Pentecost Sunday Homily - 5.31.2020 - "Reciban el Espiritu Santo"

Feast of Pentecost

Numbers 11:24-30

Psalm 104:25-37

 Acts 2:1-21

John 20:19-23

I.

Santo Evangelio de nuestro Señor Jesucristo,

 según San Juan. 

"Al llegar la noche de aquel mismo día, el primero de la semana, los discípulos se habían reunido con las puertas cerradas por miedo a las autoridades judías. Jesús entró y, poniéndose en medio de los discípulos, los saludó diciendo:

"¡Paz a ustedes!"

"Dicho esto, les mostró las manos y el costado. Y ellos se alegraron de ver al Señor. Luego Jesús les dijo otra vez:

"¡Paz a ustedes! Como el Padre me envió a mí, así yo los envío a ustedes."

Y sopló sobre ellos, y les dijo:

"Reciban el Espíritu Santo. A quienes ustedes perdonen los pecados, les quedarán perdonados; y a quienes no se los perdonen, les quedarán sin perdonar."

El Evangelio del Señor.

[John 20:19-23, DHH (Dios Habla Hoy)]

______

I bet everyone is very glad

 that their bulletin has the English version of this Gospel Passage,

  or else, I imagine, very few of you would know what I just said.

You probably know that I read from the Gospel of John,

 the passage that is appointed for this morning. 

  But perhaps you had a grin on your face appear,

   when you realized that I am not speaking your native language,

    which for us is U.S. English. 

The reaction that many of us have to hearing a different language

 ranges from a kind of pleasant curiosity

  to even so far as a frowning disdain and a sideways glance. 

However, this morning,

 I'm going to share something very personal with you

  that I think is merited on this particular Feast of Pentecost.

   And it is something that I'm far more willing to be misunderstood for

    after the events of this past week that took the good lives of my black neighbors:

     George Floyd, Ahmaud Arbery, and Breonna Taylor, just to name a few. 

And it is the experience that showed me most clearly

 that my whiteness has gifted me a privilege of position

  that has completely screwed up my perspective on God. 

Here is how God taught me this.

 And this is not an attempt to raise my own voice above other people,

  saying that you are bad and I am good.

   No, I sincerely pray that that is not what you take away from this.

    I'm actually needing this morning to confess to you, my brothers and sisters,

     the ways that I have been sinful and negligent,

      and how God has started to save me from it. 

And that necessary beginning of my lesson

 happened in three places in my life:

  Monterey, Mexico,

   Lima, Peru,

    and Todos Los Santos in Bentonville, Arkansas. 

When I was in 7th grade,

 I went on a short term mission trip to a sister church to my hometown church in Vilonia, AR,

  that is in Monterey, Mexico. 

It was the first time I ever experienced what it was like

 to be a minority. 

Sure, I was there for the work of the Gospel,

 and particularly to assist in building a physical space for the church to meet in,

  so I was missionary labor, so to speak. 

   But I cannot forget what a fish out of water I felt like in that time. 

I didn't know how to speak Spanish

 past the kindergarten-level sentences of, 

  "Hola! Me llamo Mark."

   And

    "Donde está el baño?"

But what was more striking was how I was not even able to interact with people

 in a meaningful fashion unless there was some concerted effort made between us. 

I felt nervous, anxious, scared of any interaction between myself and a native Mexican.

 Even though they were kind, hospitable, and very generous to us Gringos,

  I could not escape how uncomfortable I was.

   Why couldn't they just speak English?

    Why did I have to learn to speak a language that I didn't know?

Flash forward to 10th grade,

 where once again,

  I went on another short-term mission trip

   to Lima, Peru. 

Once again, we were helping with some basic remodeling of a church partner,

 but this time I had two years of high school Spanish behind me.

  This time, I was prepared!

Or so, I thought. 

Because, guess what?

