The Comforter
Has Come!
It’s Pentecost Sunday!
Sermon for Sunday May 27, 2007
1. Good Morning – Let’s Pray . . .
2. It’s Pentecost Sunday! What’s Pentecost all about?
3. If you were forced to reduce the meaning of Pentecost to a few words – what would they
be?
4. I will give you what I think it is but first
some context . . .
5. Today marks the 50th day after Easter Sunday – it’s the 7th
Sunday after Easter Sunday.
6. It’s also 10 days after the Lord’s Ascension to heaven.
7. For the Jews at that time – the Season of Pentecost was the time they
celebrated the bringing in of the first harvest.
8. But ON THIS PENTECOST SUNDAY – something very different was
about to happen!
9. Our first Reading recorded it – Read 1
10. Ah! Can you see where I’m
heading here?
11. Yes, what Pentecost is all about is this – Jesus, in the Person, and
Power and Presence of the H/S is now fully present with us!
12. I think that for us today the key verse is verse 18. “I
will not leave you as orphans.”
13. Ah! At the end of all
discussion is this sublime reality – that Jesus wants
for us to always be near to Him! For us
to never ever ever feel as orphans!
14. As a Christian do you ever feel abandoned as an orphan must
often feel?
15. If you do then there’s something very very
wrong!
16. Because on that first Pentecost Sunday Christ came back to
us to be with us forever! So that we woul never ever ever feel like
orphans!
17. Jesus comes to us in the form of the Comforting and Counseling Holy
Spirit!
18. Listen now to the Second Reading – listen for this sense
of Comforting!
19.
Read 2
20. Ah! Can you sense
God brooding over His Body – the Church – as a nurturing Mother or Father
seeking to make sure that His precious Body is comforted!
21. Like a Gardener . . .
22. Like a mother . . .
23. You see on that first Pentecost Jesus made sure that we
would never ever ever ever
be alone!
24. Jesus died to never leave us!
25. Did you hear that?
26. He died and then rose to never ever ever
leave us!
27. Now let’s turn to our Gospel reading and look for this
same sense of comfort!
28.
Read 3
29. The Promise of Pentecost is His Presence and His Peace –
the ultimate Comfort!
30. So let me pull all of these thoughts together . . .
31. It was on that first day of Pentecost that Christ made
Himself Present to all who wanted to know HIM!
32. Imagine that He is like a very very
comfortable comforter and that He wraps Himself around you at all times!
33. Christians are never ever ever EVER alone!
34. Ah when we come humbly seeking the comforting Presence of
our Lord we can be absolutely certain that He will come and He will comfort us!
35. Tell story of my Prayer Retreats – the wonder of
solitude.
36. I have forgotten how frightening being alone can be!
37. You see Pentecost is all about never
being alone again!
38.
Now what does that mean to you and me today?
39.
It means that when any of our fears well up inside of us – we can turn
to our peace-bringing Comforting Holy Spirit and seek and be certain to receive
His Comfort.
40.
It means that when things don’t work our at our day job we can reach
out for and receive our Lord’s comfort.
41.
It means that
when things go wrong in any of our relationships we can know for certain that the Comforter is right there
with us – comforting us!
42.
Think of any
situation which is threatening your peace right now – and invite the Holy
Spirit to comfort you – to bring you into His peace!
43.
Now what forms
can this comforting take!
44.
A better question
perhaps is what is in the “took kit” as it were of the Comforter – that He can
use to comfort us?
45.
Stories in the
Bible tell us some of the answers to this question!
46.
King David was
aided again and again by the Holy Spirit – He was comforted, He was protected,
He was fought for, He was defended, He was rescued and so on!
47.
St. Paul was
guided on all of his missionary journeys!
48.
St. Peter was
given words! He was released from jail
and so on and so on!
49.
The fact is that
the Holy Spirit’s comforting tool kit is unlimited in what He has at His
disposal.
50.
Why then do so
many Christian go un-comforted?
51.
It’s simply
because we ignore the Comforter and look rather to our own cleverness or hard
work or prudentiality to provide for our comforts!
52.
Oh Lord –
whole segments of Christiandom write off this “Holy Ghosty” stuff in the name of Cessationism
or just old fashioned hard-headed American rationalism!
53.
But that first
day of Pentecost really did happen and at this time of the Church Year we are
being reminded that THE COMFORTER is here for us!
54. What does it mean – it means never having to face
anything again alone – even when every human being deserts us – He WON’T!
55. Let me close with a
reading from the Book of Isaiah 40: Is. 40:1
56.
Comfort, comfort my people, says your God. 2 Speak tenderly to Jerusalem, and
proclaim to her that her hard service has been completed, that her sin has been
paid for, that she has received from the LORD’s hand
double for all her sins. . . . 11 He tends his flock like a shepherd: He
gathers the lambs in his arms and carries them close to his heart; he gently
leads those that have young. 12
Who has measured the waters in the hollow of his hand, or with the breadth of
his hand marked off the heavens? Who has held the dust of the earth in a
basket, or weighed the mountains on the scales and the hills in a balance? 13 Who has understood the mind of the
LORD, or instructed him as his counselor?
