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The Feast of Pentecost–Today

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Pentecost, one of my favorite celebrations in the Church year, is vibrant, sensory, exciting, colorful, unpredictable, wild…. Yesterday was an unanticipated Pentecost Preparation Day. I woke up with a little bird, as it were, pecking at my mind for me to get up and read the Pentecost story in Acts 2:1-21. The verses describe the cataclysm of “a mighty rushing wind, the tongues of fire, and the Holy Spirit descending upon the multitudes.” I read the sensational Acts passage and decided I wanted to draw a circular stained-glass window with the Holy Spirit and the tongues of fire inside. A 5-inch bowl made a great template for the window. But when I started to draw, the Holy Spirit refused to stay in the circle. The tongues of fire refused to stay in the circle. And I thought, “Isn’t that just like the Holy Spirit? Try to cage It and you are always in for a big surprise!”

 

When I read the Acts lesson, I also underlined some words in the text and doodled a visual response in the margins of my Bible. I am not a regular Bible journaler, but I like the process of entering Scripture with a pen and some colored markers or pencils. I read the passage or page and then try to be still and listen as I draw. I’m not as brave as some of the people who pray this way and dare to illuminate the text itself with drawings and lettering. (Check out some of the Facebook pages or websites about Bible journaling. Visual Faith Ministry is one example.)

Visual engagement with Scripture helps me to remember the passage for later encounters with it. I see the colorful bookmark-like drawing on the side of the page and I’m back in the Word. This artistic response feels different than Bible study. In Bible study, I feel the need to master the material and get information. I try to dissect and analyze the words, have control over them, and understand them once and for all. “Okay, I know what that’s about, let’s move on.” The hardened quest for information tamps the possibility for transformation. I am like the poetry students who Billy Collins laments in his poem Introduction to Poetry*:

“But all they want to do
is tie the poem to a chair with rope
and torture a confession out of it.
They begin beating it with a hose

to find out what it really means.”

 

If I substitute the word “scripture” for “poem,” the lines describe my sometimes uninspiring and laborious relationship with the Word. When I enter the Scripture, instead, with my backpack of art tools and start to draw, I release the need to pin down the Word and hear its final confession. To give up control of the Scripture feels scary and dangerous, like I’m inviting the Holy Spirit to take me blindfolded on a trust walk or an expedition of uncertain destination. “The wind blows wherever it pleases. You hear its sound, but you cannot tell where it comes from or where it is going. So it is with everyone born of the Spirit.” (John 3:8 NIV) Who knows where such an expedition might lead?

 

I remembered the picture below from a few years ago. The big swath of silk fabric behind me was a costume my mother wore, probably in the 1930’s, for her role in The Firebird, a ballet with music by Igor Stravinsky. For several years my husband Andy wore it as the celebrant’s garb in Pentecost services. Right before we moved to Florida in April, I found it in a cedar chest. It practically disintegrated in my hands. I’m glad I had it for as long as I did. Firebird feels like a terrific image for the Holy Spirit.
*Billy Collins, “Introduction to Poetry” from The Apple that Astonished Paris. Copyright � 1988, 1996 by Billy Collins. To read the whole poem on the Poetry Foundation website, click here.

Tongues of Fire and a Fiery Vestment

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“When the day of Pentecost had come, they were all together in one place. And suddenly from heaven there came a sound like the rush of a violent wind, and it filled the entire house where they were sitting. Divided tongues, as of fire, appeared among them, and a tongue rested on each of them. All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other languages, as the Spirit gave them ability.”  Acts 2:1-4 (NRSV)

Many words come to mind when I think of the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit, also called the Holy Comforter, is the Person of the Trinity I call upon when I am scared or need comfort. But on the Day of Pentecost, the Holy Spirit seems less like a Comforter and more like a rocket launcher. The wild, untamable Spirit of God propels the disciples and people in Jerusalem to actions and speech out of their control. Pentecost is called the birthday of the Church because on this day God anoints and commissions individuals to spread the Good News as a community and to go places where they would not dare to go on their own.

When I feel brave enough to surrender to the Holy Spirit, this is what I pray. (Fill in the blank with the words in the drawing.) “Holy Spirit, __________ me/us.” I believe the Spirit still wants to fire up the Church to do these things for us as individuals and as the Body of Christ in the world.

Pentecost 2015 v2

For the past few years I have not thought of Pentecost without the piece of silk below coming to mind. My mother was a dancer and this was her costume from Stravinsky’s Firebird ballet in the 1930’s. My husband Andy repurposed it as a Pentecost chausuble–a colorful outer liturgical vestment worn during the Eucharist or Communion.

SAMSUNG

 

Pentecost

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Today is the fiftieth day after Easter, the day called Pentecost. I love Pentecost because it celebrates the descent of the Holy Spirit on the followers of Jesus. With all kinds of people praying in all kinds of strange languages, this Disneyesque, magical blast of a day became known as the birthday of the Christian Church. With so many references to fire and blood, red is the color of the day.

Here are some verbal images from the story in Acts 2:1-21 (NRSV) and some visual images from my church at the Pentecost celebration today: