Pentecost: Where is My Tongue of Fire?

 Acts 2:1-21

Pentecost

May 24, 2026

 

Pentecost is a Greek word and it means 50^th.

Because it’s the 50^th day after Easter.

I counted, it’s true, but you have to

count Easter as day one got get there.

 

But the name actually comes from another Jewish

festival called Shavuot, which Greek Jews would call Pentecost.

Shavuot is the festival of the weeks,

because they count seven weeks after Passover

7 weeks times seven days is 49 which is close

enough for religious math.

 

Shavuot is a Spring harvest festival.
But it’s also celebrated as the day

that God gave the Torah – the first five books,

the most holy of the books - to the people.

And a tradition is that devout Jewish people have an overnight vigil,

reading the Torah –or for some reason, the book of Ruth

which is not in the Torah – out loud on Shavuot or Pentecost.

 

So this is what people were doing on that day.

That’s why all those Jewish people who spoke

different languages were gathered together in Jerusalem.

And that’s why all those people knew that

they could not previously understand the disciples.

 

All this is encapsulated in the line,

“when the day of Pentecost had come” in Acts 2

Because all Luke’s original readers would have gotten all that.

 

And right in the middle of that gathering together for the

overnight reading for the festival of Shavuot (or Pentecost in Greek),

a violent wind comes over the 12 disciples

(they had replaced Judas with Matthias in chapter 1 of Acts)

and a flame lands over each of the disciples heads,

that makes all of the people there gather around the disciples

and these 12 disciples from the Hicksville town of Galilee

are suddenly able to read the Torah-- or the book of Ruth --

in languages that all those Jewish people

from different countries could understand.

 

Which causes the people around them to ask

if the disciples are drunk because that seems like a reasonable

explanation for the phenomenon even though

it was all the other people who would have been

feeling the effects and experiencing the hallucinations.

 

And having all their attention, Peter takes this opportunity

- to tell the crowds that no one is drunk cause it’s too early

(suggesting they might have been drunk later)

- and to quote the prophet Joel and the Psalms –

neither one of which is not in the Torah –

- And to tell them about Jesus of Nazareth a man

from the same backwoods town in Galilee

- and that Jesus is the Messiah that King David

foretold and that they had all been waiting for

 

And at this, the people who are listening

are “cut to the heart” and they want to know

what they can do and Peter tells them

that they should repent and be baptized

and join the way of life and justice

and community that Jesus had shown them.

 

And it said that 3000 people had joined the

apostles in teaching and fellowship that day,

and this action-packed chapter 2 of Acts ends:

 

“All who believed were together and had all things in common; 

 they would sell their possessions and

goods and distribute the proceeds to all, as any had need.

Day by day, as they spent much time together in the temple,

they broke bread at home and

ate their food with glad and generous hearts,

 praising God and having the goodwill of all the people.

And day by day the Lord added to their number

those who were being saved.”

 

This wild and willy story of Pentecost

is what most people call the birthday of the church.

And it’s true.

It’s the moment that the disciples stopped just listening to Jesus

and started telling other people about him.

It’s the moment that they started to

build a community around Jesus and his ways.

 

It’s the birthday of the church,

this church and all churches.

 

Honestly, very little of what we see here

in this story is visible in the church these days,

And this hasn’t been visible in the church at almost any time during

its more than 2000 year history.

I mean we have some of the bare bones:

the reading of scripture,  

the praying we still talk about Jesus in a gathering.

 

But what about the wind, the flame and the languages?

 

I mean, we light candles in church.

I’ve set the baptismal font on fire in one church,

(it all worked out).

And I’ve been to churches where people

were speaking in tongues,

Church revivals were big in the early 20^th century,

with thousands of people attending.

Some churches have smoke machines.

I was part of a church with no air conditioning

and we’d run an industrial fan,

so we did have a rush of a violent wind.

But none of that is the same at all is it?

 

And this story in Acts paints a picture of

diversity in our worship. Of people

of many cultures gathering to work

tougher in God’s name.

