begins in an Upper Room, where the disci...

Acts 2:42-47 Back during my days teaching at Northwest Christian University, a couple of my students asked me what I thought about them living as a group of students in community. I remember acknowledging their interest in this arrangement, but since one of the students involved had just gotten married, I suggested that they might want to take it slowly and cautiously. While they decided not to pursue the venture, one of those students ended up forming just such a community. That community in Eugene is part of a movement that has come to be known as the New Monasticism. This movement builds off the teachings of Dietrich Bonhoeffer, who called on Christians to live together in community and pursue life lived under the guidance of the Sermon on the Mount.   Down through the years many Christians have experimented with living in community as described in Acts 2 and  Acts 4 . This community, according to Luke, gathered for the Apostles Teaching, for fellowship, for pra...

John 15:26-27; 16:4b-15 Pentecost Sunday has finally arrived and some of us are wearing red or something that suggests the color of fire.  We’ve come to celebrate the arrival of the Spirit of God, whom Jesus promised would come and empower the people of God.  It’s also Memorial Day, so we stop to remember those who have died, whether they are family, friends, or those who have died in service to country.  Perhaps the text for today offers us a sense of connection between the two.  Jesus is about to leave his disciples behind, but he doesn’t leave them alone.  If he goes away, the Spirit will come and be present with them, wherever they go in the world.   The ways in which we celebrate Pentecost varies from tradition to tradition and from region to region.  I recently learned that in Germany, for instance, Pentecost is a two-day holiday.  It begins with worship on Sunday, but continues on into Monday, when Germans, and many other Euro...

Acts 2:1-21 and  Genesis 11:1-9 The story of the Tower of Babel is a rather odd one, and yet it sets the stage for the Pentecost story. In the Genesis story a group of people discovers how to make bricks, and they use them to build a city with a tower that reaches to the clouds. This discovery offers them the means to control their own destiny. Now, they can build walls to protect themselves from outsiders and ramparts that allow them to climb into the heavens and touch God. We understand the need to protect ourselves from outsiders and the need to reach for the stars; both are part of human nature. What may seem odd to us is God viewing all of this as a threat. Apparently, as the story gets told, the Creator of the Universe is worried that if humanity gets the right tools and abilities, they might storm the very gates of heaven and take over. To keep them at bay, God decides to confuse their languages and scatter them across the land. This may all seem rather petty, but there...

Acts 2:14, 32-39 We’ve reached the half way point in our Lenten journey, and I believe that God is doing something important in our midst. With Gay Reese as our guide, we have opened ourselves up to being transformed as individuals and as a congregation. I do think it is appropriate to say that we’re becoming a converted community. That is, God is unbinding our hearts and minds so that we might be open both to the future and to the community that lies just beyond our doors.1 There’s a new spirit and purpose in this congregation. Not so long ago our congregation was wracked by conflict and division. We were broken and many were angry. Over the past few years God has been healing those wounds and preparing the congregation for something new. That new thing is beginning to happen. Oh, you may only see the first shoots sticking out of the ground, but it’s happening right before our eyes. As this new thing grows and develops, it will move us beyond these walls and out into ...