Union Church

May 11, 2008. Pentecost, Mother’s Day
Acts 2: 5-8, 11b-18

In our post-Christian era, there is a growing chorus of scoffers. People feel they have the right to denigrate the Christian faith without consideration of how the faithful feel. They can be family members, co-workers, neighbours, and strangers. Often we suffer in silence as we unexpectedly encounter this rejection.
It has become more strident in recent years, but the truth is there have always been scoffers. There are always other interpretations of events. Whatever passes as a miracle can always be explained away by those who don’t want to accept it.

There were scoffers on that first Pentecost Sunday. And it is very instructive how Peter deals with them.
We can learn from Peter.

The first thing to note is that Peter doesn’t get hooked on the people’s initial response. In fact, he makes light of their criticism.

When the Spirit drives the fellowship of the believers out onto the street, some of the onlookers say, “They are drunk with new wine.”
Peter doesn’t get angry.
He doesn’t get defensive.
Peter accepts their initial response by saying, “These people aren’t drunk. It’s only 9 o’clock in the morning.” In other words, “You might think they are but it’s too early in the morning for that explanation.”

When we are dealing with people who scoff at our faith, don’t argue. Start with their position and move it towards a logically different place.

For example, people will often say to us, “How can you believe in God when you look around and see all the terrible things happening?”
So we might respond by saying, “Yes, there are a lot of terrible things happening and it may seem difficult to believe in God. But the tyrants of history are eventually overthrown, dictators are eventually brought down. Good always makes a come back. I see the Spirit of God at work in the world. I see goodness prevailing.”

The second thing Peter does is recognize the people’s intuition and so appeals to what they believe in. These folk are pilgrims coming from all over the Mediterranean to Jerusalem for a religious festival. So Peter doesn’t discuss the Temple Tax or the Roman Occupation: He doesn’t talk about in-house problems.
He refers to the scriptures that they hold dear and he holds dear. He gets into rapport with them; he engages their religious intuition. He says, “You should recognize this from your own understanding of the prophets.”

We need to refer to what the scoffer hold precious to
them.
Remember, the discussion is not about us, it is really about them.
So get in rapport.
Offer them the benefit of the doubt: They hold good things in high regard. It may be the family, education, peace, environment, or justice. Their intuition about what is truly good and precious and therefore of God needs to be affirmed.

The third thing that Peter does is offer the connection between what is happening right now on the street and the prophetic tradition. Peter names it as Joel’s prophecy come to life, “I will pour out my Spirit upon all flesh. And your sons and your daughters shall prophesy. Your young men shall see visions and your old men shall dream dreams.”

We need to draw the connection between what is happening right now; what we see and hear and feel as an expression of our faith today and what scoffers hold to be precious and important in life.
In other words, we must be relevant.
We must be contextual.
We need to connect the Spirit’s working with their highest concerns.

So what do we do with scoffers?

We don’t get hooked.

We affirm their highest values.

We connect it to the working of the Spirit in our lives.

And so we create a bridge, a connection, an opportunity to share our greatest concerns with deep respect.

1 Corinthians 12: 4-13

What is a Spiritual Gift?

I’m sure we have asked ourselves,
“What exactly is a spiritual gift?
What makes it different from a job or a profession or
a hobby or an interest?”
Certainly the list in 1 Corinthians sounds like a list of vocations.

Two weeks ago I mentioned a quote from Robert Thurman about Spirituality. He said in part,
“Thoughts, words and actions are spiritual only if universal love is the motive, compassion the cause, happiness the aim and responsibility the active principle.”
In other words,
spiritual gifts lead to thoughts, words and actions that are
motivated by universal love,
caused by compassion,
aiming for happiness
and grounded in responsibility.

To simplify it yet again, and expanding on the words from Mother Theresa: It’s not how much we do,
it’s how much love we put into our doing.
It’s not how much we give,
it is how much we put into our giving that makes it a spiritual gift.

Spiritual gifts are the added ingredient of grace in what we do.

So, how do we connect this with Mothers Day?

Well, Mothers set the tone in their children’s lives.
When they put love, care and concern into what they do for their kids:
When they add encouragement, support, and faith in all they give us:
They are exercising spiritual gifts.

So the spirit in which we act defines whether it is a gift from God.

Mothers Day seeks to recognize the giving and
give thanks for the receiving of spiritual gifts.

That is what we are trying to express.
That is what we are trying to say on Mothers Day.