PENTECOST, 2009
MAY 30/31
Driving north from Cedar Falls nearing Charles City, or west on Interstate 80 around Adair, and in a couple of other areas of north central and western Iowa, you will encounter a new “crop” rising from the fertile Iowa fields. Dotting the landscape are giant propeller powered windmills. As a source of “green energy” Iowa ranks second to Texas in harnessing the wind to help meet our current and future demands for electricity.
Wind and fire are the two traditional symbols associated with today’s celebration of Pentecost. The next time we travel through our state and see those large turbines, perhaps they can serve as “sacramentals” of the Holy Spirit.
Living in Iowa our experience of the wind can be a mild breeze or an over two-hundred mile per-hour tornado, and all other speeds in between. From what I have learned about those large windmill generators each of them is equipped with a regulator that keeps the speed of the blades in a constant, steady rotation. If such a regulator were not a part of their construction, the wind-driven blades, subject to the velocity of the wind would end up rotating at such a great speed that both the tower to which they are attached and the blades themselves would break. As it is, the wind, even when blowing at great speed, is regulated so that when it encounters the windmill it is experienced as a gentle breeze, strong enough to produce electricity, but not so strong as to rage out of control. Today’s traditional reading from the second chapter of the Acts of the Apostles of the Pentecost experience of Mary and the Apostles in Jerusalem records a strong tornado- like wind swirling and howling around the place where these earliest believers had gathered in prayer. Meanwhile in the gospel, we encounter the risen Jesus appearing to his disciples on Easter night and imparting to them the same power and force of the Holy Spirit that had filled his life. Yet John tells us that he does it by “breathing” on them. Jesus gives them the power of God in a controlled, regulated way, in a way that will not break them or cause them to spin out of control yet in a way that will enable each of them to generate the light of the gospel in a darkened world.
Today’s liturgy celebrates this same gift in our lives. At our baptism, confirmation and once again in this eucharist, the Holy Spirit descends upon each of us in the power and love that is his which binds the Father and Jesus in a loving eternal communion of divine life. Through the Holy Spirit each of us is now drawn into this intimate life of divine love and energy. In giving us the Holy Spirit Jesus also regulates and harnesses this gift in the specific way tailored to each of us in our need, matched to our particular talents, and for the particular work he is calling each of us to do. “There are different kinds of spiritual gifts but the same Spirit; there are different forms of service but the same Lord; there are different workings but the same God who produces all of them in everyone. To each individual the manifestation of the Spirit is given for some benefit” St. Paul reminds us.
“God is coming! Hear the wind of his Spirit rushing through the upper reaches of the mind. Bolt no door, turn no key: roof will be shaken from floor. Hear the crash of wall, the fall of tree, and the sounds of towers that smash.
Never came such a gale on earth, fanning spark to flame. Nothing is safe but flung seed, spun spray, birds wings, and flower petals that weigh nothing at all. Nothing is safe but what flies, but what sings; nothing dies but what is strong. Prepare for the wheels of the wind racing through the upper air! The atmosphere quivers and shakes, the world quakes: God is coming. His Holy Spirit is here! (Edith Lovejoy Pierce)
To us the Spirit’s varied gifts are made known. In us God’s energy is shown. Teach us Holy Spirit to speak; teach us to hear; yours is the tongue and yours the ear.