¹When the day of Pentecost had come, they were all together in one place. ²And suddenly from heaven there came a sound like the rush of a violent wind, and it filled the entire house where they were sitting. ³Divided tongues, as of fire, appeared among them, and a tongue rested on each of them. ⁴All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other languages, as the Spirit gave them ability.

⁵Now there were devout Jews from every nation under heaven living in Jerusalem. ⁶And at this sound the crowd gathered and was bewildered, because each one heard them speaking in the native language of each. ⁷Amazed and astonished, they asked, ‘Are not all these who are speaking Galileans? ⁸And how is it that we hear, each of us, in our own native language? ⁹Parthians, Medes, Elamites, and residents of Mesopotamia, Judea and Cappadocia, Pontus and Asia, ¹⁰Phrygia and Pamphylia, Egypt and the parts of Libya belonging to Cyrene, and visitors from Rome, both Jews and proselytes, ¹¹Cretans and Arabs – in our own languages we hear them speaking about God’s deeds of power.’ ¹²All were amazed and perplexed, saying to one another, ‘What does this mean?’ ¹³But others sneered and said, ‘They are filled with new wine.’

¹⁴But Peter, standing with the eleven, raised his voice and addressed them: ‘Men of Judea and all who live in Jerusalem, let this be known to you, and listen to what I say. ¹⁵Indeed, these are not drunk, as you suppose, for it is only nine o’clock in the morning. ¹⁶No, this is what was spoken through the prophet Joel:
¹⁷“In the last days it will be, God declares, that I will pour out my Spirit upon all flesh,
and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy,
and your young men shall see visions, and your old men shall dream dreams.
¹⁸Even upon my slaves, both men and women, in those days I will pour out my Spirit;
and they shall prophesy.
¹⁹And I will show portents in the heaven above and signs on the earth below, blood, and fire, and smoky mist.  ²⁰The sun shall be turned to darkness and the moon to blood, before the coming of the Lord’s great and glorious day.  ²¹Then everyone who calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved.”  Luke 2

Introduction

• A few weeks ago when everyone was coming out of church Joseph shook my hand and said: “Dad, what do you know about the Holy Spirit?” 
  “Look,” I said, “I have a lot of people to see, I’ll talk to you about the Holy Spirit when we get home…”
  “You don’t know, do you?”
  “I do know, I’ll talk to you when we get home.”
  he went off in a huff, but later on I explained what I knew about the Holy Spirit to which he replied: “You still don’t know do you?”

Joseph has his first A2 tomorrow and so it not coming to church today…
I am quite relieved… because I am going to try and talk about the Holy Spirit

• First lets get rid of the Pigeons – a bit of a problem… two blokes and a pigeon… too limiting as an image

And so the first thing I want to say is that as with the rest of our thinking of God, there are limits to what we can know and to say that the Holy Spirit is a bit mysterious is not a cop out but rather a very small thing, me, acknowledging a bigger thing, God.

We can know so much about God but we have to remember that he is always bigger.

• Our God is a great big God

The Holy Spirit is a Gift from God: - Gift box

Clearly the disciples like us they knew God in some way or other

We can read in the Acts of the apostles… a kind of part two to the Gospel Story that

1. They had all met with Jesus
2. They had all experienced the reality of his resurrection.
3. Their lives had been changed and they were committed to Jesus’ way of life
4. They were meeting together
5. They were worshipping
6. They were praying
7. They were sharing with each other
8. They were doing what Jesus wanted
9. They were still hiding in a locked room… starts to point to their problem and ours

They were like most churches today… but something was missing like most chruches today

So they waited…

We can do and do loads of stuff… but without the Holy Spirit something is missing.

We can do nothing about it except ask and wait.

The disciples needed to receive a gift.

They waited…

They waited with hope… because Jesus had promised that to those who waited for God he would come to them and give himself.

He told stories about bridesmaids waiting for bridegrooms
He told stories about being ready for the thief in the night

Be ready, he said, and the Spirit will come.

• Waiting for the bus on Cragg Road.

e.g. Talk about the building projects/ talk about worship

The Holy Spirit brings people together: - ball of String

⁹Parthians, Medes, Elamites, and residents of Mesopotamia, Judea and Cappadocia, Pontus and Asia, ¹⁰Phrygia and Pamphylia, Egypt and the parts of Libya belonging to Cyrene, and visitors from Rome, both Jews and proselytes, ¹¹Cretans and Arabs – in our own languages we hear them speaking about God’s deeds of power.’

• Is it scones to rhyme with bones or scones to rhyme with dons?
  Does anybody remember the tower of babel story – one people divided by language?

The first act of the Holy Spirit is to bring people together.

This Gospel that had been almost exclusively for a tiny group of people in the North of Galilee is suddenly bursting out for everyone.

Language still divides us: it’s at the heart of our feeling about music and worship

If we let the Holy Spirit come he will break down our barriers

He will bring us together in a way that is not humanly possible.

e.g. Talk about prayer triplets.

The Holy Spirit sends us out - megaphone

• There’s a famous scene in the film “when Harry met Sally” when Sally fakes an orgasm in a café.  The woman at the next table says: “I’ll have what she’s having.”
   

The people outside the room of Pentecost seem to have missed the tongues of fire and the wind but they didn’t miss the change in the disciples… some thought them spiritual others thought them drunk!

• What are drunks like?

Most are very noisy!

The Holy Spirit still makes us noisy.

He is not a quiet and gentle experience but rather a pretty noisy and frightening experience.

e.g. Talk about Angels our noisy under fives congregation

Conclusion – The Glass of water

Some of you will want me to say that we should go and do something. 

“The Holy Spirit is good, so go get the Holy Spirit.”

I want us to do what Jesus said: to find moments of stillness to wait even if we are behind closed doors with open lives.

To ask the Father and the Son to send the Holy Spirit

You’ll know if he comes to us… he will bring us together.

Look around, he’s already doing that

You’ll know he comes to you when you are able to tell others about your faith.

Look around, he’s already doing that too

You’ll know he comes to you when you burst out of these doors and start to change Mytholmroyd and Cragg Vale.

Look around, he’s already doing that too

He’s already started to work here

I, we wait there may be more... there will be more

Jesus promised.

Dare to wait this morning

Dare to wait with an open heart, he will come in

He will make us one

He will make us noisy

He will send us out

There‘s a lot I don’t know about the Holy Spirit but I do know that.