Reversing the Trend

PROPERS:          PENTECOST, YEAR C 

TEXT:                GENESIS 11:1-9; ACTS 2:1-12

PREACHED AT ST. PAUL’S, MOBILE, ON SUNDAY, JUNE 8, 2025.

 

ONE SENTENCE:        The Feast of Pentecost expands the reach of God’s covenant to world at large.

 

         Picture this vivid scene in your mind’s eye:

 

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            Thousands of people – masses of humanity, from many nations, with many languages – are crowding narrow streets.  The one-mile square walled city of Jerusalem – literally a fortress – is packed for the sacred feast day of Shavuot. The festival commemorates the divine gift of the Torah – the first five books of the Jewish scripture. The Books of Moses.

 

            It’s like Mardi Gras is taking place on the eight-foot wide, narrow, winding streets of Jerusalem.  So thick were the crowds on the tiny, steep streets, you couldn’t stir them with a stick.

 

            The day would also be called Pentecost, but no Christians were celebrating the festival. The small band of Jesus’ followers were cowering in a closed and locked room.  They had seen what had happened to their rabbi on the last festival – Passover – and they didn’t want to be the next group nailed to a Roman cross.

 

            They were afraid.  The doors were closed. They wanted no part of the festival in the streets.

 

            Then, it started.

 

            First, there was a breeze. Then a gust. Then a whirlwind like the one that had taken Elijah into heaven. Flames appeared and danced on the heads of the frightened disciples. Their fear was transformed. They grew bold. Their spines stiffened. They no longer cowered. The Spirit had come.

 

            They flung open the doors.  They walked out… into the crowded streets. They were not intimidated by the mixed multitude… the hordes of humanity.  Language barriers did not matter. They were united by the Spirit. They proclaimed what would be known as the Good News.

 

            The story of Jesus Christ was loosed into a diverse world.  The Tower of Babel collapsed. The story of God’s love was meant to unify. Instead of a covenant with a chosen people, the net was cast into the waters of all humanity. It’s all in our second lesson -- the second chapter of Acts.

 

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         Today we celebrate the Feast of Pentecost. Fifty days after Easter Day. One of the great feast days of the church year.  The birthday of the church.

 

            But we have a curious first lesson – completely at-odds with what this day means. Consider this:

 

            In our reading from Genesis, we are told the story of Babel – not the computer software, but the tower. The passage seeks to explain why the known world, which has its roots in a small number of human beings, devolved into a mixed multitude with many languages.

 

            The story is that the people – speaking one language – aspired to build a great city, with a tower into the heavens. Their plans, it seems, troubled God – because there would be no limit to their ambitions in such a case.

 

            God, we are told, said “Let US go down there,” scattered the people, provoked a variety of languages, and threw the multitudes into chaos.  All to divide… and to spoil their plans of omnipotence. Confusion reigned.

 

            It was the divine wish to scatter the people. Compare that divine action to scatter to the story from Acts of the first Christian Pentecost.

 

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            Archeologists tell us that the remains of the ancient tower associated with the story of Babel can be found today in the ruins of Babylon, some 90 miles from Bagdad, Iraq.  It is symbolic of the arrogance of humanity in a part of the world where so much division and violence have been sown.

 

            But that was not the last word.

 

            Just a short distance away, in another country and city, we are given the example of God’s ever-expanding mission. Not to divide people, but to unite them.

 

            Four weeks ago, we heard the words of John, written on the island of Patmos, from his ecstatic vision we call the Book of Revelation:

 

“I looked, and there was a great multitude that no one could count, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, robed in white, with palm branches in their hands.” 

 

            As Jody reminded us last week, words matter.  They can divide or unite.

 

            Unity is the reason we are here today.  That is the reason the churches down the street and across town gather.  It is the reason we do what we do and why they do what they do. Because we are all one people.  We are all God’s children. All. Everyone.