14 Whom did the LORD consult to enlighten him, and who taught him
the right way? Who was it that taught him knowledge or showed him the path of
understanding? 15 Surely the
nations are like a drop in a bucket; they are regarded as dust on the scales;
he weighs the islands as though they were fine dust. 16 Lebanon is not sufficient for altar
fires, nor its animals enough for burnt
offerings. 17 Before him all the
nations are as nothing; they are regarded by him as worthless and less than
nothing. 18 To whom, then, will
you compare God? What image will you compare him to? 19 As for an idol, a craftsman casts
it, and a goldsmith overlays it with gold and fashions silver chains for
it. 20 A man too poor to present
such an offering selects wood that will not rot. He looks for a skilled
craftsman to set up an idol that will not topple. 21 Do you not know? Have you not
heard? Has it not been told you from the beginning? Have you not understood
since the earth was founded? 22
He sits enthroned above the circle of the earth, and its people are like
grasshoppers. He stretches out the heavens like a canopy, and spreads them out
like a tent to live in. 23 He
brings princes to naught and reduces the rulers of this world to nothing. 24 No sooner are they planted, no
sooner are they sown, no sooner do they take root in the ground, than he blows
on them and they wither, and a whirlwind sweeps them away like chaff. 25 “To whom will you compare me? Or
who is my equal?” says the Holy One. 26
Lift your eyes and look to the heavens: Who created all these? He who brings
out the starry host one by one, and calls them each by name. Because of his
great power and mighty strength, not one of them is missing. 27 Why do you say, O Jacob, and
complain, O Israel, “My way is hidden from the LORD; my cause is disregarded by
my God”? 28 Do you not know? Have
you not heard? The LORD is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the
earth. He will not grow tired or weary, and his understanding no one can
fathom. 29 He gives strength to
the weary and increases the power of the weak.
30 Even youths grow tired and weary, and young men stumble and
fall; 31 but those who hope in the LORD will renew their strength.
They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they
will walk and not be faint.
57.
This is who comes to comfort us!
58.
Let’s pray . . .
Read
1
Acts
2:1
When the day of Pentecost came, the disciples of Jesus were all together in one
place. 2 Suddenly a sound like
the blowing of a violent wind came from heaven and filled the whole house where
they were sitting – I wonder if they
remained sitting?? 3 They saw
what seemed to be tongues of fire that separated and came to rest on each of
them. 4 All of them were filled
with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues or languages as the Spirit enabled them.
Acts
2:5
Now there were staying in Jerusalem God-fearing Jews from every nation under
heaven. 6 When they heard this
sound, a crowd came together in bewilderment, because each one heard them
speaking in his own language. 7
Utterly amazed, they asked: “Are not all these men who are speaking Galileans? 8 Then how is it that each of us hears
them in his own native language? 9
Parthians, Medes and Elamites;
residents of Mesopotamia, Judea and Cappadocia, Pontus and Asia, 10 Phrygia and Pamphylia,
Egypt and the parts of Libya near Cyrene; visitors from Rome 11 (both
Jews and converts to Judaism); Cretans and Arabs—we hear them declaring the
wonders of God in our own tongues!”
So this is what happened and the key
phrase in all of this is in verse 4:
“All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit!”
Remember now this is a fulfillment of
Christ’s prophecy in the Gospel of John when He said:
John 14:16
And
I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Counselor or Comforter to be with you forever— 17 the
Spirit of truth. The world cannot accept him, because it neither sees him nor
knows him. But you know him, for he lives with you and will be in you. Now
listen very carefully to the remaining 2 verses for they touch on what I
believe is the central theme of Pentecost . . .
18
I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you. 19 Before
long, the world will not see me anymore, but you will see me. Because I live,
you also will live.
And
at the end of the Gospel of Matthew we read:
Matt. 28:20
.
. . . And surely I
am with you always, to the very end of the age.”
Go to #10
Read 2
Usually
when we read this passage from 1 Corinthians chapter 12 we tend to focus on the
gifts but this time I want us to focus on the fact that “THEY ARE GIFTS” FROM
GOD TO US! GIFTS FROM
THE HEART OF GOD - FOR WHAT REASON?
LISTEN FOR WORDS OF COMFORT:
1Cor.
12:4
With the coming of the Spirit came the giving of Spiritual gifts -
There are different kinds of gifts, but the same Spirit. 5 There are different kinds of
service, but the same Lord. 6
There are different kinds of working, but the same God works all of them in all
men.
1Cor.
12:7
Now to each one the manifestation of the Spirit is given for the common good. 8 To one there is given through the
Spirit the message of wisdom, to another the message of knowledge by means of
the same Spirit, 9 to another
faith by the same Spirit, to another gifts of healing by that one Spirit, 10 to another miraculous powers, to
another prophecy, to another distinguishing between spirits, to another
speaking in different kinds of tongues, and to still another the interpretation
of tongues. 11 All these are the
work of one and the same Spirit, and he gives them to each one, just as he
determines.
1Cor.
12:12
The body is a unit, though it is made up of many parts; and though all its
parts are many, they form one body. So it is with Christ. 13 For we were all baptized by one
Spirit into one body—whether Jews or Greeks, slave or free—and we were all
given the one Spirit to drink.
Go to #20
59.
Read 3
John
20:19
On the evening of that first day of the week, when the disciples were together,
with the doors locked for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood among them and
said, “Peace be with you!” 20 After he said this, he showed them
his hands and side. The disciples were overjoyed when they saw the Lord.
John
20:21
Again Jesus said, “Peace be with you!
As the Father has sent me, I am sending you.”
22 And with that he breathed on them and said, “Receive the Holy
Spirit. 23 If you forgive anyone
his sins, they are forgiven; if you do not forgive them, they are not
forgiven.”
Now listen to verse 27 of chapter14 of the Gospel of John:
John 14:27
Peace I leave with you; my
peace I give you. I do
not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not
be afraid.
He comes to us in His resurrection Holy Spirit Presence with a peace
offering – the eternal guarantee of His Holy Spirit!
Go to #29