(Modified 2021-05-23: Added audio recording of sermon)
St. Mary’s Anglican Church, Pentecost Sunday, May 23, 2021 Canon Claude Schroeder.
Today we are celebrating the great and wonderful Feast of Pentecost, which brings to an ecstatic climax the final revelation of Jesus Christ, and the fulfillment of His promise to send us the Holy Spirit, in fulfilment of the prophecy of Joel, “In the last days it will be, God declares, that I will pour my Spirit upon all flesh, and your sons and daughters shall prophesy, and your young men shall see visions and your old men shall dream dreams. Even upon my slaves, both men and women, in those days I will pour out my Spirit. (Acts 2. 17-18).
Our celebration of Pentecost today stands as a powerful sign of contradiction to this confused, divided, sin-sick, despairing, death-bound, and socially distanced world in which we live. In place of confusion there was clarity as the tongues of fire rested on the heads of each them, purifying and illuminating the intellects. In place of division there was unity, as the assembled multi-racial and multi-ethnic crowd, all heard them in their own tongues the mighty works of God. In place of sin sickness, and death, the announcement of salvation. “Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved!” And in place of social distance: fellowship and community, as over 3,000 people were baptized that day.
If ever there was a time we needed the Holy Spirit to manifest Himself to us, that time is now.
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