St. Paul’s On-the-Hill Episcopal Church
The Rev. Stephen C. Holton, Rector
The Day of Pentecost; May 31, 2009
John 15:26-27; 16:4b-15
WHAT DO YOU HEAR ON THE WINDS FROM GOD?
It’s About Love
What do you hear on the Winds from God? What do you hear from the Spirit that blows in your and every ear? What do you hear from the Spirit that blows all over the world – and all people hear the sound of it though no one knows where it comes from and where it goes.
What do you hear?
People all over the world in every generation including ourselves have tried to pin the Spirit of God down in various temples and institutions; but it will not be pinned down. It blows wherever it wills, to whomever it wills, including you, us, and the people over the next hill and the next hill and the next country and the next culture. It blows wherever it wills. God speaks to whomever He wills. It all depends on . . . who’s listening.
What do you hear on the Winds from God, from the Spirit from God that blows in your ear? Are you listening?
The Spirit speaks in every age and circumstance and in every part of life; but, are we listening – in every age and circumstance and every part of life?
We recently got a new sound system at home, with a fresh set of speakers along with our old speakers; but we were reluctant to throw out the old set of speakers and make way for the new ones. It seemed like such a waste.
So Charlotte – who knows about these things – found a way to hook up the new speakers and the old to the amp, so all of them could pipe music into the house.
The old speakers continue to be in the living room. The new speakers are on special shelves – which I made – in the kitchen.
So you can walk from one part of the house to the other and still hear music. You can walk from sitting to working and still hear the same music.
God is like that. He is a sound system that exists in every part of life, in every part of the world. Wherever you are, God makes sure He’s piped in. So we don’t miss Him. Working or playing, we don’t miss Him.
Sometimes when I drive home I have the radio on in the car. I turn it off. I park. I go inside. The same station is playing.
The same God is speaking no matter where we are. Are we listening?
It might be on a great sound system in a great cathedral. It might be in a little country church. God is still speaking.
It might be on a little blue tooth ear piece or to you alone when you’re off by yourself. God is still speaking. Is the headset on?
It might be in the woods on a summer’s day or gardening when it’s a little misty outside. It might be out on the water, driving to work, taking the train. It might be in the desert in the Middle East, in the rocky cliffs of Pakistan, the forests of Africa or herding cattle in Argentina. God is still speaking.
It might be in any number of religious houses of worship through any number of people in any number of hearts. God is still speaking.
Are we still listening? Are those people?
Are we listening to each other? God said to do that too. When we speak to each other as friends, and share God’s words of love though we learned them in other cultures and backgrounds, God is glorified. God is made known among us.
We are made into a new community by His word, shared in our inmost hearts by the One Holy Spirit.
This is what Jesus promised.
He promised that after he left he would send to us the Advocate, the Speaker. Not just the Speaker to God for us but the Speaker to us from God – “the go-between God,” someone once called him. The go between God between God and . . . everybody. So we must speak to everybody and learn from everybody what God is saying to all of us.
But it will be something about love. It will be like what Jesus said. That is what Jesus said. He said: “He will glorify me, because he will take what is mine and declare it to you.”
“He will take what is mine and declare it to you.” Everything the Spirit says in our hearts – in the woods, in the church or the office or through other people – is what was Jesus’ to begin with.
It will sound like his words. Or it will be words to his music. So if you hear something from another religion, that conforms to what Jesus said, it is the Spirit talking. And if you hear something from no religion, and it conforms to what Jesus said, it is the Spirit talking.
If you hear it from the unlikeliest of sources and the unlikeliest of personalities, and it is like what Jesus said, it is the Spirit talking – to you. That would be why the same words come to you from so many different sources. God is trying to get through to you and so He has all the speakers in every room of your life tuned to the same channel! You can’t get away from Him.
Perhaps if all the peoples of the world are saying the same thing – whether it’s from Qur’an or Bible or Torah or Bhagavad Gita or the works of Einstein – God is saying the same thing to all people, and to all governments and institutions.
Jesus said the Spirit would come. Jesus said the Spirit would speak, in every heart, without benefit of institution or higher authority.
The question is, do we listen?
The other question is, do we speak – once we’ve listened?
Do we pass on what we’ve heard? Do we pass it on in the office, or once we’ve gotten home from that inspired commute? Do we pass it on to a friend or in church or to that new acquaintance who seems in such desperate need of love?
For the word is always about love. “He will glorify me, because he will take what is mine and declare it to you.”
Will you pass it on, in all those places where the sounds of God pipe themselves into your heart, using those words of God or the words of Love – because they are the same thing, for Jesus spoke of Love.
We are the speaker system, sent from the Father, placed in every room, big and small, public and private, with ready access to all God’s children. Do we speak?
Do we speak here, in God’s special sound studio, in the grounds all around and the sanctuary in the middle, in our own voices, with word and song and with a handy cup of coffee to offer; but always with love?