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In My Native Tongue
Acts 2: 1 – 21 |
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Summary
In My Native Tongue One of the most moving stories of human history comes from an unlikely place. Not, mind you, from a battlefield or the halls of Congress or of the United Nations, and not even from a Nobel Prize-winning laboratory — but from a conversation (if I may call it that) between a 7-year-old child and her teenage teacher. The little girl was Helen Keller, who lost both her hearing and her sight when she was 18 months old. Unable to hear and unable to see, yet with a memory of a time when she could do both, she became — as she herself later said — “wild and unruly,” giggling and chuckling when she felt pleasure and screaming, kicking and scratching when she was frustrated by the imprisonment of her peculiar, quite terrifying world. Then one day the patient young teacher, Annie Sullivan, spilled water on Helen’s hand, and spelled out w-a-t-e-r on the little hand. And as Helen Keller explained later, “The mystery of language was revealed to me. I knew then that ‘w-a-t-e-r’ meant the wonderful, cool something that was flowing over my hand. That living word awakened my soul, gave it light, joy, set it free!” Now that Helen Keller’s brilliant mind had a language, there was no stopping her. She became one of the most famous women of the 20th century, author of books printed in more than 50 languages and the recipient of endless honors around the world. And it all began when she was able to write and then to speak in her native tongue. Pentecost was like that I tell you that story today because today Christians all over the world are celebrating the Day of Pentecost, and a miracle happened on the Day of Pentecost that is like the story of Helen Keller multiplied 10 billion times. Let me tell you what I mean. To do so I must take you back nearly 2,000 years to the time just after Jesus Christ had been crucified and then raised from the dead; that is, the time just following the first Easter. There was no Christian church in those days: just a few hundred people who had seen Jesus after his resurrection and who were struggling to make sense out of everything that had happened. Obviously, they were excited about Jesus’ resurrection but they were also confused. They didn’t know what to do next. Jesus had told them that they should go and make disciples of all nations — but he also told them that in order to prepare for this huge undertaking they must stay in Jerusalem until they had been filled with the Holy Spirit. So there they were in Jerusalem, doing just what Jesus had said: praying, doing church business and waiting for the Holy Spirit. But you know what? I’m very sure they had no idea what they were waiting for or what to expect. All they knew about the Holy Spirit was that in earlier times the Spirit of God had come upon Israel’s prophets and sometimes on the nation’s judges and kings; and they had been told that Jesus would sometime baptize with the Holy Spirit and with fire. But what did this mean to them? This earnest little contingent of believers was waiting for the Holy Spirit, but with no clear idea of how the Spirit would come or what difference the Spirit’s coming would make. And then it happened, the event described in our scripture lesson today. Quite suddenly the room in which they were sitting was engulfed by a sound like a violent wind. The wind seemed to fill the entire house, as if it would lift it from the ground. Then what looked like forked tongues of fire rested just above the heads of each one in the room. A violent wind and tongues of fire will get your attention! But the strangest thing was yet to come. It wasn’t as dramatic as wind and fire but it was far more significant. Each person in the room began to talk, to speak eloquently about God’s deeds of power, as if each one were a consummate orator. But here was the really peculiar thing: They were speaking in languages they didn’t know. Since it was a special religious holiday, there were people in the crowd just outside who were from every part of the then-known world. These people were astonished to hear these followers of Jesus telling about God in the language of the visitors’ homelands — Mesopotamia, Crete, Egypt, Pamphylia, Cyrene, Rome — you name it, someone was exhorting in their native tongue. Furthermore, it was clear that the people who were speaking were not trained linguists. Their appearance indicated that they were fishermen and women, village folk, shepherds, tax collectors — yet here they were, speaking powerfully and persuasively about the wonders of the kingdom of God in languages they had never known. To answer a possible question Let me interrupt the story to clarify one matter. Perhaps you know that the fastest growing Christian body in today’s world is the charismatic movement, a religious group that emphasizes an experience known as “speaking in tongues.” It is altogether possible that you know someone who tells of such an experience — or indeed, that you yourself have seen or experienced it. This is not really the same thing as what happened on the Day of Pentecost, because on the Day of Pentecost while people were testifying in languages not known to them, they were languages that people from those countries could understand. And the speaking was not for the spiritual blessing of the person speaking, but for the edification and the convincing of the persons who were hearing. The meaning of the Day of Pentecost And what did this mean? What was the point of this remarkable day that we now consider the birthday of the Christian church, the Day of Pentecost? The violent wind and the tongues of fire provided an appropriately dramatic setting for the key miracle; and the key miracle was the declaration of God’s glory in the languages of the people who were gathered there from dozens and dozens of other nations — all of whom were thus able to hear the new message in their own tongue. This was symbolic of what the church of Jesus Christ was to become. In a peculiar sense it was — as I said earlier — the experience Helen Keller had, multiplied by 10 billion. Here’s what I mean. When Annie Sullivan connected with Helen Keller, Helen had an experience that transformed her life. Her native tongue was restored to her so that she could understand other human beings and could communicate with them. On the Day of Pentecost the Holy Spirit announced to the world that the Good News of Jesus Christ was for the whole world, for every tongue and nation. Jesus was the Savior of not only the Jewish people but of all who would receive him. And his message of life and salvation was to be accessible to everyone. You wouldn’t have to learn Hebrew or Aramaic or even Greek to learn about Christ. In the dramatic event on the Day of Pentecost, the Holy Spirit was declaring that God was accommodating himself to our human limitations. You can understand only Swedish? Then God’s Word of salvation will come to you in Swedish! You speak a tongue known only to a small tribe in a remote area of the Philippines? Then God will speak to you in that singular tongue. That is, the Day of Pentecost was heaven’s dramatic announcement that God does, indeed, so love the whole world that whosoever in that whole world might be saved. Pentecost declared that the Gospel is for the whole human race, and that the Holy Spirit will pursue us in our native tongue. The Christian church is still working daily to fulfill the Day of Pentecost. You don’t have to learn Hebrew and Greek to read the Bible; the church has seen to it that you can have it in your language — now, as a matter of fact, in roughly 2,000 different languages. And people, moved by the Holy Spirit, will leave the comfort of their familiar language and surroundings to learn the languages of the world in order to deliver the Good News of Jesus Christ ... and to deliver it in the native tongues of our wonderfully diverse planet. And we’re still doing it today, on this Day of Pentecost. We’re still seeking to deliver the eternal Good News — in every tongue and tribe and nation, and in all of those tongues of human need: We seek to preach to the poor and the rich, the learned and the illiterate, the lonely and the busy, the crushed and the arrogant: We speak to them all, please God, through the empowerment and the impelling of the Holy Spirit. This is the story of the Day of Pentecost. |
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