June 11,
2000
GOD'S
SERENDIPITY FOR US - The Holy Spirit!
An old word is SERENDIPITY
meaning "a happy discovery by accident." It was coined by
the British statesman and essayist, Horace Walpole in
l754, based on the fairy tale of the three princes of
Serendip, who "were always making discoveries…of
things they were not in quest of." What we now call the
nation of Sri Lanka was for a long while referred to as
the Kingdom of Serendip.
Serendipity is a fitting synonym
for God's Holy Spirit. Our two scriptures of today
illustrate how God's Spirit came in unexpected visits:
the early Church had absolutely no expectation of
Pentecost and the blessing of the Spirit until Jesus
promised to send the Advocate or Councilor. And he
delivered what he promised.
The wondrous image of the valley
of dry bones coming to life was given to the Jewish
nation at a time when all were dispirited and broken by
years in Babylonian exile. The last thing the exiles
expected was a new purpose for living and to return to
their beloved Israel.
Both of these powerful examples
of God's Spirit, help us to come to several
conclusions:
…We can expect to
experience the Spirit coming to us in surprising ways,
and often when we are least inclined to believe there is
hope. God does surprise us with joy.
.
…This however does not mean
that God is inconsistent: The Divine is always offering
his presence for his children but God exploits some
circumstances to our benefit and that is when we are
wowed over by a sense that God is with us. And we often
foreclose some circumstances to God's
activity.
…We also can conclude that
the Spirit is a universal experience. Many peoples are
blessed with God's Spirit. Christians do not have a
monopoly upon the Divine Spirit. That is why the Spirit
goes by many names: in the Gospel of John, Jesus called
the Spirit the Advocate, the Comforter, and the Helper;
the prophet Ezekiel prophesied about the Spirit of God
who was the Spirit known and loved by Jesus through his
Jewish spirituality.
…Later the Church
formalized and set in the doctrine of the triune God, the
name Holy Spirit as the overall and encompassing
reference to this serendipitous experience of the Divine
effecting change among people.
Christians enjoy the Holy Spirit
in some ways special to our community and in some ways
shared by others. There is one God and there is one
creation, and all peoples are blessed with the
serendipitous experience that God is with them to help
and reassure them. The Spirit breaks forth throughout the
history of humankind whenever people are on the edge of
despair and death and then are pulled back to new life
and hope.
The special link of Christians
to the Divine Spirit can be only through Jesus. The
Spirit we celebrate is the Spirit that Jesus promised;
the Spirit upon whom we wait for surprising blessings to
stir us and turn us is the same Spirit which was in Jesus
Christ. That is why through the eras of Christian piety
many have referred to the Living Christ as the Spirit
with them.
In Acts l0:38 the disciple Peter
gives the first "official" presentation of the Good News
to the gentiles and he says: YOU KNOW (he is speaking to
the Roman soldier Cornelius "OF JESUS, THE ONE FROM
NAZARETH. AND YOU KNOW HOW GOD ANOINTED… WITH THE
HOLY SPIRIT AND POWER. HE WENT ABOUT DOING GOOD AND
CURING ALL THOSE UNDER OPPRESION BY THE DEVIL, BECAUSE
GOD WAS WITH HIM. (Acts l0:38)
The most central expectation
that we can have when we join the church, no matter
through what ritual &endash; baptism, or confirmation of
baptism, or becoming Serving Members is to expect to be
blessed by the Spirit of God, the same Spirit which was
in Jesus Christ.
This gives a new slant, I
suggest, to these ritual vows and ceremonies of church
membership. Without hope in the Spirit our actions will
remain on only one level of the duties and obligations we
undertake to be better church people. That is fine and
useful but that is only the first step in discipleship.
Indeed, if this is the only dimension on which we
operate, our vows may still smack of legalism and of the
fear that we are not quite worthy to be part of Christ's
family and so we must keep on striving to demonstrate
that we are without sin.
But these same rituals open us
to the expectation that now the Spirit will bless us so
that we can live as disciples, that is as persons
apprenticed to Jesus Christ. A disciple of Jesus is
anyone who commits to living the life that Jesus would
have us live.
We are not asked to live the
life of Jesus, for he has lived his own unique life. But
Jesus has promised to give us His Spirit for our lives.
***************
The important place for waiting
for the Spirit to empower us is not in the church but in
our daily lives. The majority of our living takes place
in our daily rounds of family and personal relationships,
in our workaday weeks, in our recreational and rest
periods.
To be a disciple means we put
these inclusive areas of our living under the instruction
and guidance of Jesus Christ. What a wonderful
expectation that we will receive something special from
God, not on Sundays, but on Mondays and Thursdays and
Saturday nights.
Discipleship means we are
willing to learn from Jesus how to live our lives, not
only our religious lives, but our whole lives.
This, I hope, helps you who
become Serving Members today to clarify exactly what you
are doing: You are asking God to help you live your lives
more as Jesus lived his one, wonderfully transcendental
life. You are not promising to become more religious or
more spiritual. You are promising to become more centered
in the example and the power of Jesus in your whole
lives.
