June 8, 2025 · Rev. Derek van Gulden · Acts 2:1-21; John 14:8-17
On Pentecost, everyone hears the good news in their own language. Rev. Derek van Gulden remembers an interpreter who heard Mass in her native Spanish for the first time in twenty years, and asks whether the Old Sloop would still be the church without its building, since the first church was people sharing meals, scripture and food with their neighbors.
Transcript
Friends, will you join me in a moment of prayer? Gracious and holy God, this morning I ask you to wear the move, the words of my mouth and the meditation of all our hearts by your love and help each of us this day not to be the instrument of our own or anyone else's oppression, but to be an instrument of peace in every step and every breath, in every moment of every day. Amen.
So Pentecost, the day that the Holy Spirit descends upon the disciples. And frees them to be able to talk in every language of every person present.
Have you ever traveled somewhere in a country? Actually, in this country, you don't have to go too far either. When you didn't understand the language totally. When things that you heard, maybe you'd get a piece of it here and there, but it wasn't always that clear. Anybody? Yeah. And that first time that you hear your native tongue, whether you've traveled to a different part of this country and you hear it in your own accent, you grow up in or somewhere else or in a country that you didn't know the language. What was it like that very first time that you heard words that spoke to you because you understood them? Stunning. Anyone else? No. You weren't excited. You weren't moved. Wow. Okay. Sorry. Familiar? No. Thank you. Familiar. Joyful. Joyful. Relief. Relief.
So think of this time and place. Jesus had died. Jesus had been risen. And Jesus had been about doing his ministries. But most people didn't know about it. But the disciples were still there with him because he came to them many times. And here they are in a room together. And if you read the part before that, they had been scattered for a while. And they came together, and the Holy Spirit alights on them, and all of a sudden they can speak. If you want to say, speak in tongues, that's okay. But they spoke in every language of every person that was there. I assume even if one person showed up and spoke that language, they would hear what the disciples were saying.
I've traveled a little bit. I am admittedly, I struggle with my own native language. I spent some time in France one summer at fifteen, and I actually got pretty good at understanding French. And the family I stayed with took me to the movies in French, and I was thrilled that I could understand about eighty percent of what was going on. That and it was a very action oriented movie, but it was thrilling to me. And the rest of the time I was there, they asked me to just speak in French and they would to me. I had no clue what was going on, but the first time I heard somebody speak English in an accent that felt like home, it was home. I came home.
I've traveled with people in the world. One of them, a good friend of mine, Monica, came with me when we went to El Salvador to do some disaster relief, and she came as my interpreter. She was Peruvian and moved to this country when she was sixteen and had not heard her native tongue, other than talking to family since she was sixteen. We were both in our mid thirties at that point. And one day when we had nothing scheduled to do, we went to visit a local church and she heard mass in Spanish and she cried and I thought, I wish I understood what was going on. It must be very moving or something else is going on with her. And afterwards, before I could ask her, she said, Derek, I can no longer interpret for you hearing my native language, hearing Scripture in my native language, the way I'm used to hearing it just opens something up in me. And if it's okay with you, I'm going to speak Spanish the rest of the time. We're here. Good luck. She would tell me every night what was going on. But that moment that she heard it, and I've been in other places where I've come home from somewhere or ran into some people I never expected to, that spoke English in the way that I speak it, whether they were from New England or somewhere else.
So think of all those people that were gathered there feeling joyous, feeling astonished, feeling like, oh, are they drunk? But when Peter gets up and he says, no, this is what's going on in that moment, everybody in earshot heard the words in their language that spoke to them the most.
This was the beginning of what we would traditionally call the church universal. Now, I will tell you, it wasn't the beginning of going out and building a white church with a steeple or a pueblo or anything like that, because you have to remember culturally, at that time, Christians or new Christians, they weren't even sure who they were, yet were living under the rule of Rome. And it was a military rule. It was a vicious rule, and they couldn't practice their faith in whatever way they chose to in the open. So the very early Christians would gather in a community in somebody's home. They'd have a meal, they'd listen to somebody, read scripture, and then they would go out into the community, take food with them, and bring it to those who needed it to me. That's another way of hearing your language. Coming from someone that might not speak it, to show up your door and say, here, here's some flour, here's some fruit, here's some wine. When you don't have it. That was how the church started in a lot of other ways that weren't always good.
But when you think about it, the Bible has been translated into more language than any other book in history. Some of those languages are gone now. There's a native language that came from, I believe, New England, that Harvard Divinity has one book. It's the only one left with their language in it, and it's a Bible. That language is gone except for one book. Imagine if you were someone that had that came from that tradition, and maybe some of the words were passed on to you. And finding this book and being able to read it in your native tongue. This is how Christianity spread. Well, that and many other ways that involve depression and things like that.
But in that moment and continually, we celebrate Pentecost as the start of the church. And the thing I always have to remind myself, it's not the church as a building. We are blessed to have a gorgeous building. Well, ask the trustees. Sometimes we don't feel blessed. It's a beautiful space. We use it a lot. It is a mission of this church.
But who are we without it? What would happen if all of a sudden in six months, the building was not ours for any number of reasons. It could be. Would we still be the old sloop? Will we still be church? Would we still be able to do the things that we are called to?
If you listen to the passage that. Rick read the gospel passage. The disciples are asking Jesus to say, tell us about God and Jesus. Like, tell it. Tell you about God. Where have you been? You've been with me the whole time I am. And my father, my father is in me and we are with you. But if you listen to it, one of the things that he says in there, if you can't think of it any other way, except for the works that you do, then you will know the works, the things that you go out and do because of your faith that God has blessed you with gifts. To do that we are called to as a community of faith to go out into the communities. That's what it's about. That's where the church started in many languages, many people. Inclusivity in a way that we forget sometimes because it didn't matter who you were. You heard those words. You were invited.
As we go through the days to come and the next weeks and months, we know that in this country things are not as easy as they used to be. Violence is on the uprise. People are dismissed from jobs that they've had a long time, that they are trained well and and for no known reason. Many people are losing access to health care, to shelter. Food scarcity is becoming worse. It's just it's overwhelming.
I know, I don't know how you even pick which one to start with, but I love today's. But the hope is that I find that through the Scripture, we have an example of how. We continue to be community, how we are called to do those works together for each other. And I always feel if there's a day I wake up and I just think, I can't deal with any of it today. I'm not sure what to do. I'm always reminded in one way or another that there are people in my community. That can probably remind me and pick me up in that moment.
May you be blessed moving forward into the weeks and months and years to come, remembering that you are never alone. That God, in that Pentecost day, alighting the Holy Spirit on all the disciples, and then all the people around hearing their words in their own language. It is about community. It's about inclusivity, and it's about holding up and celebrating who each are. Because the one big thing we have in common is that everybody is created in God's image, in their image. We were created everyone. Amen.