For the first time in a couple of nights, I actually started to drift off to sleep. But just as my eyes were closing, it seemed as if my whole house flashed. The security alarm sounded. One of our bedroom lights flickered brightly. It was a brief power outage. I reset the alarm. I looked out of my window and all was seemingly calm outside, but now that my adrenaline was rushing and I wasn’t going back to sleep immediately, I picked up my phone and it was through that window to the world that I saw that everything outside wasn’t calm. Riots ravaged the streets of my city like it probably did yours. I ended up watching a few live streams of the protests happening in RVA and although the streets and the buildings were recognizable, the city wasn’t. The sounds of violence: broken glass amidst the shouts of “stop, that’s a black-owned business!”, and the sights of boarded-up businesses and raging fires were shocking.
Earlier yesterday, I was thinking about how Pentecost is today. Fifty days after our Passover lamb, Jesus was sacrificed for sin, He told his followers to wait in Jerusalem and they’d be baptized with God’s Spirit to be His witnesses in all the earth. What happens next is as much of a shocking event as the riots we’ve witnessed. Jesus’ followers were all gathered in one place when suddenly the sound of a violent rushing wind came from heaven, and it filled the whole house where they were staying. What happened next? “They saw tongues like flames of fire that separated and rested on each one of them. Then they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in different tongues, as the Spirit enabled them.” (Acts 2)
The scene takes off from there. The people in the streets of Jerusalem, who were from several different nations, heard the sound of Jesus’ followers and they came running, hearing these Palestinian people declaring the magnificent acts of God in their own native language. Fire, sounds of violence, commotion...it sounds similar, but it’s different. In that moment in Jerusalem, there’s unity amongst differences. There’s a collective rerouting of the hearts and minds of diverse peoples to one Source, Yahweh. All are hearing about His power, His might, His justice, and His love. “What does this mean?”
We could say that fires that we’ve witnessed over the last few nights all across the nation, they represent the disunity and racial tension that’s been embedded deep into our nation. Once again, it’s rising to the surface, screaming to be heard and addressed. This fire and the sounds of violence come from a place of deep pain and anger; and far from declaring the magnificent acts of God, they declare the wounds felt from the awful and destructive acts of racial oppression and injustice. They declare the reality of this sinful world that’s been subjected to futility.
Family, it’s been that way for a minute. Genesis 11 records another scene made up of many peoples with the same language. But in their common understanding, they rejected God and expressively built a city that would establish themselves as great. We know it as the Tower of Babel. Long story short, God comes down and confuses the languages of the people and then scatters them throughout the earth.
Fast forward back to Acts 2. What’s taking place through Jesus’ followers’ proclamation of God in the languages of the nations is the reversal of what happened at Babel. He’s unifying what was once scattered and divided. It’s a glorious and gracious display of unity among peoples; true unity that collectively makes much of God and out of that experiences true unity with one another. Much like my late-night power flicker, it happened in a moment, and it’s repercussions haven’t stopped since. Peter stands up and preaches Jesus. “God has raised this Jesus; we are all witnesses of this. Therefore, since he has been exalted to the right hand of God and has received from the Father, the promised Holy Spirit, he has poured out what you both see and hear.”
God did this, and in the same way, for holy purposes known only to Him, God in His sovereignty did this...these riots, these sounds, this fire, the exposure of this pain and brokenness from injustice (Amos 3:6). That’s not a political statement. I’m not supporting the rioting. God doesn’t condone rioting. But is it possible that in observing this sinful response by broken people; this negative commotion, God could be leading us towards Him; showing us something we’re not seeing? The commotion in Acts 2 was caused to convert, as Peter called thousands to repentance and faith in Jesus. Three thousand people accepted the message of Jesus and were added to the multi-faceted family of God, a people comprised of every tribe, ethnic group, and language. In the same way, this commotion, however disastrous and devastating, can lead divided peoples to repentance, peace, and the only one who can give us unity through the only message that can give us unity. The commotion in our streets should cause us to see what we lack and what we need greatly. We need God’s Spirit and God’s word at this moment.
I’m not saying we need a re-creation of this exact Acts 2 moment. We need God’s Spirit who can transform our hearts and our eyes to see the hope that’s found in Jesus. We need God’s Spirit to do what we can’t on our own; to see that in Jesus, we can have peace with God and peace with one another. We need God’s Spirit who can take a multitude of diversity and unify it through the hard-hitting, sin-exposing, pain-healing, grace-giving gospel of Jesus. We’re always going to see the kinds of tension and divisions in this world that we’re witnessing right now, and empowered by God’s Spirit we should keep working, listening, and dialoguing about fixing and changing these realities, but God’s reality of true unity and peace has already been purchased for His people, the church, and we can live out of what’s been achieved for us.
Will we pray for that on this Pentecost Sunday? Will we live in light of the unity that’s been purchased for us? Will God’s Spirit move us to expose the unfruitful works of darkness in this world, to pursue peace with one another and those around us? Would the fires of hopelessness in our streets lead us to the unity of God’s Spirit poured out by God’s Son?