June 8, 2025 – Pentecost Sunday
Jack Belsom
Unlike Canada, the United States does not have an “official language.”
I know President Trump issued an executive order establishing English as the official language. Really? According to the U.S. Census, 22% of the population speak a language other than English at home. I have acquaintances from Maine and Vermont whose first language was French. Almost anywhere we go in Hawai’i, we hear other languages being spoken. And what shall we say about Hawaiian being acceptable for legal communication here? Are we defying a Presidential dictum or simply recognizing that no government can create uniformity with a law or an edict.
Pentecost is the third major festival of the Christian year. Fortunately, it has never been commercialized with gifts, greeting cards, or special meals. Yet, the church gathers to celebrate…although somewhat feebly when we compare it to Christmas and Easter. We may change the colors of the hangings in the sanctuary, but it will never compete with the festive attire of Christmas Eve or Easter. And what song shall we sing for this major festival: “Happy birthday to the church” or “In Christ There Is No East or West”?
We are people who tell stories, and the people of faith have always told stories. What can we learn from the telling of this story of this very strange event?
First, let’s recognize that the language of commerce in the first century Judea was Greek. Even Romans communicated in Greek for commerce. Second, Jesus and his followers from Galilee lived in a crossroads of commerce and had to speak Greek if they wanted to communicate. They probably spoke Aramaic—the older language of international trade before the Greek and Roman Empires—at home, and good Jews would have learned some Hebrew, which was the language of liturgy and not of the people.
Shavuot—the feast of weeks—was a Jewish harvest festival. Like our Thanksgiving traditions, people would bring the first of the harvest as offerings. It also celebrates the gift of the Torah—the first five books of Hebrew Scripture. Like our celebration of Pentecost, Shavuot did not draw the crowds of Passover, which occurred seven weeks earlier. The majority of those in Jerusalem were people who had relocated there or had been forced to relocate there by the Roman Empire.
As residents they would have spoken both Aramaic and common Greek.
They had learned to distinguish accents just as we do with English speakers. Once I tried to purchase a concert ticket in Paris using my minimal French, and the young woman quickly responded in English. My accent gave me away. Jesus’ closest followers spoke with a “country bumpkin” accent that let everyone know they were from Galilee. So, we can understand the amazement of those who gathered after the commotion and heard these “Galileans” speaking in the hearers’ first languages.
Pentecost is not about “speaking in tongues”—a Spirit induced language that requires another Spirit-gifted person to translate. The fancy word for that is glossolalia. Try pronouncing that word and your tongue will let you know that something unusual is happening. Instead of special gifts to a select few, we celebrate the gift of communicating across cultural and linguistic barriers not with interpreters but with comfortable and comforting speech that sets us free to listen and to find ourselves welcomed.
Peter seizes the opportunity to speak to his fellow Jews by referencing the prophet Joel. It begins with “In the last days.” This is not about some cosmic destruction but about breaking down barriers and bringing people together. That is the promise that occurs many times in Hebrew Scripture: not destruction but a fulfillment of bringing people together.
Look at who is included: Sons and daughters, young and old. Even slaves “both men and women” will receive the gift of the Spirit and will prophesy. They shall proclaim the new thing that is happening. They shall announce that the long- awaited gathering of all God’s people has begun, and it starts not by speaking one language but by speaking the language of the hearts of all people.
Some of us are old enough to remember when the Soviet Union collapsed.
In the 1990s, Arthur Schlesinger Jr., a former public figure was concerned by what he called “Balkanization.” Those who remember Yugoslavia and Czechoslovakia also remember that many small ethnically unique and linguistically different groups were formed into nations: Czech Republic, Slovakia, Serbia, Estonia. Gone was the Russian Empire that insisted on one language, one political way of being, and domination of a few over these small states. Today we wonder…since Russia took over parts of Georgia and Ukraine which are both fairly large, what chance would these smaller nations have?
Schlessinger was worried about the “Balkanization of American society.” He feared the kind of social disintegration that occurred in the former Yugoslavia and led to ethnic cleansing. He wrote: “Unless a common purpose binds them together, tribal hostilities will drive them apart” [Arthur Schlesinger Jr., The Disuniting of America: Reflections on Multicultural Society (New York: W. W. Norton & Co., 1992), 10]. Those who heard Peter were a diverse lot that included converts. Belonging to God’s people was never an issue of racial purity or nationality.
Michael Jinkins picks up that image and writes:
… the real threat of Balkanization lies not in the differences that God has woven into all parts of God’s creation, including humanity. The great danger of Balkanization lies in any group’s lust to power over others, its insistence that its identity alone reflects God’s nature and God’s way, its demand that the otherness of others be erased from the pages of history or from the face of the earth… [Feasting on the Word Commentary, Year C, vol. 4]
No! Instead of establishing uniformity of language, culture, or religion, Pentecost is the gift of the Holy Spirit to all without distinction. Those who hear in their own language and believe that Jesus was the Christ joined. They joined the people of God because of God’s incredible gifts are for all. God’s love breaks boundaries and barriers.
There is a movement among some Christians to stop talking about the Kingdom of God and to start intentionally using “Kin-dom.” We are not talking about family churches that abound in Hawaii. We are talking about those who find their “kin” because of God’s action. Some will even say the “kin” are not simply related to humans but to all creation. That should resonate with Hawaiian beliefs. It’s time for breaking down barriers for being part of Jesus’ kin. Do you speak another language? You can still be kin. Do you prefer to worship in another style? You can still be kin. Do you prefer to express your faith in ways that may make me uncomfortable? You can still be kin.
Forget political wrangling over diversity, equity, and inclusion. In Hawai’i we know about pluralism: racial, ethnic, religious, and linguistic. The answer to pluralism is not to establish one dominant race, culture, faith, language, and species. That is not the message of the Gospel in Acts:
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.
18 Even upon my slaves, both men and women, in those days I will pour out my Spirit, and they shall prophesy.
21 Then everyone who calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved.’ [Acts 2:17–18, 21 NRSVUE]
Welcome to God’s kin-dom. Amen.