Dear All
On the day of Pentecost, God’s longed-for promise arrives as a rush of wind and tongues of fire. The wind moves beyond our control, the flame does not consume but illuminates. In that sudden, startling moment, a bewildering crowd, men and women from many places and many languages, hear the good news in their own words.
That ancient story speaks to us now in Biddenham and Great Denham, a community and parish growing more diverse, layered with cultures and languages, histories and hopes.
The story is simple and radical. The disciples, fearful and fragmented, are gathered together on the day of Pentecost in the face of shattered hopes. It would seem that they have lost hope and courage, but the fact that they chose to meet, to pray and to break bread, was itself a mustard seed of faith.
A violent wind breaks through their closed room; tongues of flame land on each of them. The Spirit gives them speech and courage. People from Ethiopia, Asia, the Mediterranean, those who have come to Jerusalem for pilgrimage or trade stand amazed as they hear the gospel in their own tongues. Where barriers of language, power and isolation once stood, a new common speech of witness and welcome is given.
There are so many layers of meaning in this:
Wind and flame as images of God’s Spirit are both unsettling and tender. Wind refuses to be contained by walls of imposed order; it moves where it will, making borders obsolete. Flame consumes what must be purged: fear, prejudice, complacency, and warms what can be kept: compassion, hospitality, conviction. The Spirit’s power is not domination but transfiguration: a transforming presence that reorders relationships, loosens tongues and redefines the community of the Church, because we recognise the source of our power.
It is easy to have a faith of certainty when walls are strong, houses are big, finances are secure and the day is as certain as a sunrise, but for so many this is not the case: so many people in our growing, diverse communities face despair and hopelessness. For many, the cracks appear in not only one area of their lives, but at almost every point, expanding and diversifying, as circumstances become too overwhelming to deal with.
When I was a child, I sat with two friends on New Brighton Beach on the Wirral. The tide came in and we tried to build a fortress out of sand to hold back the sea. Given that we were around the age of eight, we did a fairly decent job, but in the end, the force of the ocean broke into our little fortress, and we had to go back, wet, to our parents for a towel and an ice cream. A group of adults had been watching us and they clapped out loud. We were little scouse King Cnuts who had, for a moment, held back the sea, but we were children, and our fortress had been overwhelmed.
The task of faith is, for so many, so difficult because of the power and force of the task that lies ahead. My view is that churches should not judge or condemn, but we should be there to encourage and empower the weak, the helpless and the marginalised, offering them community, acceptance and love.
Look around the parish and you can hear traces of a representation of Pentecostal in the making. Our streets and pews carry layered accents and customs: names that are unfamiliar and cause us to struggle with pronunciation; children who move between English and another home language before breakfast; elders who hold deeply felt memories of other lands and other losses. These layers can feel like noise; an interference to “how we’ve always done things”. Or they can be a chorus, a richer orchestra made possible when the Spirit loosens our tongues and manners and gives us the courage to listen.
Pentecost honours the disorienting fact that God shows up in plurality. The miracle is not that everyone suddenly becomes the same; it is that difference itself becomes the medium of unity.
Pentecost reminds us that the Spirit’s work is greater than our fears and more creative than our plans. The wind that broke down the disciples’ isolation is the same breath that can carry us beyond familiar boundaries into a more daring, more generous life. The flame that sat on each head was small enough to fit in a human palm and bright enough to change history. May that flame land again here, on our habits, our liturgies, our welcome and may we find, in the rush of that wind, a shared language of courage and love.
May the Lord bless you during this season of Pentecost.
Eric