Waiting for a Sign - Acts 2:1-21

Happy Pentecost to all! There is much Good News to celebrate today. The Holy Spirit has descended upon us, Christ Church looks gorgeous in red, and our waiting is over. If you didn’t know you were waiting, no problem, I’ll fill you in. Last week, Kate preached a wonderful sermon about the power of waiting and of rest. She reminded us that the time between Ascension, when Jesus says his final goodbye to the disciples, and Pentecost, when the Holy Spirit arrives in Jerusalem is marked by such holy waiting.

As he disappeared from their sight for the last time, Jesus told the disciples not to travel far, but to wait for a sign in Jerusalem. I feel like this is the Biblical version of the marshmallow test, where a parent places a marshmallow in front of their toddler, tells them not to eat it until the parent returns, then leaves the room, but films the child’s reaction. Spoiler alert: most toddlers eat the marshmallow.

Since the disciples are what we might call spiritual toddlers, it would not have surprised me if they had disobeyed Jesus’ final instructions. But they didn’t, and today we find them gathered together, exactly where they’re supposed be, waiting for their sign. And boy do they get one. Strong winds, flames of fire, speaking in tongues. There can be no doubt that this is what they were waiting for.

On the other hand, even with all the obvious signs of divine presence, there may still be room for some ambiguity - my favorite! What we now celebrate as Pentecost first took place during a Jewish festival called Shavuot, and there is a lot of overlap between the two. Shavuot marks the giving of the Torah at Mount Sinai, and back then, it was observed by gathering together with friends for all night worship, often including visions of fire and speaking in tongues. Sound familiar?

With this in mind, I can’t help but wonder, was the experience of Pentecost so incredible because nothing like that had ever happened to the disciples before, or was it incredible because although it had happened many times before, this time, they finally felt the presence of the Spirit. I think the Scripture leaves room for either option, and I think we experience them both all the time.

Life-altering, before and after moments come in many forms. Sometimes, something brand new and totally unexpected suddenly changes our course; something like the birth of a child, the death of a loved one, a financial windfall or a natural disaster. We are not who we used to be and we can point to the exact moment the shift occurred. This is the work of the Holy Spirit.

Other times, the shift is more subtle. We’re going through our normal routine on a regular day, but then something feels different. We discover something new in old, familiar words. We see a new side of someone we thought we knew everything about. We notice something miraculous that has been right in front of us for who knows how long, and now we’ll never look at the world in quite the same way again. This is also the work of the Holy Spirit.

So we know that waiting is holy, and that signs of the Spirit can be found all kinds of places. But in our global, digital age, it feels like signs are everywhere and nowhere at the same time. We don’t expect something dramatic like speaking in tongues, and yet we are inundated with dramatic news all day every day. The disciples recognized the sign they’d been waiting for to start their new ministry in the world. For those of us still waiting for a sign of the way the Holy Spirit is at work in our lives, how can we recognize it when it comes?

The scriptures are filled with examples and clues, but I think that as we come to the end of this strange liturgical waiting period, we should pay attention to what happened on that first Pentecost. It was an unlikely sort of revolution. The events that unfolded were not marked by destruction of the halls of power, or even miraculous healing. These things would come later. The first fruits of the descent of the Holy Spirit were diversity and understanding.

The people gathered did not form an army. They did not proselytize to one another. They were not even of one mind. Instead, they listened to one another, and spoke their owns truths in their own words. They experienced a peace like they’d never known, one that flowed out of their variety and breadth of expression, a symbol of the wideness of God. Their unity came not from agreement, but from commitment - commitment to hear and share, to know and be known, to stand together in the Spirit. I think our world could use more communities like this these days.

If you are frustrated with the world around you; If you are anxious about an outcome you can’t predict; If you have grown weary of waiting for a sign of the Holy Spirit, perhaps Pentecost is calling you to look in places where communities are strengthened by diversity, and where people commit to seeing one another clearly - and loving each other anyway. Maybe it’s time to find something incredible in something totally new.

If you are already in a place like that, maybe for you, Christ Church is just such a place, then perhaps it’s time to look around and notice how the Holy Spirit has been embodied all around you all along. If you come here for worship week after week, or if there’s another place in your world that draws you in, what is about that place that calls to you, and could that, in itself, be a sign? Maybe it’s time to find something incredible in something familiar, by seeing it in a new way.

I am grateful every day that this place knows me so well and chooses to love me anyway.  And so it was a gift to spend time in holy waiting with all of you over the past couple of weeks. But I’m also glad to move into a new season with you as well. We are heading into the final stretch of our construction project, and if we can wait just a little longer for our marshmallow, we will be an incredible, embodied sign to those around us. In so many ways, we already are. Because the Holy Spirit is surely at work right here in our very midst, in both familiar and in unexpected ways, bringing us together in all our glorious diversity. You simply can’t miss it. Amen.