 Monterey Mexico and Lima Peru are COMPLETELY different places,

  with distinct cultures, distinct people,

   distinct accents and dialects of Spanish,

    and I as this super white country dude from Arkansas

     was dull enough to just assume that when I understood the language,

      that would take care of the problem!

No, it didn't. 

 And I had it put in my face when I spent that week in Lima,

  utterly unable to understand and wrap my mind around why my experience was so different,

   and how I still experienced the embarrassment of getting laughed at when I said a sentence,

    and how I could see the sideways glances of people 

     who see this blue-eyed, brown haired U.S. guy

      and recognize that many people view us in the U.S. like I viewed them:

       if you have seen one, you have seen them all,

        and that there is no difference in a white guy from Arkansas from a white guy in New York. 

Then,

 flash forward again to 2014,

  when I served as an intern at an Episcopal Church. 

   But not just any Episcopal Church:

    one that has an extremely healthy Hispanic congregation,

     La Iglesia Episcopal, Todos Los Santos, in Bentonville.

       In English, that is All Saints Episcopal Church. 

And I didn't just stay there for a week. 

 I was there for a whole calendar year. 

  And I was just as much a fish out of water then

   as I was in 7th grade. 

But what was different this time was that I was there for a whole year. 

 Every week, I worshiped with them in La Santa Eucaristía: Rito Dos.

  In English, that means, "The Holy Eucharist: Rite II."

I couldn't understand a lick to start with,

 as I had no reason to practice my Spanish since high school. 

  Spanish was a utility for me, 

   something to use as a means for basic communication. 

    But what I was exposed to was not just Spanish,

     but the entire cultural and social aspect as well. 

The way I live and worship as a white person in the U.S.

 is SO different than my brothers and sisters at Todos Los Santos.

  And that's not necessarily a good thing, either. 

Even though most Sunday mornings we are saying pretty much the same service,

 almost word for word in both English and Spanish,

  their execution and culture of the service is night and day

   compared to ours this morning. 

It is punctuated by loud Mariachi-style music,

 joyous laughter from kids running around the nave,

  deep prayer from the older members,

   and a jovial atmosphere that somehow also carries a strong sense of solemnity and reverence

    even in the midst of a far noisier worship space. 

And after the service, 

 the ladies of the congregation bake and prepare authentic dishes from Central America,

  South America,

   and the Caribbean

    for all of us to eat for lunch,

     all while conversation and sharing of story happen all over the place. 

I would get there in the morning for worship at 11am, 

 and I wouldn't be home until nearly 3pm!

  I couldn't believe how LONG people stayed.

   I had stuff to do, man!

    I can't stay that long!

But that year changed me,

 because I also saw how much more real and scary

  that being a minority was for them

   than it ever could be for me in the U.S.

Their culture,

 their language,

  and the color of their skin,

   was the source of direct discrimination and racism,

    the likes of which I had never seen before. 

The cat calls from white folks of, "We only speak English here!"

 the name-calling that I heard white people use, that I'm not going to repeat here in church,

  the pain I saw people carry. 

   And I recognized how my white skin and my white culture in Arkansas

    had blinded me from an intense and very real problem

     that I had never experienced. 

But just because I never experienced it

 doesn't mean it is not viciously real for my friends and neighbors

  who aren't white. 

And I think I would never have realized that

 if it wasn't for God putting me in those places

  to really see the inhumane and unChristian treatment

   of those for whom God has poured out his Holy Spirit upon

    in the world-changing event of Pentecost and the coming of the Holy Spirit. 

II.

If you don't think that Pentecost has something to say about this,

 then we need to shift our perspective on how we see the Gospel

  in our Acts reading this morning.

Because something that is easy to skip over

 is the list of places, people, and cultures

  that hear the Gospel proclaimed to them

   in the power of the Holy Spirit. 

And where were they all from?

