Oak Chapel United Methodist Church

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Edward Gibbon wrote The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire in the late 1700s.  For him, Rome's fall was a disaster, a catastrophe.  He characterized it as "the triumph of religion and barbarism over civilization."  Civilization, of course, was the Empire itself.  The barbarians  were our ancestors, at least some of ours: the Germans, the Franks, the original inhabitants of the British Isles.  (Unwashed, uncultured, unlearned by Roman standards).  And, by "religion," Gibbon meant Christianity.  And he was right in that.  Only he was on the wrong side.  We are proud of the role our faith played in bringing down the tyranny and cruelty of Rome.  Our faith still brings down tyranny and cruelty, still confronts and confounds those who put their trust in titles and armies and material wealth.

    It is an amazing story, how the Christian church beat Rome.  Today we have received five fine young women into the fellowship of the church.  They need to know, and we need to remember, what kind of an organization we've signed on to.  This family of faith, which we call the ecclessia, the church, began as a tiny handful of broken hearted followers of Jesus, who, after he was crucified, were convinced that the battle was lost, that death had claimed their leader once and for all, that might had once again made right, and that any hope Jesus had offered them to the contrary, had been nullified by the cross.  The proof was in the pudding.  He's dead.  It's over.  Let's get out of here.  That's how the church began, young ladies, this church you've joined today.
 But then two staggering events occurred which transformed this forlorn little company of ordinary men and women, into a mighty force for good, two things which enabled this group of losers really!) to bring down the Roman Empire and change the world forever.  One, Christ rose from the dead, and they saw it.  And, two, they received the Holy Spirit.  The first happened on Easter, and that's behind us.  The second happened on Pentecost, and that's today.  Girls, you are joining church on the birthday of the Church!  And I want to tell you about the greatest promise Jesus ever made: the promise of the Holy Spirit.

    Jesus spends a lot of time, especially in John's Gospel, saying goodbye.  We call these passages the "farewell discourses."  His disciples are horrified when he speaks of leaving, of dying.  He is only thirty-three years old, and they're not much more than boys themselves.  He carefully prepares them for life in his absence, for everything will depend on how they will behave after he is gone.  (John, the Gospel writer, knows, of course, that they behaved magnificently.)  "Let not your hearts be troubled," Jesus says, "neither let them be afraid."  "I will not leave you orphaned," he promises them.  And that's the central theme in all his farewells: that the disciples will not face the future alone.  God will send an Advocate, a Counselor, a Comforter (the Holy Spirit is called by many names)  And, in the trials that are to come, the Spirit will tell Jesus' people what to say, strengthen them, and see them through the deep waters.  He actually tells them they'll be better off when he's gone and the Spirit comes.  I guess he meant that he, as a man, would be limited in space and time, but the Spirit of God would not be so limited.

    Matina, Jackie, Nadia, Whitney, Alisha, you are still young.  You may have already experienced some deep sorrows, and you surely have more to come.  If we can't find a comforter when we are sad, we remain unconsoled -- and sometimes we become bitter and depressed, and this state becomes the story of our lives.  Think about those early Christians for a moment.  We know that many of them were tortured, and many died (sometimes terrible deaths) for their faith.  We honor them as martyrs, but what about those who were left: the mother who did not choose to lose a child, the wife who did not choose to lose a husband.  For them the only answer was comfort.  We call a heavy quilt a comforter, and we pull one over us on bitter cold nights.  Our ancestors in the faith, these who suffered for Christ, had such a comforter, the Holy Spirit, and they knew its warmth when times were bitter cold, when the contrast between Jesus and this world was stark, and all the smart money went elsewhere, and they were the losers.  Then they needed the Holy Sprit to comfort them, as we need the spirit to comfort us in our grief.

    The Spirit -- this amazing being that will take the place of Jesus after he's gone --the Spirit also teaches and guides.  In order for me rightly to understand the scriptures, for example, it takes three things: me, the book, and the Holy Spirit.  Reading scripture away from the presence of the Holy Spirit is like seeing  a movie in black and white.  It's like hearing words but not understanding what they mean and how they fit together.  That's why some college professors are able to make the Bible look foolish, pointing out all its apparent mistakes and contradictions.  Because the Spirit of God is not present in their lectures or in their hearts.  You can post the Ten Commandments in every class room, and every court room, but without the Holy Spirit to interpret the commandments, and to make them come alive, they will be empty words -- they won't grab us and convict us, as the Ten Commandments should.

    So the Holy Spirit, which came on Pentecost, comforts and enlightens.  It also gives us courage, which, for Christians, means the courage to be different, to be intentionally and unflinchingly opposed to the ways of this world.  Now, my friends in the confirmation class, I know that is hard for teenagers.  It's not so easy for adults either.  But when we see people doing things that we know are against the will of God, and that therefore will harm them in the end, we must speak up.  And let the consequences happen.  John the Baptist, who many say, was the first Christian martyr, was thrown into Herod's prison because he had the temerity to tell Herod that he shouldn't be sleeping with his dead brother's wife.  But, John was lucky.  Herod  liked him, and listened to his preaching.  Do you think John backed away from his message?  Did he say, "Well, it's OK for kings to sleep with their brothers' wives?"  Certainly not.  And that infuriated Herodius, the woman in question, and she waited for an opportunity and had him beheaded.  John could have just blended in, could have just kissed the king's backside, like everyone else at court.  But he didn't, he wouldn't, and it cost him his life.  And we still remember him today.  Today he is Saint John the Baptist.  It is the Holy Spirit of God that gives us courage like that.

    The Holy Spirit is the fuel of the church, it is the glue that holds believers together.  We can build all the buildings, and sponsor all the programs, and have a thousand in worship on Sunday morning, but if we don't have the Holy Spirit among us, we have nothing at all.  In a stodgy, big-city church an older woman from the country shouted  "Amen" whenever the preacher said something she liked.  People looked around,  for they weren't used to that.  After a while a dark-suited usher came down the aisle leaned over and said, "Madam, you must be silent."  "But," she said, "I've got the Spirit."  "We'll you can't have it here!"  When you join a church, you need to get in touch with the Spirit of God.  It is God with us.  It is all there is to the church.