Open Your Mouth

Acts 2:1-21

I wonder if they knew what they were going to say, before the Holy Spirit blew through them and set them afire.

Do you think they planned a persuasive speech about Jesus; five key points, a summary, an altar call? Or do you think they were as surprised as anyone else to hear what came out of their mouths?

Jesus had told them that this would happen. You will receive power by the Holy Spirit, he had said, and be witnesses, testify from Jerusalem to the ends of the earth.

And if they were planners (like I try to be), maybe they did figure out what to say, what words and stories they wanted or needed to share about Jesus, about God’s deeds of power, and the transformation of the world.

Have you figured it out? Do you know what you want to say to the world, as a witness of Jesus? Something you need to say about what God has done in your life?

You know we’re supposed to do that, right?

We’re not usually very good at teaching testimony, or expecting personal proclamation, in the Episcopal Church. And yet it’s still a promise we make in baptism, a promise we make again, several times a year, here in worship, even if different words or a different book was used at your own baptism. It’s a promise we’ll all make again in a few minutes, as we renew our baptismal promises together on this anniversary of the church’s very first baptisms – three thousand that day in Jerusalem:

Will you proclaim by word and example the good news of God in Christ?

I will, with God’s help.

Many of us are more comfortable proclaiming the good news by example than by word – and nothing about this promise requires us to set up on the street corner or go door to door for Jesus! – but example alone isn’t what we promise.

Sooner or later, we’re going to have to open our mouths.

A year or so ago I attended a conference where I was urged to develop an “elevator speech”: 30 seconds, maybe a minute, to encapsulate what I most wanted people to know about Jesus.

We had a workshop on it.

I was terrible.

I stumbled. I ran long. I fell silent when I couldn’t figure out what to say. (Turns out a seminary degree doesn’t help.)

That’s neither the first nor the last time I tried, but I just don’t have an elevator speech. I can’t seem to plan what to say about Jesus, about God, but over and over again in my life, when I’ve really had to explain my faith, or my call, or why I do what I do, I’ve always found the words.

All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak,  that day in Jerusalem, as the Spirit gave them ability.

Whether they’d planned their speeches or not, the Spirit gave them ability, and they spoke. The varied languages are just the icing on the cake when the Holy Spirit gave those disciples – and gives us – the ability to speak so that hearers can hear.

The Holy Spirit has – more than once, regardless of my level of preparation for preaching or unpreparedness for conversation – given me the ability to speak of God, of Jesus, so that others can hear.

The Holy Spirit gives you that ability too. Truly.

I just have to believe Jesus, when he tells us this will happen; believe him when he tells us we are going to testify. Just had to believe enough to open my mouth.

When we renew our vows, at Easter, at Pentecost, when we bring children for baptism, at anyone else’s baptism; we explicitly accept responsibility for proclamation. Then we just have to believe ourselves, that with God’s help, we will proclaim; and believe that Jesus means it when he calls us witnesses, and the Spirit gives us ability.

Ability to proclaim, to witness, to testify, not on street corners, necessarily, but with words, and with examples that provoke the questions we have to answer with our words.

And if you still feel unready (frankly, I do too); if you feel like the Spirit hasn’t given that ability to you, well, maybe it’s useful to notice that the action of the Holy Spirit give that ability to the community, not just to individuals.

I’ve noticed that when I talk to families before baptism, as we look at these promises about proclaiming good news, serving Christ in all persons, loving our neighbors, striving for justice and peace, most of the time, if I ask “how do you do that?” there’s caution or uncertainty in our conversation. 

But if I ask “who do you know who does this well?” there’s no hesitation. We may not know what to say for ourselves, but we know proclamation and love of neighbor and striving for justice when we see it.

You do, too, don’t you?

You know someone who does that well.

And you proclaim good news – I’ve heard you – when one of you describes to me what another of you is doing, in love of neighbor, or service to Christ; in reconciling, or in striving for justice and peace. I’ve even heard you proclaim the work of God in something I’ve done without noticing that it was Spirit-filled.

When you call it out in someone else, instead of being silent about the grace you actually see,

your words proclaim good news; you testify to God’s deeds; to the presence of Christ.

So call it out explicitly. Tell your friends where you see Christ in them. Tell friends, maybe even strangers, how they have shown you God’s love, God’s healing, holy, gracious power. Call up someone who’s made God present in your life, or the world, and tell them so. Write them a note. Tell someone else what that person does. Be specific about the love of God you see.

Name it. Claim it. Proclaim it.

Open your mouth, and use your words, because the Spirit gives you ability, so that your hearers can hear.

And don’t forget to put words to your own example.

If you cook breakfast in Camden; give your time to help a struggling soul, strive for justice in your daily work, or care for the earth because of God’s love, then say so. Not on street corners, not unless you want to, but do tell a friend about why it matters to you, why it’s natural to you, to love your neighbor or serve Christ in these ways.

If your prayers or actions when you hear news of another school shooting have anything to do with Jesus; if your relationship to God motivates you to respond to tragedy with anger and love and action, tell someone why. Tell someone how what you do is motivated by God.

When you are moved to be hospitable, generous, vulnerable, or radically sincere, ask yourself where Jesus is in that for you, and then tell someone. In a world where too many see Christians being  defensive, punitive, self-righteous, smug or judgmental – yes, that’s what people think of Christians these days – I promise you there’s someone longing to hear how Jesus makes you generous.

You don’t have to plan a whole speech about it. Just seize the opportunity when it happens in conversation. Because the Spirit gives you ability to speak so your hearers can hear.

