Acts 2:1-11; 1COR. 12:3-13; John 20:19-23
Shortly before the end of his earthly ministry, Jesus said to his disciples: “It is to your advantage that I go away, for if I do not go away, the Advocate will not come to you; but if I go, I will send him to you” (Jn 16:7). Today, we celebrate the fulfillment of Christ’s promise of the Holy Spirit—the Paraclete to the world. The word Paraclete is from the Greek parakletos, meaning “advocate”, “intercessor”. This phenomenal event is popularly known as the Pentecost. The Pentecost has no Christian origin. So why do we refer the day of descent of the Holy Spirit as Pentecost Sunday?
The name Pentecost is derived from the Greek “pentecoste” which means “fiftieth (day)” It corresponds to the Jewish feast called Shabuoth or the Feast of Weeks. This Jewish feast was a thanksgiving for the wheat harvest and took place seven weeks after the Feast of Unleavened Bread. Christian association of this feast started in Acts 2:1-45. Fifty days after the resurrection of Christ, the Holy Spirit descended on the Apostles while they were in the Upper Room. This happened on the day when all Jews gathered to celebrate the “Shabuoth”. Little wonder today is exactly fifty days after Easter Sunday.At Pentecost, God reversed the Babel event with the Upper Room event. In Genesis 11:1-9, the Tower of Babel was built by the proud men of the land of Shinar after the flood to affirm their power over their creator. But God defeated their design by confounding their language, and hence the name Babel, meaning "confusion." Today in our world, we have people who embark on intellectual and scientific Babel projects either to debunk the mystery of the existence of God or to compete with God in ordering the cause of the universe. Such people bring back to the world the fruits of their confusion. On the contrary, the Pentecost was accompanied by great signs among which was the speaking in various tongues by the occupants of the Upper Room. The apostles began to speak in other languages as the Spirit enabled them (Acts 2:4); all were able to understand them in their local tongues (Acts 2:8). Thus, humility, prayer and total dependence on God led to the unification of human language, showing that with God all things are possible.
Before the Pentecost, they were locked up in the Upper Room in an atmosphere of fear and anxiety. As they were inside the room, they were unable to confront the injustice, prejudice, hatred, violence, idolatry, pride, immorality that were being perpetuated outside the Upper Room because they the Spirit had not come. When the Holy Spirit came upon the disciples, He endowed them with his different gifts. They are: wisdom, understanding, counsel, fortitude, knowledge, piety, and fear of the Lord (Is. 11:2-3). The doors of the Upper Room were thrown wide open. There was a radical transformation that pushed the apostles to leave the Upper Room with the zeal to love; to change world. They healed, prophesied and made converts. The whole community noticed something exceptional.
My dear friends, what do we do when we live our various churches today with the gifts of the Spirit we received? Let us allow the Holy Spirit to transform us. The fire which rests upon the heads of apostles is a symbol of transformation, renewal and power. Allow the this Fire to burn down the Tower of Babel in you which is a road block to your spiritual growth. Be docile to the promptings of the Holy Spirit so that you can begin to transform the world. The church buildings represent the Upper Room. When we leave this Upper Room can we be able to see the level of immorality, hatred, injustice and abject poverty in our neighborhood? Can we be able to do something to better people’s helpless condition?
Finally, in as much as we thrive with the variety of gifts as St. Paul mentioned in 1Cor. 12:3-13, let us be also familiar with his admonition: “If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. If I give away all I have, and if I deliver my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing” (ICor. 13:1-3). Let us speak the language of love, it is the language of the Holy Spirit.