This relieves you of several of
the hang-ups of conventional Christianity: one is that
those who do full time ministry, something which none of
our Serving Members can do, are somehow more blessed than
those, like you, who at best can aspire only to part-time
ministry.
Being a Serving Member has
little to do with the number of hours you spend in
worship, working on church programs, or helping with
various tasks in running the church. These are relevant
to your duties as Serving Members. But they are not the
ultimate blessings which God will give you as you invite
him to be part of the rest of your lives.
The serendipitous and added
dimension of Christian discipleship is that you are now
open to the Spirit influencing your whole lives.
The medieval monk, known as
Brother Lawrence, was a kitchen worker and cook, who
wrote:
"Our sanctification does not
depend upon changing our works, but in doing that for
God's sake which we commonly do for our own…It is a
great delusion to think that the times of prayer ought to
differ from other times. We are as strictly obliged to
adhere to God by action in the time of action as by
prayer in the season of prayer."
What Brother Lawrence was
getting at, I believe, is that disciples or apprentices
of Jesus are persons who try to be Serving Members of the
whole community by inviting Jesus to be present and an
influence in their daily lives; whatever one's business
or profession or work, disciples are Serving Members
there and they can expect the Spirit to empower them and
to counsel them.
I caution you, however, that you
to not make your job or your private lives primary places
of discipleship with Jesus by becoming the Christian
nag-in-residence, or the rigorous upholder of all
propriety, or the dead-eye critic of everyone else's
behavior. This is abundantly clear from Jesus who took
life naturally and easily and without
judgmentalism.
This does not mean that we turn
pious faces away from obvious denials of the Spirit:
Christians do not engage in the profanity now common in
the work place, in our schools, and in our entertainment.
Christians have little time for the silly and sometimes
dangerous preoccupations of the work place like gambling,
gossip, excessive drinking, and loose sexual
attitudes.
Of course the Christian will
witness a gentle and firm noncooperation with things that
everyone knows to be wrong, together with a sensitive
non-officious, non-intrusive, non-obsequious service to
others. This overt manner should be combined with inward
attitudes of constant prayer for whatever kind of
activity our workplaces requires and genuine love for
everyone around us.
As circumstances call for them,
disciples tend to special points we receive from Jesus'
teachings and example, such as nonretaliation, refusal to
press for financial advantage, standing apart from the
silly and profane language and pasttimes of
non-believers, consciousness of and appropriate
assistance to those under special handicaps. But in all
situations we are mindful to meet any obvious spiritual
need or interest in showing forth our relationship with
Jesus in words that are truly loving, thoughtful, and
helpful.
We try to live the Gospel but
there are often occasions when we need to rely upon the
power of words, beautiful and instructive words, to speak
the Gospel. Words about Jesus, and the Spirit, and the
serendipity of the Divine, are capable of bringing life
and joy to others. We cannot assume that everyone knows
what is going on in our discipleship if we live merely
humbly but quietly among them as Jesus' person. They may
just regard you as one more version of peculiar humanity.
Our intention with our job
should be to expect the highest possible good in every
aspect of our daily existence, and we should pursue with
conscious expectation of a constant energizing and
direction from God. Although we must never allow our job
to become our life, we should expect, within reasonable
limits, to make sacrifices of our comfort and pleasure to
enhance the quality of our work.
We do the job well not because
we await approbation from others, but because we know
Jesus wants us to do our jobs well, and we love Jesus. As
Colossians puts it: "WHATEVER YOUR WORK, PUT YOURSELVES
INTO IT, AS DONE FOR THE LORD AND NOT FOR YOUR
MASTERS….YOU SERVE THE LORD CHRIST." (Col. 3:23 and
25).
An episode at a World Olympics
for the Handicap may illustrate the extra, serendipitous
dimension which God gives us when we do the ordinary and
remain open to the extraordinary assist of the Spirit
with us.
Ten physically handicapped youth
were competitors in a l00 yard dash. They all had
physical infirmities which meant there race would be slow
and laboured and as all were disadvantaged any one might
expect to win.
When the starter gun sounded all
enthusiastically set out for the finish line. But one of
the competitors stumbled badly at the very outset.
Several of the other contestants looked back and saw the
kid sprawled on the ground. They stopped and hurried back
to him. Then others noticed the interruption and they,
too, paused. The race ended with all nine helping the
fallen youth to his feet and hobbling with him toward the
finish line.
God's ways are not necessarily
the ways of the world. God's blessing upon as we strive
to be Jesus' men and women in the world will often
surprise us, and then others.
Of course, there is this one
further point. We must decide to enter the race. Whatever
the vast reaches of the Holy Spirit, we must decide that
we want to run the race with God, if God is to move
within the circumstances of our lives.
You Serving Members have counted
the costs of discipleship and decided you want to go on
with the race of your lives and with God present with
you.You have decided to become disciples. Which means you
have decided that you want to please God. And your
intention will make all the difference in how the Spirit
of God will now reach you.
The words which Ezekiel reported
from God still pertain to us: "I will put my spirit
within you, and you shall live."
Pastor Gene
Preston
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