A Multiplicity of Ways (Pentecost)

When the day of Pentecost had come, suddenly there came a sound like the rush of a violent wind, and tongues, as of fire, appeared among them. All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other languages, as the Spirit gave them ability.

Powerful. Dramatic. Miraculous.

On that day, for those gathered in that place, the coming of the Holy Spirit was unmistakeable. They were filled with the Holy Spirit, of that there was no doubt. It was an experience of awe and wonder.  And those who witnessed it, who heard the apostles speaking in their native languages, were amazed and astonished.

Wouldn’t you love to have an experience like that? Maybe you have had an experience of the Holy Spirit coming upon you in a powerful way. We do sometimes have dramatic experiences, moments of awe and wonder when we just know that God is present, when we experience God within us and around us.

Yet we also know that experiences this powerful, this unambiguous, at least for most of us, are few and far between.  If ever.

These past several weeks, as we’ve worked our way through Jesus’ final words to his disciples, we’ve been talking a lot about what I’ve called our mutual in-dwelling with God. How we abide in God, and God abides in us. How God is the one in whom we live and move and have our being. About Jesus’ promise that he would send the Holy Spirit who will abide with us and be in us. How at his ascension, Jesus told his apostles to wait for the coming of the Holy Spirit.

The promise that God will abide in us, that the Holy Spirit will come to us, it is a promise for all of us.

Yet on this Pentecost Sunday, on this day when we pray “Come Holy Spirit Come”, it does raise a host of questions for us. Has God kept that promise to me? How will I know? Have I received the Holy Spirit? Does the divine dwell in me? And if so, how do I experience that, and how can I know that’s what I’m experiencing?

For most of us, the reading we just heard from the book of Acts, though wonderful and amazing, only serves to deepen those questions.  Because though I can certainly recognize the coming of the Holy Spirit to those gathered in that room on that day in the dramatic story that we just read, I’ve never experienced anything like it, nothing as dramatic or powerful or miraculous as that. Does that mean that I’ve yet to receive the Holy Spirit?

Thankfully, our scriptures suggest to us that the Holy Spirit can come to us in a whole bunch of different ways, that our experience of the Spirit can range from the dramatic to the subtle, from the unmistakeable to the imperceptible. So, what I want to do this morning is to explore some of the many and various ways that the Holy Spirit does come to us, to help us to make sense of our own experiences of God, and perhaps to lean into some of our doubts.

Our Pentecost reading from Acts tells us that the Holy Spirit can come with power. We can receive the Holy Spirit in experiences of wonder. There are amazing experiences in life that overwhelm us, that engender feelings of awe and wonder. For the apostles, it was the sound of rushing wind in that room. For me recently, it was the birth of my granddaughter.  When we experience these things, and many more like them, when we experience that awe and wonder, it can prompt in us an awareness of something more, a something more that stirs within us and around us. An experience of the wondrous presence of God in our lives.

Yet in our gospel reading today, the Holy Spirit is received in a completely different way. The disciples are gathered behind locked doors on the evening of Easter, consumed by grief and fear. Jesus appears in their midst and tells them “Peace be with you”. Then he breathes on them and says “Receive the Holy Spirit”. It is an intimate setting, they’re close enough that they can feel his breath on their skin.  No rushing wind, no fire. Just an experience of comfort in the midst of grief and fear, an abiding feeling of peace, a subtle encounter like breath on skin. The coming of the Holy Spirit into our lives can be as gentle and as almost imperceptible as these.

Our Psalm reminds us that the Holy Spirit comes not just to humans, but to all of creation.  Having in mind all living things, the psalmist praises God saying, You send forth your Spirit, and they are created; and so you renew the face of the earth.” The Spirit breathes life into all living things. Indeed, the in-dwelling of the Spirit reaches all of creation. “You look at the earth and it trembles; you touch the mountains and they smoke.” One of the ways that we experience the in-dwelling of the Spirit in creation, and we too are part of creation, is by being attentive to nature.  My favourite poet, Mary Oliver, captures the experience of being attentive to the divine in nature in many of her poems, including this one, When I Am Among the Trees:

When I am among the trees,

especially the willows and the honey locust,

equally the beech, the oaks and the pines

they give off such hints of gladness. . .

“It’s simple,” they say

“and you too have come

into the world to do this, to go easy, to be filled

with light, and to shine”

For some of us, the Spirit comes to us when we are in nature. In hints of gladness. Filling us with light.

For others, the Spirit comes in the ordinary, everyday experiences of life.  In another of her poems, Mary Oliver writes:

“It’s almost dawn

and the usual half-miracles begin.”

There are everyday experiences of the Spirit, of the divine in-dwelling that are so common that we miss them or take them for granted. The usual half-miracles as I wake each morning. The return of consciousness, the divine gift which allows us to experience ourselves and the world. The awareness that I exist, that “I am”. The renewal of agency, my ability to intend and to do in the world. And not least, the gift and experience of life itself. All these, what Mary Oliver calls the usual half-miracles, are the fruit of the Spirit in us.

Finally, at least for today, Paul’s letter to the Corinthians reminds us that we know the in-dwelling of the Spirit through the gifts we have received. He names wisdom, faith, healing and prophecy, and there are so many more. Each of us has been given gifts by the Holy Spirit, and when we use our gifts, we experience God at work in and through us.

This rings true for me. I am fortunate, blessed really, to have the opportunity to preach, to speak to you each week.  As I prepare, I have a process I rely on, reading the scriptures and various commentaries, listening to podcasts, and spending time in prayer. But often enough, I get to a point, late in the week, where I still have no idea what I’m going to talk about. And then there’s a moment, not always, but often enough, when, in what seems like an instant, I go from having no clue, to knowing exactly what it is I need to say.  And I have come to recognize this moment as a gift of the Spirit, an experience of the coming of the Spirit.  Some people would call it inspiration, which if you trace back the word, literally means “God-breathed”. Those of you who are artists and creatives, and we all are to some extent, you may recognize your own experience of the Spirit in these gifts of inspiration.

So, as I hope that I’ve made a little clearer, the Holy Spirit comes to us in a multiplicity of ways. Our experience of the Holy Spirit who dwells within us can take a variety of forms, sometimes dramatic, sometimes subtle, sometimes cloaked in the ordinary half-miracles of our daily life.

We may never experience the Spirit in the same way that the apostles did on the day of Pentecost, with rushing winds and tongues of fire, speaking in foreign languages, with miraculous power and drama. But the promise of the Spirit is for all, indeed for all of creation, and the way the Spirit comes may well be different for each one of us. How beautiful is that!

Come, Holy Spirit, come.

Amen.

Poems from Mary Oliver, Devotions, pp 123 and 166.

Homily. Yr A Pentecost. May 24 2026. Trinity

Readings: Acts 2.1-21; Psalm 104.24-34, 35b; 1 Cor 12.3b-13; John 20.19-23

Image by brian