Acts 2:1-21 (first published 30 May 2004)
The story of the Tower of Babel describes the dispersal of humans over
the face of the earth as a result of the confusion of their speech. The
story of Pentecost describes humans coming together and hearing the good
news of God's love as a result of the gospel being preached in a variety
of languages. Thus, in a real sense, Pentecost is the antithesis of the
Tower of Babel. In the aftermath of the Tower of Babel, people were
scattered, and community was broken, but a broken world community is not
inevitable, nor is it God's will. It is important to remember that the
ultimate reason for broken community in Babel was not God's desire to harm
the people but the people's lust for power. Like Babel, Pentecost has God
descending on the multitude, but this time God's purpose is to gather, not
to scatter. Like Babel, Pentecost is about power, but it is divine power
given to humans for the purpose of reuniting them to God, not human power
that challenges God. The church on the Day of Pentecost added about 3,000
people to its number. Religious people sometimes treat success as a
mandate to act capriciously, as though no matter what they did, God would
be on their side. However, we must remember that Babel is the flip side
of Pentecost. When Christians are tempted to force our religious beliefs
on others, we need to remember that the God who blesses can also curse.
When we want to use superior weaponry to advance a "Christian" worldview,
we need to recall that the God who gathers can also scatter. When we
envision a homogeneous world in which everyone speaks the same language,
or embraces the same political goals, or glories in the idea of the free
market, we need to understand that diversity can be a good thing.
Pentecost is a day to celebrate God's gift of the Spirit, but it is also a
time to remember the dangers of the lust for power that so easily grips
powerful nations.
Psalm 104:24-34, 35b (first published 30
May 2004)
Intense rains in Haiti and the Dominican Republic this week killed more than one thousand people, many in mudslides. Officials blame the mudslides on severe deforestation that has occurred throughout the island of Hispaniola. Locals cut down the trees in order to plant crops and for fuel, destroying the habitat in the process of meeting their basic needs. Both the large number of human deaths and the destruction of animal and plant species that results from clearcutting the forests are the result of structural injustice. "But isn't a natural disaster like flooding just that?" you might ask. "It's nobody's fault," you might argue. You might think that, but you'd be wrong. Ask yourself, when torrential rains hit more developed countries, like the U.S., Canada, Western Europe, Japan, or Australia, do hundreds or thousands of people die? Some often die, to be sure, but the number is much smaller. Compare, for example, the Mississippi River flood of 1993, described by a Web site at the University of Akron as "the most devastating flood disaster in U.S. history." The river was above flood stage for 144 days, and "nearly fifty people died." Fifty people is too many, but it is hardly a thousand. Why do so many people die in flooding in Hispaniola or Honduras or Bangladesh? The psalmist gives us a hint in today's psalm: "O Lord, how manifold are your works! In wisdom you have made them all; the earth is full of your creatures." The psalmist goes on to describe God's care for creation and God's provision for their needs. Humans, whom Genesis describes as caretakers of the earth, often act contrary to the purposes of God, with disastrous effects on both nature and other humans. For example, deforestation destroys animal and plant habitat, driving species to extinction. With the natural trees gone, the soil is not able to absorb the rain like it would otherwise, and great sheets of mud move during heavy rains, covering whole villages. The poor are forced to live on the sides of mountains, and thus they die in higher proportion than those who are wealthier when the rains come (the swath cut by a killer mudslide in Honduras in 1998 is still evident, because no houses are built on the site, but there are plenty of shacks built on adjacent mountains). We need to learn to appreciate what the psalmist means when he says, "In wisdom you have made them all." We need to interact with nature wisely in order to minimize the destruction caused by natural disasters. We also need to provide for the poor so that they won't be forced to violate nature in order to live.
In the book 2001: A Space Odyssey, a tribe of African ape-men
come across a crystal monolith that has been sent through space by an
unknown alien civilization. Gazing into the monolith, one of the ape-men,
Moon Watcher, finds his mind slightly altered, and he suddenly has the
beginnings of understanding of simple tools, as well as the beginnings of
something even more important: self-awareness. The ape-men are on their
way to becoming full-fledged modern humans, and though they still have
three million years of growth and development left to them, they have
already been transformed into something new. Paul urges his readers to
remember that they no longer have a spirit of slavery, which leads to
fear, but a spirit of adoption. They are the adopted children of God.
Too often today we live with little or no awareness of our true
identities. We think of ourselves as cogs on the wheel of society,
fulfilling our purpose in life as we go to work, to church, to the store,
to the beach, and so forth, whereas we should be thinking of ourselves as
something much more. As God's children, we have inside us a tremendous
potential, as well as a call from God to realize who we really are. The
children of God are a creative people, who no longer have to rely on old
solutions to the problems we confront. War, unhealthy competition,
harmful distribution of wealth--these are some of the old solutions to
problems that we are called on to discard and replace with new, creative
solutions. The children of God are a compassionate people, not
compassionate like the so-called "compassionate conservatism" that was
proclaimed in the 2000 presidential campaign, but which was much more
conservative than it was compassionate. The God who adopted us calls us
to treat our fellow human beings as our own brothers and sisters. Who
would let their actual brother die or starvation, or who would sit idly by
while their own sister suffered from an easily preventable disease? As a
truly compassionate people, we are called to love the whole world as God
loves it: intensely, completely, sacrificially. The children of God are a
hopeful people. We look to the future expectantly, because that is where
we seek God, so we are no longer mired in the past. History is full of
wrongs suffered and affronts left unavenged, but as people of hope we are
able to put the need for revenge aside. At the same time, however, the
past instills in us a deep and abiding sense of justice, so that we see
the injustice of society's structures in the suffering of others, and we
work with quiet confidence in the God of the future toward a world in
which the barriers of hatred, fear, and inequality are finally and forever
battered down. We are the children of God, and we cannot turn back.
John 14:8-17, 25-27 (first published 30
May 2004)
"Wanted: Growing organization looking for workers to replace those who wouldn't. Great rewards for great results. Successful applicants are expected not only to meet but to exceed the high standards set by the company's founder." Sound like a difficult job? It's the job description of a Christian, according to today's reading from John. "Very truly, I tell you, the one who believes in me will also do the works that I do and, in fact, will do greater works than these." Greater works than Jesus? How is that possible? In part, it's possible because of God's power working in the lives of many different people through the Holy Spirit. Whereas there was only one Jesus, there are many Christians capable of calling on the resources of the Holy Spirit to accomplish great things. Jesus went about teaching, healing, and telling others God's good news. As followers of Jesus, God calls us to carrying on these ministries. Don't worry if you can't lay your hands on people and heal them. Maybe you can encourage them during their illness or donate money to an organization that is working to find a cure for deadly illnesses. Maybe you don't consider yourself the most knowledgeable person in the world, but you can pass on to others your understanding of Jesus' teachings. Maybe you don't fancy yourself an evangelist, but by your good works you can cause others to glorify God. Today's reading from John is presents a challenging job description. Do you have the courage to apply?