Invisible Omnipresence Given a Name

Day of Pentecost A  May 28, 2023
Gen. 11:1-9Ps. 104: 25-32

Acts 2:1-11 John 14:8-17, 25-17

Lectionary Link

To see if one is still alive, one can place a mirror under the nostrils of the one near death.  If there is breath in that person, the mirror may cloud and that cloud is an effect of the breath and life of the person.

When we see tree branches and leaves rustling, but we don't see a visible material pushing against them, we name the invisible wind as the cause of such movements.

And we understand how the ancients arrived at breath, wind, ruach, pneumatos, Spiritus, as metaphorical words to speak about great Life itself.

How do we come to name what is invisible?  Why do we name the invisible when the invisible cannot be made visible by the sheer act of naming?

First of all, we name everything that is visible and invisible by what is invisible.  Words are invisible.  They have sensorial products of speech sounds and writing, but words themselves are invisible phenomenon.  Words also have the products of body language deeds.

Is that which is visible or sensorial the only criteria for something to be meaningful?  Using words and naming things is also psychological, in that it occurs from the constitution of our inner invisible being.

The biblical story purports to be writings about events when the effect of the invisible Spirit became known in meaningful ways to the people who experienced these events of the Spirit.

The naming of the Spirit was found in the creation story.  In this story, the words of God spoke things into existence and the Spirit moved over the un-worded chaos and brought the incredible diverse world into being.  Diverse things which came to have names.

The world is experienced as both an ordered cosmos but also as internally competitive cosmos experienced as chaos in the clash of systems which the reality of genuine freedom requires.

It is very difficult to detach Spirit events from Word Events.  The Bible itself is a conglomeration of textual word events spanning the hundreds of years of its compilation.  The Bible includes words about word events, events of the effects of God's Spirit being made evident to people.

The crowning Word and Spirit event of the Hebrew Scriptures was the arising of the Law and the attending writings and stories of the people who were inspired to create such milestone remembrances.

The Law was words about how to live best case scenario lives given the limited experience of the contexts of the biblical writers.

Word and Spirit have never been finished in the visible world.  Words always have subsequent interpretations into the new contexts in which they are read.  As such, the Torah, and the Hebrew Scriptures were still growing and becoming during the time of Jesus.  Jesus was living Word and Living Spirit in human form; Jesus was a Spirit event both for Mary and for humanity.  He intertwined the meaning of his life with the great words of the Hebrew Scriptures.  As the Word made flesh, he instantiated the Spirit in human flesh.  He as the Word made flesh, said that his words were Spirit and life, and so united word and spirit.

If Jesus is the fullest visible effect of God's presence, what does most of humanity have to experience who were not privileged to experience such a full visible effect of God's presence in the life of Jesus of Nazareth?  Are we indeed divine orphans because God only blessed a few people with the visible presence of the Spirit made flesh in Jesus of Nazareth?

The feast of Pentecost is a feast of word, language, and Spirit.  The Feast of Pentecost is the celebration of what the followers of Jesus discovered after he could no longer be seen, namely, the discovery of his continued presence by the Great Force of Life Itself, the Holy Spirit.  And just as Jesus was the Holy Spirit life in the flesh, the followers of Jesus understood themselves as Holy Spirit life in the flesh which would effect their lives in word and deed such that the effects could be known and transmitted to other people.

The Day of Pentecost is when in our story,  God's Omnipresence is given the name of Holy Spirit.  Naming is what people do because we have language ability.  Our very lives are organized by language, and so we too are word and language made flesh.  The Day of Pentecost is a day to celebrate that God can be translated into the lives of people of all languages.  God can be known as relevant to everyone.  And the Holy Spirit is the great translator of the life of God into anyone's language.

The Day of Pentecost is a day to celebrate that Word and Spirit in human experience means specific direction toward the life of love and justice that has been exemplified in Jesus Christ.  It is not enough to know words and life force;  Christ as the Eternal Word of God and Holy Spirit as the life force of God give superlative direction to the words and the energies of our lives which are ever in need of having God's love translated into the words and deeds of our lives.

Let us observe this day in our corporate story when God's Omnipresence has been named as the Holy Spirit.  And let us accept the Holy Spirit as the direction of our lives toward the love and justice of Jesus Christ.  Amen.