The Holy becomes accessible
The story of Pentecost fascinates me on so many levels- the tongues of fire, the odd wind, the mass conversion of thousands. But the piece that is really in my mind today is the moment when everyone understands in their own language, no matter what language is being spoken. It’s a huge moment.
When the tongues of fire rested on the heads of the disciples, they began to speak in many languages. This would have been strange enough, but the crowd heard them speaking in each person’s native language. No matter what language was being spoken, the hearer heard it in their own language. No translation necessary. No confusion. People from all over Africa, Mesopotamia, Egypt, Rome, and Greece. Everyone heard in the language they best understood.
In that moment, the holy became accessible.
Making God and religion and church accessible has been a challenge since the literal beginning of the church at Pentecost. For centuries, church leaders have grappled with what it would mean for everyone to have access to God, to worship, to communion, and even to forgiveness. In Catholic tradition, there has been a history of using Mary and the Saints as intermediaries between the pray-er and God. In old Scottish presbyterianism, there was a physical fence around the communion table allowing access for only the deserving.
Some churches practice a metaphorical fence around communion, allowing access only to members or to people who have supported the correct causes. Some people believe that you can ONLY access God through a relationship with Jesus. Still, others believe that only priests and pastors have access to God and everyone must go through them. Add to that the history of a Latin-only Mass- a service you could only understand if you know Latin, and you can see that the church has been limiting access to God for quite a while.
The issue of accessibility shows up a lot in the biblical record. Curiously enough, it doesn’t seem to be an issue in Genesis, but once God intervenes in Exodus things change quite a bit. Moses becomes an intermediary for God- so much so that the Israelites don’t know how to worship without Moses present and resort to building a golden calf in his absence. Later in Exodus, God consecrates Aaron and his sons to be priests. In numbers, the Levites are tasked with setting out the tabernacle and guarding access. There are also the priests and the prophets who mediate access.
Things do not get easier in the New Testament. In the Gospels, the Disciples are often running interference for Jesus and blocking access to him. They notably try to keep children from him, and Jesus asks them to let the children pass. And the gospel of John records Jesus as saying “No one gets to the Father except through me,” which certainly seems to narrow access to God. Access to the Gospel itself was limited to those who had witnessed the resurrection, had seen Christ in his post-resurrection appearances or heard firsthand from the disciples.
Additionally, there were language barriers- people spoke Greek, Aramaic, Hebrew, and Latin. And based on the biblical record, we have reason to believe that Parthian, Media, Elam, Akkadian, Persian, Coptic, Berber, Arabic, Phygrian, and numerous local dialects were also practiced. IF the gospels had any written or spoken form at that time, it would have been in Aramaic or Greek. And of course, the Torah would have been in Hebrew. So access was limited based on language too.
Pentecost turns all of that on its head.
A gush of wind and tongues of fire, and suddenly everyone can hear in their own language. No translators, no struggling to understand, no frantically trying to remember what word means what. No- everyone was able to understand what was being said. They were able to hear about God’s deeds of power and understand those words in their own language. For the first time.
To be clear, I don’t want to dismiss the power of hearing the Torah or the Gospels in their original languages. There is a beauty and a vitality to the words when read that way that doesn’t always come through in translation. And there are often no words in our language that mean what was originally being said, so things get lost in translation. But the experience of Pentecost wasn’t that- it wasn’t a situation of translation. It was about UNDERSTANDING.
The barrier of language was completely removed and people could understand in their own language. They could access these words for the very first time. There’s no wonder then, that upon finally understanding these words for the first time, so many people wanted to be baptized. Acts says that 3000 came to be baptized after this experience and in the days that followed they devoted themselves to prayer and communion and praise. This moment of understanding- this moment of accessibility- changed lives.
At Pentecost, the holy became accessible. Here’s my question though. What are we doing TODAY to make the holy accessible? ARE we making the holy accessible or are we putting up physical and symbolic barriers to God? I’ve got to be honest. I’ve seen modern religion do a whole lot of gatekeeping. From Priests deciding who and who cannot take communion based on their political decisions to churches deciding who is welcome in their pews based on their gender expression or sexuality. I see a whole lot of barrier building.
I once experienced elders of a church removing a man from the building during a service. Why? The man was homeless and had not bathed in a few days. Apparently, the elders had decided that someone who smelled bad wasn’t welcome in the church. I’ve seen people turn their noses up at the person who asked for a large print bulletin or a hearing device- or worse they vote to not include those things in their services to begin with. I think about the buildings with too many stairs or the services that don’t want children to remain in the sanctuary. I think about the fact that so many services are only done only in English and I wonder where the Spanish-speaking folks go for worship and fellowship?
At Pentecost, the holy spirit did all the work. In the time beyond Pentecost, it falls on us to meet the holy spirit halfway. To make sure that we are aiding her in making God’s story and God’s love accessible to all. We are responsible for bringing a little Pentecost with us wherever we share God’s love. The good news is that tongues of fire aren’t required!