Loading...In the past several weeks during the Easter season, we’ve read some stories about and talked quite a bit about the disciples who locked themselves in upstairs rooms because they were afraid. They were afraid that what happened to Jesus would happen to them. Or, maybe they were afraid of what they were supposed to do next; they had no idea how to proceed....
Today, in our first reading from Acts,
the disciples are back again in that locked room.
It was less that 50 days after Jesus’ resurrection,
and he had already shown up a couple of times in those locked rooms filled with scared disciples.
He’d shown up and walked with two of the disciples who’d left Jerusalem on foot and were despondent and dejected.
He’d shown up on the shore of the lake the morning after some of the disciples went on a big fishing trip.
On this 50th day, the disciples are NOT visited by Jesus again.
These followers and students, crippled by fear and hiding out in a locked upper room again are given the Holy Spirit –
the Holy Spirit blowing through the room,
busting open the windows and doors
burning with little tongues of flame over everyone’s head
giving all those disciples the ability to speak a wide variety of languages.
They are given the Holy Spirit
which encourage (read: “gives courage”) and equips them
to go out into the marketplace and the lanes to tell others about Jesus
to go outside and share the stories of Jesus and the great love he was
to share their faith of the Christ.
They are given the Holy Spirit
not just so that could resist the fear that had a grip on them
but so that they would step out and away from the fear,
and stand instead in confidence and joy.
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You and I are followers of Jesus
and like the early disciples, we need not be crippled by fear.
Paul, in his letter to the Romans, goes further.
He doesn’t just call you and I disciples and followers of Jesus.
We’ve been given the Holy Spirit, Paul writes.
And that Holy Spirit is not a “spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received a spirit of adoption.” [emphasis mine]
The gift of the Holy Spirit – the gift we celebrate today but that is real and true every day – is the gift of being claimed, being chosen, or in Paul’s words, being adopted.
For any who are adopted or have adopted
you will know this on a deeper, maybe more visceral level,
but it’s true for all of us:
God claims, choses, and adopts you.
You are fully and completely one of God’s own.
You are given the gift of courage and confidence that comes from knowing that you’ve been chosen, accepted, and loved for who you are, as you are.
With no requirement that you have to be different to be acceptable, or that you have to do something in order to be loved.
Chosen, accepted, and loved – as you are.
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With this knowledge sinking deep into our bones and deep into our thinking and consciousness, we need not be shoved around by fear,
we do not have to be bullied by anxiety.
We all know the fear that is around us.
As one teacher of mine put it, fear is the “soup” that we live in.
You may know fear in the guise of
• economic insecurity (unemployment, divorce, even retirement)
• health, or the lack of health, in yourself or someone you love
• violence in your home, your neighborhood, or on TV
• even the political climate we’re in that capitalizes on fear and tries to whip us up into a frenzy and then tell us that he or she is the only one who can save us.
We know the fear that is around us. We fear
• that we are not good enough or worthy enough
• that we have made too many mistakes
• that we have lost chances at reconciliation or forgiveness
But “you did not receive a spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received a spirit of adoption. When we cry, ‘Abba! Father!’ it is that VERY SPIRIT bearing witness with our own spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs, heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ.” (Romans 8:15-17a)
Because we are God’s children – fully and completely – then we do not have to give in to fear, even if it is all around us.
The promise is –
the reality is that we are destined to inherit all good things!
(Clarify what “good things” are:
I’m not speaking Osteen-like that good things is made up of money/wealth, material stuff, or even fabulous health)
All good things that are of God = life, wholeness, freedom, joy, shalom.
The reality is, in the Spirit, the gift of the Spirit,
we have courage not simply to resist fear in all of its trickiness and wily-ness,
but to step out into the world in confidence and joy, as the early disciples did.
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Today, with our geraniums, red paraments and clothing, the “tongues of fire”, balloons, and fans, we are celebrating and giving thanks for the Holy Spirit and the myriad ways that this One comes to us in a variety of ways to remind us of God’s love in Jesus.
Today we are celebrating the love of Jesus, the One who comes into our lives and into our world amid any number of kinds of fear to remind us again and again that life is not fickle, but that the future is in God’s hands.
Today we are giving thanks for God – the same God who calls us OUT of whatever place of fear and “upper room” we may be locked in (even, and especially, the VERY REAL and understandable fears) in order that we would serve others around us in love, courage, and hope.
Service for others that looks a little bit like (or a lot like) the image that Anne Lamott offers in her essays on faith in Traveling Mercies : We’re all in an big ER waiting room, having been triaged, but waiting to be seen by the great Physician. As we wait, we care for each other – sharing juice and cookies all around.
With our geraniums, tongues of flame, balloons, red, and fans, we celebrate and give thanks that we are not alone
as we encounter and overcome fear
as we take risks
as we trust God.
We are not alone because, of course, the Holy Spirit, the Advocate, has been given and is with us.
We also are not alone because we have each other.
So, today, as we go into the rest of the day and into the week ahead,
pray for one another as we each face whatever monster seems so big, frightening, and fearful.
Pray for one another; that your pew-mate, person-across-the-room, friend-who’s-not-quite-sure-about-God (who may or may not be in the room with us today) would have courage and joy. Even when faced with fear.
Pray for one another and our life in the Spirit as claimed, chosen, and adopted beloved children of God.
And together with the Spirit, we will live as fully loved and boldly courageous people of God.
Amen
