Last week was Pentecost Sunday when the help Jesus promised to send after his death arrived in the form of the Holy Spirit, filling the Apostles and many others with new-found strength and understanding. 

I didn't fully appreciate this part of the New Testament until I studied the book of Acts over the last year and a half in our small Sunday School class. We discovered then how much the Holy Spirit drove early Christianity, empowering the Apostles and others to spread the word and do good against powerful adversaries, both Roman and Jewish. Without the gift of the Holy Spirit, I don't think Christianity would have lasted past a generation or two! And it was at the Jewish festival of Pentecost that this gift was first given.

Diana Butler Bass, an author/preacher/historian, recently shared a sermon she delivered over a decade ago telling the story of Pentecost in terms of the classical Greek elements: Wind, Water, Fire, Earth. As you will see, all four are very much present in the Pentecost story and many think this was intentional by the author, Luke, who was very familiar with the Hellenistic audience he and Paul sought to convert. Here is how Luke begins: 

When the day of Pentecost came, they were all together in one place. Suddenly a sound like the blowing of a violent wind came from heaven and filled the whole house where they were sitting. They saw what seemed to be tongues of fire that separated and came to rest on each of them. All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues as the Spirit enabled them. (Acts 2:1-4)

In her sermon, Bass discusses how the ancient world believed the four elements symbolized all matter in the universe and that Luke, in telling the story of Pentecost, invokes these elements to reveal a story of new creation. Pentecost tells us how God reshaped the living world and chose to dwell within us and among us here, on earth, in the form of the Holy Spirit. Pentecost, Bass says, is not a story of the end of days, as many thought then, but is a "celebration of all things being made as God intends, the world set a-right." This was God's way to bring heaven into our world with his very presence.

Here are a few excerpts from Bass's sermon concerning the elements:

WIND:

The dominant image in Pentecost is wind—the clouds and storms that brood and threaten yet give life. The image of Pentecost’s wind harkens back to the Book of Genesis, in the opening of the biblical creation story, where the wind of God hovers over the waters. We can imagine that it, too, was a roaring wind, that wind of creation, stirring all things, whipping at the waters below, separating the sky from the earth. God’s wind is a storm of creativity, the roar and rush of divine breath, bringing forth life. Breath is life.

WATER:

The next image is that of water. Water is the main element of baptism; water is an image for Jesus, the living well, the one who quenches our thirst:

On the last and greatest day of the festival, Jesus stood and said in a loud voice, “Let anyone who is thirsty come to me and drink. Whoever believes in me, as Scripture has said, rivers of living water will flow from within them.” By this he meant the Spirit, whom those who believed in him were later to receive. Up to that time the Spirit had not been given, since Jesus had not yet been glorified. (John 7:37-39)

Pentecost is not only a day of wind, it is a day of water. Water cleanses, water quenches. The water of Pentecost is the river of God, the water poured out by God that washes us clean and relieves our thirst.

FIRE:

Fire is the most dramatic element of the Pentecost story, with tongues of flame appearing above the heads of those gathered as God’s wind rushed in.  Fire is the element of illumination, of purification, of passion. The fire of Pentecost is God’s passion, burning and creating, purifying and illuminating, the flame that both frightens us and yet invites us to experience the power of God.

EARTH:

Earth is represented by the crowd, the people of the earth, who are gathered from many nations at the feast. All the people mentioned in the story — Jews, Libyans, Egyptians, Persians, Romans — are all of the earth, made of dust. Like everyone, they are the stuff of earth, made of dust, they all return to dust, return to the earth in the shared fate of every creature. To these children of Earth, Pentecost comes. 

I love this poem by poet/musician/priest Malcom Guite who also focuses on the elements at play in the story of Pentecost: "This is the feast of fire, air, and water Poured out and breathed and kindled into earth."

Pentecost 

Today we feel the wind beneath our wings
Today the hidden fountain flows and plays
Today the church draws breath at last and sings
As every flame becomes a Tongue of praise.
This is the feast of fire, air, and water
Poured out and breathed and kindled into earth.
The earth herself awakens to her maker
And is translated out of death to birth.
The right words come today in their right order
And every word spells freedom and release
Today the gospel crosses every border
All tongues are loosened by the Prince of Peace
Today the lost are found in His translation.

Whose mother tongue is Love in every nation.