You may not see the tongue of fire on your own head when you do this, but I do. I hear the rushing wind of God, see you alight, when you proclaim God’s news, about your own experience, about what you see in others.

Because opening your mouth is a miracle as great and as ordinary as hearing conversation in many languages at a crossroads in Jerusalem. The Spirit breathes over and in us and through us, not only long ago in Jerusalem, but in you and me, now and tomorrow, and wherever we go, so that our hearers can hear God’s story, if we just open our mouths, and speak.

Get Ready

Acts 1:15-17; 21-26

How do you get ready?

Think about your morning routine – or about preparing for travel, or a big event. When you need to get something done, or when you know something big is about to happen, how do you get ready?

For many of us, those answers will involve coffee. (show of hands) Or tea, or diet coke?

Getting ready often involves clothing, or getting equipment together. What else is involved? Making lists. Washing. Checking the weather or the news.

Does anyone here “get ready” by creating some silence or space for yourself? By prayer? Getting ready – for the day, or something momentous – is often a mental and spiritual exercise.

What about throwing dice, or casting lots?
No? Nobody?

I’m not surprised – that’s not a usual method of “getting ready” for 21^st century Americans. But we heard about how it was an essential part of “getting ready” for the believers in Jerusalem, about six weeks after Jesus’ resurrection.

After the first shock of Easter, they’d all spent time with the risen Jesus, learning all over again about the kingdom of God, getting oriented to a world in which death isn’t guaranteed, a world God had transformed in ways they hadn’t anticipated. 

Now Jesus is gone again – lifted straight up into heaven while they watched – but he’s told them what will happen next:

You will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; he told them, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.

So here they are in Jerusalem, Jesus risen but gone, given a mission to carry the story to the ends of the earth, and the promise that they will be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from now.

And they know they’re not ready.

Because they are incomplete.

Judas is gone. Dead of betrayal. And since twelve is the number representative of God’s whole people, the count of the tribes who complete the kingdom of Israel, it feels wrong to start this mission of witnessing to the kingdom of God with eleven apostles instead of twelve.

So in order to get ready for the power of the Spirit and their work of witnessing, they try to complete the circle. They sort out what they think it takes to become one of “the Twelve”: time spent with Jesus throughout his ministry, through the resurrection. They pray for guidance and revelation, and then leave it up to God through the tools of chance.

And the lot fell on Matthias. And the eleven became twelve.

And then they felt ready.

This is the only thing we ever hear about Matthias, by the way, in the whole of the New Testament, the whole of scripture. That’s how we know this story isn’t really about him. It’s about completion, about God’s people getting ready, ready for the inspiration and power of the Holy Spirit, getting ready for work; ready for our work as witnesses of Jesus, in Moorestown or Mount Laurel, in New Jersey or Philadelphia, and to the ends of the earth.

How do you get ready for that?

How do you get ready, now, for the inspiration and power of the Holy Spirit to pour all over you? How do you get ready, now, to be a witness of Jesus at home, and in your daily neighborhoods, and to the ends of the earth?

The believers in Jerusalem did three things in this story to get ready:

They figured out what kept them from feeling ready and set out to fix it;

they prayed;

and they put themselves in God’s hands.

You and I probably don’t need to organize ourselves in groups of twelve to do God’s work. The number twelve mattered profoundly to the disciples in Jerusalem two thousand years ago, because it represented the completeness of Israel, twelve tribes, and they knew they’d have felt unbalanced and incomplete at any other number. Naming a group of twelve helped them know God’s kingdom could be complete on earth, with the power of the Holy Spirit.

It’s not likely to be numbers that get in your way, or mine. We’re more likely to notice other things that make us imperfect witnesses to Jesus.

Some of us feel like we’re not good enough people, good enough examples; we make or have made too many mistakes, too many bad choices.

Some of us feel like we just don’t know enough.

Some of us feel like there’s something we need to do first, before we’re ready for the Spirit and for mission – take a class, lose ten pounds, give more (maybe make more money so you can give more), get rid of my doubts, organize my time so there’s enough of it, or my house so I can have people over; be healed; find inner peace….

or at least, have another cup of coffee.

Any of those sound familiar?

Jesus already knows this about you. And me. And us. And even so, Jesus sends the Holy Spirit to pour over us, and expects us to be witnesses to his truth and his resurrection in our neighborhoods and to the ends of the earth.  It may sound like a lot of work, butit’s a grand adventure. One you honestly don’t want to miss.

So we’ll just have to get ready.

Just like the disciples in Jerusalem:

Figure out what we can do about what’s in our way;

pray;

and put ourselves in God’s hands.

If you’re one of us that feels like you don’t know enough, that knowledge is getting in your way, well… read the Bible. You don’t have to read all of it before you’re ready. Even in seminary we don’t read the whole book of Numbers. There might be just one story that you need to know. But you do have to start reading.

And pray.

And put yourself in God’s hands.

If you’re one of us that feels like a bad example, like mistakes and bad choices will get in your way, well… seek forgiveness. Seek healing for the hurt within the bad example.

Or make one good choice. Just one.

And pray.
And put yourself in God’s hands.

If it’s something else that’s making you feel incomplete, unready, then fix it. You don’t have to fix all of it at once, and it may not need fixing the way you think. You can use your doubts instead of losing them. You can find time for one conversation or relationship without being any less busy or more organized. If you don’t know what to do about what’s in your way, talk to me.

Figure out the very first step. Take it.

And pray.

And put yourself in God’s hands.

Because you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.

Jesus is sending the Holy Spirit upon us, ready or not.

We are going to be witnesses of Christ in our lives, whether we plan it or not.

So let’s get ready.