 

But that’s not been the truth of churches has it?

Martin Luther King called 11am on Sunday morning

the most segregated hour in America.

And that still stands 60 years later.

We have black churches

and we have white churches

And in the ELCA, we have 

Scandinavian churches and German churches

on the same square mile that still can’t figure out

how to talk to one another or work together.

 

Some churches are able to establish a

diversity of cultures, but those are the exception.

 

And then there’s the behavior of the community.

Distributing proceeds and having the

good will of all people as a priority.

 

And many churches like ours have made a good go at the

distributing goods to any who has needs.

But we’re the exception for the most part,

and I think even we could more of that.

 

But the community sharing all things in common,

and selling everything they have for the community

THAT is not very common in churches at all.

And there are very few examples in history

where this community sharing has gone well,

where it wasn’t a cult with someone

taking advantage of other people.

And I don’t think I could do it now, but I really long for a place

where that kind of trust and sharing could happen.

 

So where did all this stuff in Acts 2 go?

 

I love this story in Acts of the birthday of the church,

but I also can’t help feeling let down by it.

Did we grow away from this? Did we change?

I feel kind of embarrassed and sad.

Did we let Peter and the rest of the disciples down?

Have we let Jesus down?

Have we lost the church they created on that first day?

Have we failed?

 

I don’t think so, the truth is, the rest of the

story of Acts tells us they actually lost it early on.

  

For example that bit about sharing all things in common.

Right away in Acts 5, it goes off the rails.

A couple defies that community covenant and

keeps the proceeds of a land sale for themselves

and when confronted about it, they literally drop dead.

And “great fear seized the whole church.”

And that’s the end of it. No more talk about

sharing things in common.

 

Then the persecution starts and their community

breaks apart and moves away from Jerusalem.

Then Paul converts and joins them and becomes a leader

and he and Peter don’t see eye to eye on most things,

even though they’re both Jews and speak the same language.

 

And in Acts 15, Paul and his traveling companion Mark

have an intense disagreement and they part ways.

 

And all of Paul’s letters, it’s apparent the churches

he started have serious trouble with diversity,

and with sharing, and with remaining faithful

to the way of Jesus.

 

Even before the end of Acts, this church that

was born on Pentecost with wind and fire,

is a fractured church that doesn’t ever seem to

live up to it’s birthright and wonderful beginning.

 

And yet God’s Spirit is still with them,

every step of the way,

adjusting  to their stupidity and stubbornness

and other people’s stupidity and stubbornness,

and pushing them to the next challenge

and opportunity to make Christ known.

We didn’t fail. We haven’t failed.

We’re still doing it. The Church is a work in progress.

 

This birthday story in Acts 2 is a vision for what the church can be.

What a community in Jesus can be. It’s a vision.

Like Jesus first sermon in the synagogue,

Like the Beatitudes and the sermon on the mount,

like the feeding of the 5000 is.

 

We are given a vision of a community

that is devoted to teaching, fellowship,

and the breaking of bread,

that gathers all people, that loves and

celebrates all cultures, that feeds

and cares for all those in need,

that shares what it has without fear

of corruption or greed.

 

It’s not something that was handed to us

fully formed and then we lost it somewhere.

It’s something that we constantly work for, strive for,

it’s something that we set our sights on,

that guides our mission and actions and behavior,

 

It’s something we figure out and then reality interrupts

and our shortcomings get in the way,

and all the gory and practical, and seemingly

non-spiritual details happen in real time,

with real blood, and real broken hearts

and real broken relationships.’

 

And yet God’s Spirit is still with us

every step of the way, adjusting

to our stupidity and stubbornness

and pushing us to the next challenge

and opportunity to make Christ known.

 

Our work is not in vain.

We’re not a failure.

One day we’ll get there.

 

The spirit works more gently now than it did in Acts 2.

No rushing winds or tongues of fire.

 

But still with burning hearts and

visions and dreams

of a better church

and a better world.