Sermon 5/31/2020 “Authorized Spirit”
Preacher: Jo J. Belser
Location: Church of the Resurrection at VTS in Alexandria, VA
Text: Number 11:24-30
Day: Pentecost, Year A, during a pandemic
We Christians celebrate the Birthday of the Church today. This day, Pentecost Sunday, is when Christ Jesus gave his disciples his authorized Spirit. We heard about this event in two of our lessons today. The reading from Acts that Cor Medrick read so amazingly well in many languages is most familiar. In this event, Jesus’ disciples were waiting, as Christ Jesus had commanded after his Resurrection.
The disciples were observing the Jewish Passover festival, no doubt, while they waited. That’s when the Holy Spirit appeared so vividly for all to see and hear. John’s version of this event is more private, with the disciples locked away by themselves when the Risen Christ came and breathed God’s Spirit into them, as God had breathed his Spirit into the world at creation. Either way, though, Jesus’ disciples received the Holy Spirit.
Given what Jesus’ disciples accomplished next, we know beyond doubt they had been Spirit-filled by the authorized Spirit. We humans just can’t do the things they did without divine assistance.
The Spirit the disciples received is God energy, God’s means of staying connected with us given that we are bound by time and God is not. The Holy Spirit is the “back door” God built into his creation that allows us to be connected to him and to each other through this “God channel.” The Holy Spirit is a source of great spiritual power, power that cannot be corrupted, usurped, or harnessed for our own purposes, but is essential for accomplishing anything in God’s Name.
Today is for reminding ourselves about the Holy Spirit. And right into the mix of scripture lessons about Pentecost, we have a little reading from Numbers where God gave his authorized Spirit to people long before the Christian Day of Pentecost. Numbers is one of the first five books of Christian scripture, and also in the Jewish Torah. So, Jews and Christians alike have had thousands of years to reflect on today’s lesson from Numbers.
The obvious lesson is that God puts his authorized Spirit on those whom HE chooses, not necessarily on those WE choose. God authorizes his Spirit, not us. “God goes where God goes. God does what God does. God ordains who God ordains,” I heard preached in 2003, and as Moses discovered in his day.
Today’s incident occurred early in the Israelite’s wilderness trek. They had run out of food and were complaining to Moses about being hungry. And Moses had HAD it. So, Moses had turned to God. “I need some help here,” he undoubtedly said. And God answered, telling Moses to appoint 70 people to help him. You heard the lesson; you know what happened next.
But let’s stop and ask, “How did Moses pick 70 people from the 12 tribes?” The Jewish thinking is he must—for political reasons—have asked each tribe to name 6 people. Then, this thinking continues, Moses would have written “elder” on 70 pieces of whatever they used for paper and left the other two pieces blank. After each person had chosen, the two who had not been selected would have been revealed.
This method of choosing leaders reminds me of how we at Resurrection choose our leaders each year. Throughout our 56-years, we have drawn lots to discover who God has chosen to serve our Vestry. Of course, we (like God) allow people to say “no.” But even if we say “no,” God is persistent. Just ask Jonah how close he got to Tarsus when fleeing Nineveh. (THAT was a whale of a tale!)
We must ask, though, what God was up to when he told Moses to pick 70 people. God can do math; God INVENTED math. Was he wanting to see how Moses would choose? Whether Moses would consult God? Whether Moses would pray and discern? Or to see if Moses would give in to politics?
All scripture says is, “Moses gathered 70 elders of the people.” Jewish midrash insists each tribe chose six people and that Eldad and Medad must have been very humble. They must have said, “We are not deserving of being elders.” And in so saying, they became deserving, so God gave them his Spirit. This thought is a comforting to all seminarians, that God makes fit those whom he calls.
I have experienced this in my own life, of being made able to do things I had thought impossible until I said “yes” to God. And, let’s name it, Church of the Resurrection, haven’t we been and aren’t we being made able to do amazing things in Christ’s name?
- I mean, a food pantry in a pandemic when we can barely lift and bend?
- I mean, 113 units of affordable housing when we have so little money?
- I mean, life beyond all our “in five years we will be dead” predictions?
So, God pours out his Spirit where God wills, on those only God authorizes, like Eldad and Medad. From the very first, then, of our worship of God, God told us he’s going to seek out the rejected, the overlooked, the marginated people and shower them with gifts just like those in the center, those authorized and in charge.
God was telling us, from the very beginning, that God’s Spirit is so abundant we need not fear running out. We don’t have to—shouldn’t—compete for the Holy Spirit. Like Moses, we should wish ALL people would have and act with God’s authorized Spirit.
God is showing us, especially today, that we humans can get trapped in false thinking. The 70 elders appointed to help Moses became the Sanhedrin. As good as the Sanhedrin members were, we all can think of at least two times when the Sanhedrin got vital things wrong. First, they understood themselves filled with “Moses’ spirit,” when the Spirit is God’s, merely shared by God in those whom he chooses. Second, the Sanhedrin members in Jesus’ day were among those who engineered his crucifixion, channeling neither Moses’ spirit NOR God’s.
About Eldad and Medad, Jewish thinking is they prophesied about three things:
- That God would send manna and quail to feed them, as came to pass.
- That Moses would die before entering the Promised Land and be succeeded by Joshua, as came to pass Is it any wonder, though, that Joshua had raced to assure Moses he wasn’t plotting his undoing?
- And finally, this thinking goes, they both must have prophesied about the coming of the Messiah and the End of Days.
By Christian reckoning, the Messiah has come and has shared his Spirit with us. And—given the pandemic and the state of our world—we might be wondering if we are now living in the End of Days. However, the Holy Spirit assures us that “all will be well, and all manner of things will be well.” Because we are Resurrection people; we live in hope and assurance of life now and in the age to come.
