Tongues of Fire

 Yesterday was Pentecost Sunday in our church year.  This is the event when a great sound and light show came upon the early followers of Jesus Christ who had gathered from the known corners of the world.  The Holy Spirit invaded the gathering of those people in Jerusalem and there was a great wind, tongues of fire over their heads, and the local people were speaking in the languages of everyone who had gathered there

When I was trying to discern my call to be ordained, I was in some ways hoping for something as distinct from the Holy Spirit as all the action on the Day of Pentecost.  I was hoping to get a Road to Damascus experience – like the original one in which Paul was knocked off his horse when he received a voice from Jesus asking him why he was persecuting Jesus?  A voice that would have given me a clear message that the road to ordination I was embarking on was the correct one.  Well on reflection, and considering what happened to Paul, I decided that I would prefer a more subtle message after all. 

I received that some time later.  I was in the process of deciding to begin the path to ordination with the diocese and went for an interview with the Dean of Theology, at Huron College, John Chapman as part of that process. 

Well, I had a very positive interview with the Dean, and the indication seemed to be that I was beginning the journey that God intended for me. 

After the interview, I got in my car to drive home and turned on the radio.  A CBC program was on air in which three people were being interviewed about their becoming clergy later in life – second or third careers like me.  I took that as the work of the Holy Spirit - my road to Damascus or road to ordination experience.  Now this could be dismissed as a mere coincidence.  However, Carl Jung has called these experiences of meaningful coincidences, synchronicity.  It certainly was a meaningful coincidence for me I was certain that this was a sign for me as the work of the Holy Spirit and one that has helped sustain on my road to ordination and as a priest since.

So, can we conclude that the Holy Spirit does not always work in such dramatic ways as it did on the Day of Pentecost which we celebrate today?  Let’s look at some other accounts of the Holy Spirit in the bible.  Jesus promises his disciples in John 16:13 that the Spirit will be a guide and “the Spirit would guide them into all the truth.”  In Acts 8: 29, the Holy Spirit instructed Philip to go to the chariot of the Ethiopian eunuch, leading to the eunuch's conversion. The Holy Spirit is a teacher - Jesus referred to the Holy Spirit as the Advocate who will teach His followers all things and bring to their remembrance all that He had said to them.  The Holy Spirit also has the role of sanctifier.  Paul writes in 2 Thessalonians that God chose the believers to be saved, through sanctification by the Spirit and belief in the truth. 

The Holy Spirit was there in the beginning when God created the world – a wind from God – the Holy Spirit swept over the face of the water before God said, “Let there be light.”   The Holy Spirit the creative power of God – the empowerer, guide, teacher, and sanctifier. 

As I discovered in my road to ordination experience, the Holy Spirit is not always as easy to discern as on that Day of Pentecost.  However, be assured that it is still at work in us and in the world.  We must play our part in working with God by identifying how the Holy Spirit is at work and responding to that knowledge.  It can be in the still small voice we hear; it can be in our dreams if we pay attention to them; it can be in meaningful coincidences; it can be in the inspiration that gives you the answer that you have been struggling to find for a long time.  It can be in the inspiration we receive from an unexpected encounter in reading the bible as you come to gather in bible study or on our own.  It can be when we come together in the name of Jesus Christ to worship and partake in the body and blood of our Saviour.  Be assured that it is there at work in and for each of us. 

May we be blessed to recognize the Holy Spirit guiding us on our journeys. 

Wither the Holy Spirit

Last Sunday was Pentecost.  The scripture reading from Acts is one of the better know passages of the New Testament which describes the impact of the Holy Spirit on those assembled in Jerusalem at what is now considered the birth of the Christian Church.  There was the sound like a mighty wind, tongues of fire on the heads of the assembled, and the speaking in tongues―which should be remembered was by the Galileans in the different languages of the assembled people (unlike the modern speaking in tongues which apparently no one can interpret).

I noted in my sermon that the Holy Spirit seems to be more subtle in its work these day.  At least we don’t seem to recognize the work of the Holy Spirit as easily as happened on that Day of Pentecost two thousand years ago.  As a result, we seem to have trouble being aware when and how the Holy Spirit is actually working in our lives and in the world. 

Coincidentally, at the time I began to write my sermon the Daily Meditation from Richard Rohr, for that day arrived in my mail inbox.  It had a passage which addressed just this point:

In the great basilica in Assisi where Francis is buried, there is a wonderful bronze sculpture of Francis inviting the Holy Spirit. Instead of looking upward as is usual, he gazes reverently and longingly downward—into the earth—where the Spirit is enmeshed. Francis understood that the Holy Spirit had in fact descended; she is forever and first of all here!

There are many different ways―perhaps countless ways―in which the Holy Spirit is at work in our lives.  However, we do not have ears to hear and eyes to see many of them.  This coincident of the email from Richard Rohr is one of them.  It is what I consider to be synchronicity.  Synchronicity is a technical term which can simply be defined as a significant coincident.  A more formal definition is:

the coincidental occurrence of events and especially psychic events (such as similar thoughts in widely separated persons or a mental image of an unexpected event before it happens) that seem related but are not explained by conventional mechanisms of causality —used especially in the psychology of C. G. Jung

I have for many years been interested in synchronicity as a concept and have had some experiences of it in my life.  I consider them to be significant and can, as in the case of dreams, reveal things to me about where my life is and where it is heading. 

In the case of the Richard Rohr quote it was a helpful encapsulation of what I had wanted to say about the work of the Holy Spirit today.  Another example in my life was when I had been considering my call to ordained ministry.  I had been taking a few theology courses at Huron College, basically for interest, as I approached retirement for the first time from my civil service job.  I had resisted what seemed to be the nagging of God telling me that I should begin the formal path to ordination.  I decided the only way to move forward was to actually begin the formal part of the journey.   I went for an interview with the Dean of Theology at Huron, John Chapman.  We have a very positive conversation.  At the conclusion I started my drive home and turned on the radio which was tuned to CBC radio one as usual.  What was playing was an interview with three people who had been ordained later in life.  I took this to be confirmation that I was on the right path in my life.  That this was and is the right path seems to have been confirmed since.

Another example which was more a question of confirming the important of synchronicity in my life as a phenomenon happened many years ago when I was taking a course on Jungian psychology at University.  In one class we considered Jung’s concept of synchronicity.  We were discussing an essay on the subject written by Jung.  It was entitled “On Synchronicity” in the collection The Portable Jung.  In it he writes, “On April 1, 1949, I made the note in the morning an inscription containing a figure that was half man and half fish. There was fish for lunch.  Somebody mentioned the custom of making an “April fish” of someone.”  Jung goes on from there to discuss the multiplying of coincidents that occurred.  For Jung the concept of fish was very important as it represented in dreams and waking life material that is drawn from the unconscious of a person.

It so happens that I was born on April 1^, 1949.  It also happened that the class was begin held on April 1^st.  I inquired of the professor if he had chosen to deliberately to discuss the topic on that day because it fell on April first.  He declared that he hadn’t.  It was, in effect, a synchronistic event about synchronicity. 

I have had other experiences of synchronicity which I consider to be important.  It is very easy for someone to dismiss these experiences as mere coincidence without meaning.  However, as with much of the work of the Holy Spirit today we need to be open to the possibility that the Holy Spirit is working in our lives in ways that can be meaningful if we pay attention to them.

I hope that you will be open to however the Holy Spirit is working in your life journey and in the world.

Blessings on your journey.