 Well, let's let St. Luke tell us:

"Parthians, 

 Medes, 

  Elamites, 

   and residents of Mesopotamia, 

    Judea and Cappadocia, 

     Pontus and Asia, 

      Phrygia and Pamphylia, 

       Egypt and the parts of Libya belonging to Cyrene, 

        and visitors from Rome, 

         both Jews and proselytes, 

          Cretans and Arabs-- 

           in our own languages we hear [these Galileans] speaking about God's deeds of power."

Think of the places where these people have come from!

 These people don't just represent the Mediterranean:

  they represent places from modern Northern Africa,

   Mid and Southern Europe,

    the western islands from the Atlantic Ocean,

     the Middle and Far East.

      Literally, for the readers of Acts,

       it was a representation of the known corners of the world. 

And the Holy Spirit spoke in such a way through the Apostles

 that all heard them speak the Gospel in their own native tongue. 

And this proclamation was a proclamation of repentance! 

If we read on with what St. Peter said after our passage today,

 Peter tells out the Gospel of Jesus Christ,

  who was crucified and raised,

   now giving the forgiveness of sins to all who call upon his name,

    and the listeners from all over the world are called to repent,

     to turn from their ways, and believe in Jesus Christ, and be baptized. 

      [c.f. Acts 2:22 and following]

People from everywhere,

 red, yellow, black, and maybe some white,

  because my ancestry is from the British Isles,

   and so, in the first century, we are the barbarians of the North,

    so we aren't off the hook yet. 

But nonetheless, 

 God poured out his spirit,

   the Holy Spirit, 

    even upon the Gentiles,

     the "Nations,"

      because God was not afraid or embarrassed to go to the people he loved:

       which is ALL of us. 

III.

The question that burns in my mind this morning, friends

 is that if God is so passionately willing to go out into the world to all people,

  why is it that we so rarely do the same?

If God is so willing in Our Lord Jesus

 to move towards "those people"

  the sinners, the prostitutes, the Samaritans,

   why are we so slow in following suit?

If Jesus, a very dark skinned 1st Century Jew who is also fully God

 is willing to die on a cross for the salvation of the world

  including us white people,

   why do we white people so rarely take seriously what has happened racially

    in the U.S.'s history and in our current point in time?

I have no good answer to that question, friends.

 But what I offer is this:

  now more than ever,

   we need to be able to set aside our comfort and our convenience as the dominant white culture

    in order to build relationships that protect the oppressed and broken.

As many beloved Black theologians and public speakers have repeatedly said in the past week,

 "Racism isn't getting worse. It's getting filmed."

  [c.f. Presiding Bishop Michael Curry's Pentecost message].

The pain that we feel when looking at the hourly news is a real pain,

 and what I would offer is that it is a necessary pain. 

  It is a pain that we don't know how to deal with,

   and it is okay to just say, "I don't know what to do."

And when we get to that place,

 here's what Michael Curry, our Presiding Bishop, a black man,

  says about what we should do

   and it has to do with what Love looks like:

"Love looks like making the long-term commitment to racial healing, justice and truth-telling — knowing that, without intentional, ongoing intervention on the part of every person of good will, America will cling to its original, racist ways of being.

Love looks like working with local police departments to build relationships with the community and develop mechanisms that hold officers accountable. It means ensuring that no police officer with a history of unauthorized force or racialized violence is shielded and allowed to endanger the lives of those they’ve sworn to protect and serve.

Love looks like all of us — people of every race and religion and national origin and political affiliation — standing up and saying “Enough! We can do better than this. We can be better than this.”

What does love look like? I believe that is what Jesus of Nazareth taught us. It looks like the biblical Good Samaritan, an outsider who spends his time and money healing somebody he doesn’t know or even like."

[https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2020/05/31/black-man-i-understand-anger-our-streets-we-must-still-choose-love/]

Pentecost is a world changing event

 in which God poured his very self out upon us

  adopting us as his sons and daughters.

Where today, friends,

 are you called to follow the God who is Love

  into a hurting world, desperate for the presence of Jesus Christ,

   who loves us,

    red, yellow, black, or white,

     and gave himself for us?

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