What Does This Mean?

One of the disadvantages of Being Old is that people don’t understand me.  When I’ve laid out my plans and agendas and procedures in what I feel is perfectly good English, there are those who ask, “What do you mean?”  People of Earth have always wondered, I suppose, what it ‘s all about.   Those who hear readings for this Pentecost weekend will resonate with believers who continue to ask, “What Does This Mean?”  Will insight follow?

We begin with a reading that is actually TWO readings.  If I were  planning worship, I’d separate the Joel 2 section from the larger one of Acts 2:1-15.  The Acts passage is the traditional Pentecost story about the coming of the Holy Spirit to citizens of the entire known world, with tongues of fire and the rush of a mighty wind.  Whereas at the ancient Tower of Babel the people’s language was confused, now God has made plain to all near ‘n’ far the universality of the Word.  This idea of God takes Jesus beyond a local Jewish sect into a realization of a world-wide phenomenon.  What was once divided has been mended–if folks can accept the wholeness of What This Means.

Be careful with the Joel 2:28-32 part:  Peter–or Luke?–twists this a bit to work in an Old Covenant prophecy.  Is “afterward” (Joel) the same as “in the last days” (Peter)?  Splitting hairs, perhaps.  At any rate, a nice image is proclaimed of the Spirit liberally POURED; not dribbled or sprinkled.  Some will get hung up on the portents of bloody-red moons and other ominous signs…my own feeling is that these are but a background for this world-wide baptism.

The Gospel, John 7:37-39, tells about Jesus’ presence at a whole ‘nother festival, the Feast of Booths or Tabernacles.  “Originally a harvest festival, it came to be associated with the eschatological hope for a time when God’s life-giving presence would flow out in rivers from the Temple…”  (Meda A.A. Stamper, in FEASTING on the WORD, A 3:21)  Jesus offers himself here as a Holy Stream for the relief of the world’s thirst (remember the Woman at the Well).  Does this apply, then, to all who believe?  Are they/we conduits of this living water to those who crave sustenance in the arid times?

Receiving God’s life-giving flow of water and fire and wind enables the new “church” to speak fluently to the nations and situations of the world.  It doesn’t promise the Reign of Christ–yet–but affirms the actions and presence of Believers then and now.

In the process of unfolding,                        Horace Brown King

My encounter with scriptural passages lined up for the upcoming weekend can be found every Tuesday at this spot on Facebook; or at horacebrownking.com