Pentecost Homily - June 9th, 2019 - Babel and Pentecost

Pentecost Icon

I.

The Tower of Babel
 is more important than you may think it is.

This story of the Old Testament may seem strange,
 enigmatic,
  maybe a little contradictory to our expectations of God.

I mean, what happens in this account in Genesis anyway?

All of humanity was united in one language.
 Well, that doesn't sound so bad, huh?
  We are usually really positive about unity
    and it seems odd that this should be anything but positive, right?

One day, humanity wants to build a big city
 with a really big tower,
  so that they aren't scattered around the world.
   I mean, nothing wrong with that right?

And then God,
 looking down at what those pesky mortals are doing
  decided to confuse their language
    and stop them from building that city
     with that super tall tower.

If you read it this way,
 God seems like a super big buzzkill,
  and maybe even a little scary.
   And this is the way that many people read this passage.

BUT,
 if you read this passage in context,
  paying really close attention to when this passage appears in Genesis,
   and seeing what kind of language is used in the story,
    you will realize very quickly
     that what humanity was trying to do at the Tower of Babel
      was anything but innocent.

First of all, you must recognize that this passage occurs
 directly after the great Flood,
  where Noah and his family, with animals,
   were saved from the cataclysmic event
    of the destruction of the evil upon the earth.

In the re-population of the earth,
 Noah's family line was enumerated in the chapter just prior to the Tower of Babel.
  And in the passage itself,
   you have eerily similar language used to describe humanity building that tower
    as you have when Adam and Eve speak with the serpent in Genesis 3.

Remember, In Genesis 3, the serpent tempts Eve by saying,
 "Did God really say you would die if you ate from that tree?
  Well, I'm here to tell you that you actually won't die,
   but you will be like God, knowing all these things,
    Good and evil."
    [Genesis 3:4, paraphrase]

The moral of the story is that the primordial temptation for humanity
 in the creation account of Genesis 3
  is that they didn't really need God anyway.

Look closer at the Babel passage this morning.

What did these people say when they were going to build the city?
 "Come, let us build ourselves a city,
  and a tower with its top in the heavens,
   and let us make a name for ourselves;
    otherwise we shall be scattered abroad upon the face of the whole earth."
    [Genesis 11:1-9 NRSV]

The beginning seems innocent,
 "let us build ourselves a city,"
  but the second and third lines give away the ulterior motive.

You see, the "tower with its top in the heavens"
 and "let us make a name for ourselves"
  is the equivalent to saying that they are setting themselves
   in the very place of God.

In the Ancient Near East,
 how they saw the world and understood its construction
  was like a big dome:
   land down here,
    and the big blue sky being the actual "heavens"
     where God resides.

For humanity to say that they were going to build a tower
 "up to the heavens
  and make a name for ourselves"
   is to attempt to replace God by our own power.

So, when God confuses their language,
 you may get a little bit different feel for what exactly God was doing.

God is not the divine buzzkill.
 God is their divine Father,
  looking with some measure of sorrow at the beautiful creation that He had made
   attempting to replace him by their own strength.

Just like when a toddler climbs up on a counter because they want that cookie jar,
 not noticing they can't get back down without falling and really hurting themselves,
  so also humanity reaches for something that may seem attractive at first,
   and yet could cost them their souls.

If they were to replace their Creator with themselves,
 they would do untold damage to themselves.

But when the Lord Most High confused their language,
 God also had in mind the solution,
  creating something new.

II.

And that is when we arrive at Pentecost,
 the great feast of the enlivening Fire of the Holy Spirit,
  when God pours His Spirit upon the Apostles
   for the sake of the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

It's why we wear the color red today,
 the colorful reminder of that sanctifying fire.
  I mean, goodness, even the flowers on the altar
   are getting in on the Pentecost action!

But did you know that the Feast of Pentecost has even more layers of meaning,
 all deriving from the other celebrations associated with it?

We find a few of them in today's readings.

First of all, Pentecost etymologically means "fiftieth,"
 as in fifty days.
  [https://www.etymonline.com/word/pentecost]

Well, fifty days since what?

Fifty days since the Passover,
 the celebration of the deliverance of the people of Israel
  from the land of Egypt.
   And remember that at the celebration of the Passover,
    the Lamb without blemish was to be killed,
     its blood put on the door sills of the Hebrews's houses.

Well, guess what happened 50 days ago (give or take)?
 The great celebration of the Passover of Jesus Christ from Death to Resurrection,
  which is also known for us as Easter!

And we, along with the disciples in Acts,
 although in different places and in different times,
  gather to await God to clothe us with His Holy Spirit,
   the promised gift of Jesus Christ after He ascended into heaven.

But what also is occurring in this amazing act of God
 is the exact reversal,
  the recapitulation,
   of the Tower of Babel and the arrogance of humanity's attempt to discard God.

