A lot has happened between last week and this one in the
book of Acts. Last week, in Acts 1, the disciples were watching Jesus ascend
into heaven and acting dumbfounded that he didn’t give them the military victory
they were after. This is a far cry from this week, in Acts 3, as we find Peter
and John doing their absolute best Jesus impersonation, healing in the same way
that Jesus healed, speaking in the same way Jesus spoke; simply, being pretty
good followers of Jesus. Somehow, in the span of two chapters the disciples
figured it out. Something clicked. And that something is the Holy Spirit.
I’m going to briefly touch on Acts chapter 2, which we
did not read today or last week because it is a traditional reading on the day
of Pentecost at the end of the Easter season and we will read it then, but it
is critical to understanding what made the disciples change so here’s a little
context. In Acts 2 the Holy Spirit descends, people start speaking in tongues, they
hear one another each in their own language, and the disciples emerge as
different creatures. The Holy Spirit wrecks their old lives and makes them into
the Jesus-followers they always should have been when he was alive. This is
very good news for all of us, because, frankly, we don’t get to see Jesus face-to-face
today, but we have the very same Holy Spirit messing with us that they did on
that first Pentecost. And it can change us like it did them.
So when Peter and John come across a man crippled by the
gate, begging for a handout, they do the Jesus-thing: They heal him. They don’t
give him food or money; they give him health—something he didn’t even ask for. Health
is always a first sign of salvation. Every time. But they also give him more
than that. This man, who was the least of those on the outside of the temple,
becomes the one who witnesses to God inside the temple. The outside has come
in. This is what Jesus was always doing.
The man who was on the outside because of some imagined
unworthiness becomes worthy because of what the Holy Spirit does through
ordinary people. This is a story of how God makes the outside in. So, who are
our outsiders? Who are we keeping at arm’s length? Because those are not just
the people we are called to be nice to, or to feed, or to clothe; we’re not
even called just to welcome them—yes, all that, but much more. Those are the
people who will preach to us. They will tell us about God far more surely and
more persuasively than the people on the inside. They are the ones whom the
Holy Spirit will use, because they know what it feels like to be treated as
unworthy.
This week I sat down with a person in this community who
had fallen behind on bills, who is facing medical issues—both physical and mental—the
very definition of a person on the outside. Not a member of a church. Not a
person who feels comfortable showing up here, let alone anywhere, on Sunday
morning. And you know what she did when I stopped by? She preached to me. She
said, “I can see the handiwork of God in everything—how the leaves of a plant
are different, one from another. I see God in all sorts of small things.”
The Holy Spirit chooses people like this. The kingdom of
God is made visible through people like this. People without privilege. People who
should have no hope. People who would never show up in worship on Sunday
morning because in a thousand different, very subtle ways they are told they
are unworthy.
Look how they
dress!
Does
he have alcohol on his breath?
Don’t
they know they’re not supposed to bring a mug in the sanctuary? And what’s in
that mug anyway?
They’re
sitting in my spot!
Or, more likely, it never gets to this point because they
face a thousand more obstacles to ever get through the front door because
they’re uncomfortable and they feel broken, and because we’re uncomfortable
with them.
I’m
not saying these people should be welcome in the church. Much more than that, I’m
saying these people who are on the outside are the ones who will show us Jesus.
That’s how the Holy Spirit works, and it is as uncomfortable as it gets. Inside
is comfortable; inside is easy. Outside scares us; outside makes us vulnerable.
The idea of begging at the gate sounds worse than death. Honestly, it does,
because the amount of shame that accompanies begging for scraps from the
well-put-together masses on their way into the temple is immense. Can you
imagine—yourself—sitting outside begging for some food, begging for some money?
No, because I don’t
have a drinking problem.
No,
because I don’t have mental illnesses.
No,
because I have chosen better.
If
that’s our attitude then forget about the Spirit. Actually, forget about
anything I say because then it’s just me saying it; it’s just thoughts I jot
down over the course of the week, like any blogger or opinionated person can. If
there is a Spirit working here the Bible shows us again and again that that Spirit
works through the ones who make us uncomfortable. It’s why part of my calling is
to afflict the comfortable, and I feel that if I’m not doing that I am not
pastoring as I should. Most of us on the inside need to be more afflicted, but,
with that said, there are also people here who are the ones who are afflicted
and we need to give them the space and the freedom to show us what the Holy
Spirit is doing. And I’m not talking about the imagined victimhood that breeds
films like God’s Not Dead. I’m
talking about people who for myriad different reasons do not have a voice. The
Holy Spirit works contrary to privilege and contrary to all the ways we want to
control it.
So, a church that follows the Spirit is, by definition, messy.
The temple was not ready for the Holy Spirit. So, eventually, the temple gets destroyed.
The Holy Spirit does not care about history on the one hand, or the future, on
the other. It builds on one; it prepares the other; but it does so always in
the now. The Holy Spirit is in the business of right now. What are you doing
right now to pave the way for God’s kingdom to break through?
How
are you making yourself uncomfortable? That’s really the question.
How
are you neglecting comfort for the sake of making God’s kingdom present here?
Because
you are saved by Christ, through his death and resurrection, raised with Christ
not only on Easter but in our baptisms and in our deaths, how are we living out
the reality that we are saved creatures? How can we let the Spirit loose with
the assurance that all of that is already taken care of?
The disciples didn’t get it at first. Not when they lost
Jesus. Not even when he was raised from the dead. Not until the Holy Spirit
took a group of foreigners and losers and people sneered at for being drunk at
nine in the morning and used them to show the world what it looks like when God
moves through human beings. Then the disciples became the disciples they were
always meant to be. Then they became like Jesus—going to the vulnerable, the
losers, the broken, and they gave them not just hope; they gave them a voice
and that voice is where the Holy Spirit speaks to us today. Through the
marginalized, the forgotten, the least of these—to these is the kingdom of God.
Are we welcoming that? More than that, are we ready for them to preach to us?
The Holy Spirit is bringing the outside in. It’s doing it
as surely in Hallock today as in Jerusalem after Jesus ascended. Do we get it,
yet? I’m not sure. But that’s the calling we all have. Like it or not, if you
want to know what salvation is listen for the voice of those who have no voice.
Let’s let them speak.
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