"Together in One Place" | Grace Covenant

“Together in One Place”

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Date: June 4, 2017

HOMILY “TOGETHER IN ONE PLACE”

SCRIPTURE: ACTS 2: 1

–

21; JOHN

20:19

–

GRACE COVENANT PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH, ASHEVILLE, NC

June 4, 2017 Pentecost

The Rev.

Dr.

Marcia Mount Shoop, Pastor

It started with a curious look through the window on the door outside m

y office.

After our worship service on Sundays they used our Fellowship Hall for their

worship services.

From

inside

my office I could hear the tambourines and the shouts and the cadence

of a people on fire with the Spirit.

It was strange music to me

—

my first reaction came from the biases I had learned

against all things Pentecostal

—

my family heritage is Presbyterian as far back as you

can find Presbyterians and even before that we were French Huguenots

—

Scottish,

English, Scots

–

Irish

Coughing in w

orship was a big deal when I was growing up.

The who

concept of speaking in tongues, of speaking out in church without the

words being printed in the bulletin, of spontaneity

of any sort in worship was

“

other

”

to me.

The otherness of Pentecostal Chr

istians did not just make the

hard

for me

understand;

I had learned to judge them, to

dismiss them,

even

to doubt their

veracity.

My glances in the window

each Sunday afternoon as they worshipped

began as

curiosity and then morphed into a courtesy wa

ve to the pastor who

one Sunday

saw

me standing out in the hall looking in.

She was a strong woman, their pastor, her voice unequivocal, her strength

undeniable, and her deep peace inviolable.

One Sunday

my courtesy wave was met with a gesture from he

r, Rev. Sanders. She

was asking me to come in.

I couldn’t say no

—

that would be rude and it would mean my glances inside were

more voyeuristic than I wanted to admit to myself. I had to go in to show them I was

sincere about connecting with them when I

glanced in that window

each Sunday

afternoon

The first couple of times

I went in

I just took a seat and thanked her for inviting me

in. I never knew what was going to happen or how long the ser

vices would last, but

it soon

became something that I actual

ly looked forward to.

They were always happy to see me, always welcoming of

the interruption of my

arrival.

What

seemed at first like chaos

to me

, became

palpable

rhythm to

worship

—

starting slow and gathering steam

—

until someone might begin to shout

or weep or even fall out

prompting the whole community to

focus in with prayer,

laying on of hands, tongues, or admonition of an affliction or lapse.

One week Rev. Sanders

asked me to come forward and speak

—

to share a message,

to speak the Word.

I pr

ayed for God’s help. And

I moved to the front of the room and

I opened the Bible

and began to read

—

I can’t remember the passage, but I remember the sensation

—

the strong

pull to trust the moment, to not think my way through how I would share

Good News with

God’s gathered people, but to simply speak from my heart

—

from a

place that really meant something

—

this was the absolute antithesis of phoniness

—

it was truth they wanted, truth about how God was speaking to me and through me

and so I had to get out the way,

I had to let the Spirit move.

This fourth generation Presbyterian minister from KY

—

this

child of two college

professors with a PhD,

let go. I let go of the way I had been taught proper, decent

and in order, worship was supposed to go.

It was a Penteco

st moment

—

words that felt effortless and free, and a community of

faith that heard their own story in my story,

in the glimpse of Gospel that came

through.

We were together in that place, in that sacred space. The trials and troubles we had

all seen in

r lives coalesced in the joy and liberation we

all

understood

—

it was

God’s deeds of power

that spoke our common language.

That first Pentecost

, that day in Jerusalem

—

the disciples were doing as Jesus had

told them. They were there, together

—

the peop

le who loved Jesus

. And after Jesus’

ascension they were praying for what they needed.

This coming together coincided with an especially intense time in Jerusalem

—

it was

the Jewish feast of Weeks that they

held 50 days after Passover

. That meant that th

nations were there in Jerusalem

—

Jews from far ranging geography.

The ones who loved Jesus were open, they knew they needed help, they were

grieving, they were confused. And then, a

violent wind

and tongues of fire

—

and the

ones who had been on their kne

es, confused, asking for what they needed

—

began to

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