Thought for Today
Acts 1:8 But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth."
Acts 8:17 Then Peter and John laid their hands on them, and they received the Holy Spirit.
Acts 10:44 While Peter was still speaking, the Holy Spirit fell upon all who heard the word. 45 The circumcised believers who had come with Peter were astounded that the gift of the Holy Spirit had been poured out even on the Gentiles,
Acts 19:2 He said to them, "Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you became believers?" They replied, "No, we have not even heard that there is a Holy Spirit."
When I took chemistry in high school, I learned about various ways of testing substances to determine their identity and composition. I learned about litmus paper, chemically treated strips that turn one color when dipped into an acid and a different color when dipped into a base. I learned about other tests used to determine other characteristics.
As I have aged, I have become increasingly familiar with a panoply of medical tests. I am regularly sent ‘to the lab’ to have blood drawn for running a multitude of tests to determine the health of this organ in my body. Some specialists have a wide range of equipment to test the health of specific things such as my vision, or high-tech machines to take images of my internals.
This week, in anticipation of Pentecost this coming Sunday, I have begun to wonder about the Holy Spirit. The name Holy Spirit appears more than 200 times in the Bible. The Acts of the Apostles contains more than 80 of those references (40%). As I read through Acts, it seems to me that having received the Holy Spirit became the litmus test for the nascent Christian movement. Time after time Peter or another of the 12 would visit a community of believers to determine the authenticity of their faith.
Were all this to have taken place today, there would certainly have been an app for that testing. Some enterprising young apostle (John?) would develop an app or an easily downloaded bar code to be scanned onto the cell phones of the apostles sent out to authenticate these faith communities. We have apps for everything from remotely locking our car doors to turning on the lights in the house as we use another app to open the garage doors.
But, read as I might, I find no reference in Acts to smart phones, be they iPhones, Androids or any other brand. I have tired repeatedly to explain to my grandchildren the possibility of a world without computers, television or smart phones. They think I don’t notice the eye rolling!
I have also wondered how those young communities of faith recognized the authority of Peter or another apostle to even question their faith. Today, they would have badges or laminated identification cards attesting to their authority. They might wear uniforms or identifying clothing like clerical collars. In the early days of television, young doctor Kildare and Marcus Welby carried the ubiquitous black satchels identifying them as physicians. When Peter showed up at the door, how did those Christians know who he was?
In our computer age, a common trope is the picture of people dining together around a table with everyone looking only at their smart phones. The next time you dine out, at a fancy restaurant or a fast-food place, look around you and try to find anyone not looking at a cell phone! Many families now place a basket on the table and insist that everyone place their phone in the basket until dinner is finished.
In the 1st century, Peter and the other apostles talked to each other and to those new communities they visited. They shared their experiences, their memories, their stories of faith. Thankfully, Peter and others wrote letters. Think about how much we still learn from the epistles (letters) written by Peter, Paul and others to the churches they started and visited.
In seminary, I read a book that helped me understand the amazing spread of the early church. The Lost Letters of Pergamum by Bruce W. Longenecker (2003, Baker Academic) is a fictional collection of letters circulating among Christians in the 1st century. I believe Christians can still speak to each other, in person, without apps or cell phones. We can and must share our personal journeys of faith. And, we can discern the Holy Spirit in our own lives and in the lives of others.
Stay safe, talk with each other, trust God,
Pastor Ray