"A Violent Wind"
A Sermon of
The Rev. Dr. David A. Killian, Rector
All Saints Parish
Brookline, Massachusetts
The Day of Pentecost
Whitsunday
June 4, 2006
Text: Acts 2:1-11
I
You may have seen the news that the Hurricane Season is about to begin. People in New Orleans and on the Gulf Coast are bracing themselves and hoping that this year they will not encounter storms as furious as Katrina.
We in New England have not faced the devastation of the hurricanes that battered the Gulf Coast, but we too have had our wind and storms. You may remember Hurricane Bob or the "No Name Storm" that battered New England a few years ago. I happened to be vacationing on Block Island when the "No Name Storm" struck. Wind and rain pounded the island for days. Ferry traffic from the mainland to the island was halted and everyone was told to stay indoors. When the official warning was lifted and it was safe to go out, I drove around the island to survey the damage: downed trees, damaged boats in harbor, shingles blown off roofs. At the north end of the island a breach had opened in a barrier separating an inland pond and the ocean. Water from the pond was pouring out into the ocean. This storm, the "No Name Storm" didn't even have a name. Its punch was much less devastating than Katrina or Rita, but it was strong enough to knock down trees, destroy boats and rip a channel to empty a pond into the ocean.
II
In the Acts of the Apostles, read wondrously in numerous languages today, the disciples were all together in one place. "And suddenly from heaven there came a sound like the rush of a violent wind, and it filled the entire house where they were sitting."
Pentecost is the feast of God's power -- "like the rush of a violent wind." The disciples at that first Pentecost had their lives up-ended -- as though they had been hit by a hurricane. In their case, there was no destruction of persons or property. It was instead an internal change, an interior renewal of spirit, a personal transformation.
J. Philip Newell, former Warden of Iona, in his The Book of Creation, says that Celtic spirituality has a sense of what he calls the "wildness of God." God, for the Celts, is unrestrainable. "A true worship of God, therefore, can neither be contained with the four walls of a sacred building nor restricted to the boundaries of religious tradition. The early Celtic Church was characterized by patterns of worship and prayer under the open skies. The high-standing crosses were gathering places and focal points of contemplation. Often they were situated in wild, exposed sites, as were the many Celtic monastic communities dotted along the coastlines of Ireland and Britain. Earth, sea, and sky, rather than enclosed sanctuaries, were the temple of God."
One of these wild places is Skellig Michael, a steep-rock island off the south-west coast of Ireland where a monastery was built in the seventh century and which I visited six years ago. The boats going to the island had not been running for days because of the turbulence on the ocean. The day I arrived the boats were going out, even though the sea was still choppy. When we were about half-way there, some on board were getting very sick. The captain asked if we wanted to turn back; we took a vote and everyone voted to proceed. For a stretch of the journey I went up to the captain's deck. He pointed to the radar and other modern electronic gear on board, and then reached for a little plastic bottle of holy water. He sprinkled some on the boat, and said, "I use these new devices, but this water also helps me to get there safely." We did arrive safely and as we arrived the sun came out. I climbed the winding path to the top and explored the ancient bee-hive cells that the monks built over a thousand years ago. The cells built without mortar are still standing strong. Those repaired with mortar in the past couple of decades are showing cracks. The monks knew what they were doing! Seeing the stark beauty of these surroundings, I marveled at the courage of these Celtic monks and sensed how they found God in the wilds of nature and in the rush of a violent wind.
III
I felt the presence of God in nature last weekend at our All Parish Retreat at the Bishop Harris Camp and Conference Center in New Hampshire. I took a walk in the woods and could sense the whisper of God in the gurgling of a brook. I could delight in a large bass circling around her eggs near the sunlit shore of the lake, back away from protective adult geese guarding their goslings, and marvel at a humming bird with a red breast that flew nearby. God is in all of this and yet is beyond all of this. As one theologian put it, "You can take the entire universe, add up all that is there -- and there is still more and that is God."
The almighty God of the universe, Creator of "the vast expanse of interstellar space, galaxies, suns, the planets in their courses, and this fragile earth" cares about you and me. Our life is a gift from God, we did nothing to earn it. Each of us is unique and special in God's eyes. You can see some of this uniqueness in the "Pentecost portraits" that grace our altar. They were crafted last weekend on our retreat. Each square is a portrait of someone from All Saints.
We see the beauty of God in the children that we will baptize today. Each of them is a unique and special child of God. Each is created in the image of the Creator. Each is called to an eternal destiny.
Baptism is the primordial sacrament. It connects us to the Creator of the universe and reminds us that birth and life itself are a gift from God. As we celebrate baptism, we remember that Pentecost is the birthday of the church, the day that the disciples had their world turned upside down by the rush of a violent wind -- when they felt the power of God to change their lives and open them to new possibilities. Holy Baptism links us forever to the disciples at the first Pentecost and to the God of wildness, creativity, hope and promise.
Amen.