Become the Flame

Blessed be God who animates our lives and calls us to remember on this Pentecost the holy flame and life-giving breath which the Holy Spirit brings to all creation in fulfillment of God’s divine plan. AMEN

Throughout this Lent and Eastertide and Ascensiontide and now Pentecost, I have felt a strange likeness to the season of isolation and imaginative worship we have been experiencing during this time of COVID19. It is not just the coincidence of time but rather the coincidence of theology. Beginning with ashes and ending with fire, looking for resurrection signs and welcoming the ultimate liberation from time and space which the Ascension brings, have we not been living every moment, every emotion, every doubt, every fear, every joy? 

And like the aftermath of the crucifixion and resurrection when people gathered in different ways to ponder and console, to pray and to listen, to worship, have we not been deep into imaginative ways of pondering and consoling, praying and listening and worshipping?

I would submit that even with technology pushback and exhaustion, I have experienced a deepening of faith, a renewal of commitment and a sense of wonder rekindled.

I have also, however, experienced deep loss and almost unbearable grief, especially this past week...

And so this Pentecost while we are not physically together and listening for a cacophony of strange voices as the Spirit alights and inspires, I have been noticing a variety of voices and tongues finding their way into our lives and making it known that all, every single last one of us, is filled with the Holy Spirit. Different gifts, different fruits, different behaviors, habits and personalities, different cultures, different secular allegiances, different poverty levels, different emotional experiences, different Myers-Briggs predictions...I could go on and on. 

Pentecost creates and magnifies a kind of chaotic and magnificent variousness which actually means something. We are called to make meaning of it and not just get through it. It is not just a birthday party for the church; it is a culmination of all divinity in diversity made manifest. 

There is much talk about fire at Pentecost. Many wear the color red to signify that. Banners are created and images reproduced to attest to the flames of this Spirit filled emolation! 

Fire brings fear for many. It can distance. And it can also warm. 

When I think of fire I think of the story of the Desert Fathers: Abba Lot came to Abba Joseph and said: Father, according as I am able, I keep my little rule, and my little fast, my prayer, meditation and contemplative silence; and, according as I am able, I strive to cleanse my heart of thoughts: now what more should I do? The elder rose up in reply and stretched out his hands to heaven, and his fingers became like ten lamps of fire. He said: Why not become fire?

Why not indeed?

Whether they did or did not is less important than the essential message. All spiritual practices are meaningless if not furthering our full development into divine selves we were intended to be. Within each of us is that ember of sacred self which is kindled by the Holy Spirit and made manifest in our diversity and variety. 

This seems for some chaotic and tumultuous but God created the world out of chaos and is making all things new. This fire within is part of the creative energy to bring God’s vision and mission to fruition.

That leads to me to one line in the reading from Paul’s letter to the Corinthians today: To each is given the manifestation of the Holy Spirit for the common good.

Common good

This ignition is communal not individual. When one light is snuffed out by human hands not by natural albeit harsh circumstances the Pentecostal glowing celebration is set back, interrupted, and must be reconciled.

This week we had such a violent interruption when George Floyd was killed while crying I Can’t Breathe!!!

I cannot imagine...

This kind of terror and racial hate are diametrically opposed to the common good and life in the Holy Spirit. The manifestation of the Spirit is fire and wind. For fire cannot burn without oxygen. The Holy Spirit is not only fire-like energy but it is sustained by the Breath of God. When we cannot breathe we cannot come fully alive!

We have work to do that we might realize our communal calling to be pentecostal people, to bring light and life to creation and make it come alive! That is our Kingdom work!

Today I invite us to realize our role in helping to bring about the common good which God imagines and to imagine ourselves becoming the flame! 

Common good, becoming fully alive, living into our holy identities, is the incarnational sacrament we celebrate at Pentecost. It is the Kingdom on earth. 

It is the outward and visible sign of the inward and invisible grace of having been created in God’s image. When we gather in a building or virtually, through prayer or silence, we are acting in holy communion. 

May we never take that for granted and may this holy communion remind us of the God in whom we live and move and have our being, in multicolored varieties.

So I invite you to stand and stretch and become the flame...why not!

As you meditate on Sherry’s playing of Hymn 516 Come Down O Love Divine may you feel the seeking of your soul by the Spirit and may you know that ardor glowing which is nothing less than God dwelling within you!

A Prayer for the Power of the Spirit Among the People of God

God of all power and love,
we give thanks for your unfailing presence
and the hope you provide in times of uncertainty and loss.
Send your Holy Spirit to enkindle in us your holy fire.
Revive us to live as Christ’s body in the world:
a people who pray, worship, learn,
break bread, share life, heal neighbors,
bear good news, seek justice, rest and grow in the Spirit.
Wherever and however we gather,
unite us in common prayer and send us in common mission,
that we and the whole creation might be restored and renewed,
through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.