At Babel,
 we try to make a name for ourselves,
  not even giving credence or acknowledgment to God in any way,
   attempting to work on our own merit,
    our own righteousness,
     our own justice.

And yet at Babel,
 if God had let us continue in our error,
  we would have killed ourselves.

God knew what lay ahead for us
 the moment that our pride lay hold of our souls
  and convinced us that we could do it ourselves
   and that God had become irrelevant to our lives,
    and perhaps the Lord should just consign himself to the wastebasket of history.

But what God used to save us from ourselves in the Old Testament,
 the confusing of our languages,
  became the very avenue to show God's presence and power:
   the hearing of the proclamation of Jesus Christ regardless of language.

Where in Babel, we were united in language as enemies of God,
 now at Pentecost, we are re-united in the Gospel language as children of God.

And the Holy Spirit uses this cross-lingual proclamation of that Gospel
 to show forth the sign of the Prophet Joel:
  "In the last days it will be, God declares,
   that I will pour out my Spirit upon all flesh,
    and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy..

I will show wonders in the heavens above
 and signs on the earth below,
  blood and fire and billows of smoke.

The sun will be turned to darkness
 and the moon to blood
  before the coming of the great and glorious day of the Lord.
   And everyone who calls
    on the name of the Lord will be saved.."
    [Joel 2:28-32 NIV]

When Christ died for us,
 shedding his blood for our redemption,
  and rising again as the Lamb that was Slain,
   and when the Holy Spirit fell on the Apostles in fire and smoke,
    did not Joel speak of blood and fire and billows of smoke?

This blood of Christ,
 this fire and smoke of the Holy Spirit,
  ushers in the great and glorious opportunity for all who call upon the Lord
   to receive salvation
    to receive healing,
     and to be commissioned as witnesses to the ends of the earth!

And we are commissioned as a people of a common language,
 the gift of the Holy Spirit,
  that all who call upon the name of Our Loving God
   will indeed be saved.

III.

We who have called upon Jesus Christ as our Savior,
 who have cried out "Abba, Father" through the interceding Holy Spirit,
  we have been given this gift of God's own self
   to inhabit, to justify, to sanctify, and to grow the life of our souls
    so that we may be restored and revived to what we were always meant to be:
     sons and daughters of the Lord Most High.
     [Romans 8:15]

And our work today in proclaiming the Gospel of Jesus Christ
 has everything to do with the point of these two stories.

We live in a struggle between these two cities,
 Babel and Pentecost.

In Babel,
 the world desperately tempts you to make a name for yourself.
  In Pentecost, you have waited upon the Lord
   and have said, "I'll do my best, with God's help."

In Babel,
 the world sits precariously on the edge of pride and loneliness,
  the toddler on the kitchen counter,
   cookie in hand,
    but putting themselves in real danger in the process.

But in Pentecost,
 God, our Father in Heaven,
  has sent his Son Jesus Christ our Lord to die for us
   and to rise for us,
    so that the Holy Spirit may be sent to freely give us life anew
     for any who cry out to the Lord.

And as we live between Babel and Pentecost,
 we are commissioned as people of a new common language.
  Although we may speak English,
   or Spanish,
    or Portuguese,
     or German,
      or Swahili,
       or Kazakhstani,
        our new common language is this:
         "The world will know you are my disciples,
          by your love for one another."
          [John 13:35]

The Love of God is our language
 in the midst of the unified, yet terribly broken language of pride.

The language of the Spirit is that Love set on fire
 by the very same Triune God who IS Love itself.

Go into the world, friends,
 and speak this language,
  this primordial language of Love
   even in the midst of the swirling loneliness of vainglory and pride
    that seems all-consuming some days.

Because the language of Love is something that we don't speak on our own,
 but that Jesus Christ speaks through each of us,
  unifying us not by our hunger for making a name for ourselves,
   but instead by unifying our hearts in saying,
    "I can't do it on my own. God, please help me."

In just a moment,
 on this feast day of Pentecost,
  we will renew our Baptismal Vows,
   and I want you to notice that every time we are asked to vow something to God,
    that we end with this petition:
     "I will, with God's help."

When we renew our Baptismal Vows
 in celebration of the Baptism of the Holy Spirit in fire and smoke,
  recognize with me
   that we can do none of this on our own.

We are no longer the people of Babel.
 We have become the people of Pentecost.

And so, friends,
 remember as you go into the world,
  that we go forth in the language of sacrificial Love,
   a Love that says, "I will, with God's help."

You go into the world as a people that are no longer alone.
 You go into the world as a witness to God's sacrificial love shown to us in Jesus.
  You go into the world stripped of your pride,
   and clothed with a greater power that makes you whole.

Share this holy Truth with the world,
 that none of us can make it without God who made all of us.
 
And teach others the language of Love.
 Because in doing so, you teach them the name of God.

In the name of the +Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.