Happy Birthday, Church!

Happy Birthday! Well I must admit that you look pretty good for being almost two thousand years old. This is what we are celebrating though, the birthday of the church. Happy Pentecost! Are you very familiar with Pentecost? Can you tell me what you know about it? Can you tell me what you don’t know about it? Pentecost is really a very cool, and a very, very, very important day.

Pentecost is not simply the birth or beginning of an organization. It is a time where we celebrate God pouring out his Spirit upon his people in a way that was not possible before the death, resurrection and ascension of Jesus. In the Old Testament, God’s Spirit comes to some. However, this is somewhat limited. But now, with Pentecost, the Holy Spirit comes to all of God’s people. This is a common thread throughout the lessons for today. God’s Spirit comes to God’s people. Not just to some of them. Not just to the gifted ones, or the talented ones, or the educated ones, but to all of his dearly loved sons and daughters. He comes to you. He comes to me. He comes to us. There are some great things here, so allow me to touch on them a bit.

Our Old Testament lesson is from the book of Numbers. The people are wondering in the wilderness and guess what they are doing? They are complaining. Is that a surprise? No, not really, no. They are grumbling, whining and complaining, and Moses is ready to throw in the staff. “If you are going to treat me like this,” he says to God. “Then just kill me now.” God talks with Moses and Moses goes out and gathers seventy elders of the people to go with him to the tent of meeting. Now out of the seventy about sixty-eight showed up. That’s not a bad attendance record for an elder’s meeting. And God placed his Spirit on the elders that were chosen. But here is the thing. The two that stayed in the camp, God’s Spirit rested upon them as well, even though they didn’t show up.

Now the message here is not that you can skip out on your elder’s meetings. That is not what this text is saying. Instead what it gets at is that God is generous with his Spirit. The two men in the camp, Eldad and Medad, did not deserve to receive the Spirit. They were disobedient. But you know what? The other sixty-eight didn’t deserve to receive the Spirit either. In fact, not even Moses was worthy. But God, because he is gracious, loving and generous pours out his Spirit. God allows us to join him in his work. It is pretty cool.

Now fast-forward several hundred years. Jesus is born and comes onto the scene. And you know this story right? What happened? He was conceived by the Holy Spirit. Born of the virgin Mary. Suffered under Pontius Pilot. Was crucified died and was buried. He descended into Hell and on the third day he rose from the dead. He ascended into heaven, and is seated at the right hand of God the Father almighty.

So some days after Jesus ascends into heaven, ten to be exact, his followers are gathered together in one place. And on that day God shows up. There is no thunder and lightning, but there is the sound of a rushing wind. And there are tongues of fire that rest on the heads of the disciples and they begin to speak and no matter what language they spoke in, everyone heard it in their own native languages. Now this speaking is very important because note what they say. The speak of the wonderful things that God has done.

The God who is at work at Pentecost. Is the same God who was at work in the creation of the world. He is the one who rescued his people from slavery to the Egyptians. He is the one who became a human being. He lived the perfect life. Died on the cross in our place. Rose victoriously from the dead, and ascended into heaven.

This God, on Christmas, in the incarnation came to us in our fallen state. In the same way he comes to us now, and chooses to work in and through us. He has set aside a people for himself to be about the work of making him and his love known throughout the world. But their job is not to just talk the talk, but to walk the walk as well. To show God’s love instead of just speaking about it. To be about the business of being God’s agents of reconciliation in this world. This is the church.

Now if I asked you what comes to mind when you hear the word “church” how would you answer that question? What comes to mind? What is the church? What is the church not? The church is the people of God. It is not a building. It is not an institution. Although those things are not bad in and of themselves. But the church is not an organization it is a living breathing organism. It spans the boundaries of space and time and is made up of the sinful people who know God’s forgiveness and live that out with one another and the people around them.

The people of the church are not in the church because they have chosen to be in it. Rather, like the children of Israel, the people of the church were chosen by God to be in it. And not for their own sake but for the sake of the world. We are here to love and care for and to serve one another so that we can go out and love and care for and serve the world. So as a church how do you think we do with this?

So how does this happen? Where does it come from? Well it comes from the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit calls, gathers, enlightens and makes Holy the church. And he does this through the word. The word is proclaimed. And through that word the Holy Spirit does his things. The grace of God has been secured through Christ and the Holy Spirit uses the word to make us Holy.

We gather together to hear God’s word. To be made aware of our sin and our need for a Savior, and then to be reassured of God’s grace in Jesus. So that we are assured that those sins are forgiven. This happens as we study and hear God’s word. Then our faith is strengthened and again forgiveness is poured out into our lives through Baptism and Holy Communion. We are given to one another as gifts from God to encourage one another and to hold each other accountable.

God works through these things to heal our brokenness. He binds our wounds. Forgives our sins. Strengthens us encourages us and then, being reconciled and restored. He sends us out into the world, to proclaim in word and deed the good news of the gospel. We are not here for ourselves, but instead for the sake of those who do not know of God’s love in Jesus. It is our job to take this wonderful message that has changed and transformed us and to proclaim it to a world that needs to hear it. Because in this message is love and healing and it is a wonderful, awesome and amazing thing.

And we mark the beginning of this thing with Pentecost. Where God came to dwell in us, in our midst, in the midst of our brokenness, to work through us to show and proclaim his love to the world. It is a special thing. We are the church. We are a part of the living organism that God uses to do his work in the world. We are strengthened and encouraged through his word in this organism and then sent out to share that great news.

So what are we afraid of? Right? And yet the reality of the matter is, even though we have this awesome and wonderful gift, even though we have God’s Spirit living in us and with us, we can get lose sight of what really matters. We can lose focus of what is important. We can allow fear to rule the day. We can get caught up in our own pride. I want to be in charge. I like to be in control. I want things to work out according to my plan and to happen so that I will be happy.

When we live and think this way, we spend more time asking what I want than we do asking what God wants. Because they may not be one and the same. So, not only can we get stuck in focusing on what we want and trying to make ourselves happy, but when we do this we are ultimately just drinking salt water. If you are thirsty, the worst thing you can drink is salt water. It doesn’t quench your thirst and it will end up killing you. If our goal in life is to make us happy, we are never going to achieve it. Our thirst for happiness will never be quenched and it will ultimately kill us.

If however, our goal is to pursue the life that God has in mind for us. If our goal is to live out who God in his grace has declared us to be for the sake of Jesus. Then we will find live that is full and abundant. We will find life that is about something that is bigger than us, about something that is eternal and about something that is better than we could ever imagine.

If we take this thirst and thirst for the things that really satisfy, the things that we can only find from God then we discover that we are included in Jesus words too. “If anyone thirsts, let them come to me and drink. Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture has said, ‘Out of their hearts will flow rivers of living water.’”

And this living water is none other than the Holy Spirit. This abundant life that God so graciously gives is yours. It belongs to you. Because God loves you. He has made you his own dearly loved son or daughter. He knows you. He cares for you. He is with you and gives you his Spirit so that this living water will flow from you as well. He does this so that you too can know life and life abundantly.

This is what Pentecost is all about. And may you be blessed as you live as the Pentecost people of God in this place, now and always. Happy Birthday! Amen.