Emmanuel Episcopal Church
May 23, 2021
Pentecost, B
Acts 2:1-21
John 15:26-27; 16:4b-15
Unity In the Midst of the Gods
About 12 or 13 years ago, I was meeting with Rabbi Annie from Temple Sinai to learn from her about Judaism and especially about first-century Judaism. While I was able to read about first-century Judaism in biblical commentaries and my Bible’s footnotes, those were all written by Christian authors, and I figured, “What do they know?” So I called Rabbi Annie, and the two of us began to have monthly coffees to learn about each others’ faiths. That began a great friendship which continued and strengthened when we were worshipping in Temple Sinai for over two years after Harvey flooded our previous building.
In one of Rabbi Annie’s and my early coffees, Annie was talking about Jewish holy days, one of which was Shavuot, the holy day from which Pentecost came. Now, Pentecost is the Greek word used for the Jewish Festival of Weeks, the harvest festival described in Leviticus 23 and Deuteronomy 16, as all of us know, being good Episcopalians who read our Bibles. The idea was that the people of Israel would bring the first of their harvest to God to give thanks and dedicate the harvest to God. I know we all know that.
So, when Rabbi Annie started talking about Shavuot, the festival of weeks, as the time when they remembered God giving the Law at Mount Sinai, I was utterly confused, saying, “Wait, no, that’s the harvest festival, the first fruits deal, right? From Leviticus. What does God revealing the Law have to do with it?” I was so cute showing off my biblical knowledge.
Rabbi Annie explained that after the destruction of the Temple and of the nation of Israel, the people of Israel were left without a place to bring their harvest offerings, and since much of the society was no longer agrarian, a harvest festival didn’t make an over abundance of sense anymore. So, the rabbis discussed the idea that as the Festival of Weeks came seven weeks after the Passover feast, so did the giving of the Law on Mount Sinai come about seven weeks later. The Festival of Weeks made sense to be the time to celebrate the giving of the Law.
The festival of Shavuot changed from the harvest festival to a time of celebrating the revelation of God given to Moses and the people of Israel on Mount Sinai. Both harvest and revelation.
For us in the church, the Festival of Weeks, Pentecost, changed as well. On that first Pentecost after Jesus’ resurrection, Jews had come from all over, both within and beyond Israel, to Jerusalem to celebrate the Festival of Weeks. Peter and the other apostles were also planning on celebrating the Festival of Weeks, the harvest festival, as they had so many years before, but then, something strange happened. The Holy Spirit was revealed to them and to those gathered near them as tongues of fire, resting upon them, and those Jews who had come from all over heard the apostles speaking to them in their native languages, not just in the Hebrew language. God was connecting these people from disparate parts of the region into one people, through the Holy Spirit. Both harvest and revelation.
The harvest was the church. The revelation was that God was not just the god of one people, but that God truly was the God of the whole earth, indeed of the whole cosmos. See, as Israel was being formed as a nation, there were near constant struggles with other nations. Who was going to win? As they would fight, God would win the victory over other nations' gods.
So, the God of Israel was the supreme God over all others. We read in Psalm 82:1, “God has taken his place in the divine council; in the midst of the gods he holds judgment.” Whether considered gods or lesser heavenly beings, they were all subservient to the God of Israel, the God of all creation. Even so, God was often understood as a tribal god. As with all the other tribal gods, God was seen as the God of Israel, not of all the peoples. He was God above all, but favored that one nation. A tribal God.
Then, the birth of the church at Pentecost, the harvest, and the revelation that God was not the God only of one people, but the God of all peoples, as each heard in their own language the proclamation of the apostles. Pentecost is both the harvest of the church and a revelation that God desires one people throughout the earth, unity, rather than tribalism.
This idea had been spoken of through prophets many timed before, and Paul wrote of this idea in his letter to the Ephesians, that God is the God of all peoples and that God’s desire is for all of humanity to be united. In Ephesians chapters 1-3, Paul writes of the mystery of God that has been revealed, namely that God would gather up all things in Jesus, all things in heaven and on earth. Paul wrote of Jesus as sitting at the right hand of God in the heavenly places (where these other gods dwelt), and Paul wrote the church as the body of Christ, dwelling as Christ’s body with God in the heavenly places right now, so that we are both here on earth living out our mortal lives and at the same time we are in the heavenly places joined together as Jesus’ body.
Paul went on to say that we are joined together with Jesus as part of God’s revelation, that we are in the heavenly places revealing even to the gods or heavenly beings, the the unity that God has in mind for all of humanity. No more tribalism and no more tribal gods. One people living in unity.
Now, that does not mean that we are meant to convert all people to Christianity. We’ve tried doing that for a couple millennia, sometimes even forcing conversions on others. That’s led to lots of conflict, war, and disunity. Forcing, coercing, and shaming conversion has not been a quest for unity, but the Church turning God into one more tribal god. We don’t find unity through tribalism and conflict. We find unity through love and belief that there is one God over all humanity. Many of us call God by different names, and that’ ok. God is big enough for all our names.
That’s what we found when we worshipped for over two years at Temple Sinai. While both congregations believe in the God of Israel, we believe such different things about that God, that as far as religion goes, they are very distinct. As much as our beliefs area different, however, we also get to believe that we worship not two different tribal gods, but the same High God who is God of all the tribes, of all the nations. Being at Temple Sinai, we found that we don't need to be right in our beliefs or for the other religion to be wrong. We have unity and love with Temple Sinai while still worshipping with two very different faiths.
The same is true throughout the earth. We call God by different names, and God is big enough to answer to all of them. God’s mission for the church is to strive for unity among the peoples of the earth. God’s mission for the church is to live and to share God’s great love for all humanity. God’s mission for the church is for us to be united, both here and in the heavenly places among the gods, the heavenly beings. Our mission, our way of life, is unity with all people through love and forgiveness, and to share that unity with all of humanity both here and in the heavenly places as God gathers up all things in him, both in heaven and on earth.
