For those of you who’ve ever done the readings in church, I have a question. What’s the first thing you do when you know you a reading’s coming up? I suspect that for most of you the answer will be the same. Number one, check the length of the passage; and number two, scan it for foreign words. Depending on what you find when you check these two things, you’ll either breathe a sigh of relief: “It’s only ten lines and the hardest word to pronounce is Jerusalem.”When the day of Pentecost had come, they were all together in one place. 2And suddenly from heaven there came a sound like the rush of a violent wind, and it filled the entire house where they were sitting.3Divided tongues, as of fire, appeared among them, and a tongue rested on each of them. 4All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other languages, as the Spirit gave them ability.5 Now there were devout Jews from every nation under heaven living in Jerusalem. 6And at this sound the crowd gathered and was bewildered, because each one heard them speaking in the native language of each.7Amazed and astonished, they asked, ‘Are not all these who are speaking Galileans? 8And how is it that we hear, each of us, in our own native language? 9Parthians, Medes, Elamites, and residents of Mesopotamia, Judea and Cappadocia, Pontus and Asia, 10Phrygia and Pamphylia, Egypt and the parts of Libya belonging to Cyrene, and visitors from Rome, both Jews and proselytes, 11Cretans and Arabs—in our own languages we hear them speaking about God’s deeds of power.’ 12All were amazed and perplexed, saying to one another, ‘What does this mean?’ 13But others sneered and said, ‘They are filled with new wine.’14 But Peter, standing with the eleven, raised his voice and addressed them: ‘Men of Judea and all who live in Jerusalem, let this be known to you, and listen to what I say. 15Indeed, these are not drunk, as you suppose, for it is only nine o’clock in the morning. 16No, this is what was spoken through the prophet Joel:
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.
19 And I will show portents in the heaven above
and signs on the earth below,
blood, and fire, and smoky mist.
20 The sun shall be turned to darkness
and the moon to blood,
before the coming of the Lord’s great and glorious day.
21 Then everyone who calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved.”[Acts 2.1-21]
Or, you’ll have a good hard think about whether you really
need to come to church on that Sunday.
But for those of you who have ever experienced that sinking feeling when you come across, Elimelech or Melchizedek, Shelumiel or Shephatiah, or my personal favourite: Pokereth-hazzebaim, take heart, you’re not alone. An American church asked people to vote on the most unpronounceable Biblical names, and these are the top three:
In third place was Joseph’s Egyptian name from Genesis: Zaphenath-paneah
In second place was King Cushan-rishathaim of Aram-naharaim
And in first place was Isaiah’s son Maher-shalal-hash-baz.
For centuries, English speaking Christians have tried to cope with ancient Hebrew names. And over those centuries a number of strategies have come up, and I’m going to share them with you now.
There are the mumblers: who speak loud and clear all the way through the reading until it comes to mentioning Pokereth-hazzebaim. It’s not really the best method because the mumbling draws more attention to the difficult word.
There are the researchers: who get copies of audio Bibles and listen to the name being pronounced, and then write it out as it’s pronounced. That works okay, but it’s a bit of a faff, and involves buying an audio Bible, which can be expensive.
Then there are the bluffers: those who argue that no-one really knows the pronunciation of a word from three or four thousand years ago, and so long as you say it with confidence, it doesn’t matter what you say.
There is another method. One that we don’t use in church, which is funny because it the most Biblical method of all. In Matthew 10.19, Mark 13.11 and Luke 12.11 Jesus tells the disciples not to don’t worry about what to say in front of the authorities, because it isn’t them speaking, it’s the Holy Spirit.
And that’s exactly what happens in the Acts reading: the Holy Spirit descended upon the disciples, and you’ll notice it says that tongues of fire rested on them. The Greek word is ‘glossa’ and it means an actual tongue, and also a language, like the mother-tongue: Cumbrian.
So these tongues, rested on the disciples, and gave them the ability to speak in foreign languages.
They use this new ability to speak about ‘God’s deeds of power’, His wondrous works. And the question we have to ask is ‘why?’ Why do they get this amazing ability?
One thing is for certain, it wasn’t so that they could travel the world and tell everyone about God. Which I have to say I find a bit strange. The twelve men who followed Jesus every day, who knew him intimately, and would probably be the best possible witnesses, ended up in Jerusalem. When all the other believers left as the Jewish leaders started persecuting them, the twelve original believers stayed in Jerusalem. So it can’t be that.
There are a couple of possibilities. One nice idea is that this is like the Tower of Babel in reverse. In that story the people of the world were separated by language, they were suddenly confused because in their pride they thought they could build a tower high enough to reach Heaven, and here, the people are suddenly united by language: despite coming from across the Jewish world, Europe, Asia and Africa, everyone hears their own language. The Spirit brings them together.
The other idea is that this is a foreshadowing, that although the disciples don’t themselves go out of Judea, the message of God will, and does, until the entire world knows about him.
The message that I want you take home today is a word of comfort, and a real challenge.
The comfort is that with God anything is possible: the disciples were able to stand in front of the authorities and speak about God’s majesty, they were able to communicate in languages that they’d never spoken in before, and we are able to stand at the lectern and read from Isaiah or Judges or Genesis without making fools of ourselves.
The challenge is that for God to help us, we need to trust him. We need to not rely on our own abilities, because when we do that, we can get in God’s way. To really take advantage of the gifts that God is offering, sometimes we need to step back and let him be in charge.
But for those of you who have ever experienced that sinking feeling when you come across, Elimelech or Melchizedek, Shelumiel or Shephatiah, or my personal favourite: Pokereth-hazzebaim, take heart, you’re not alone. An American church asked people to vote on the most unpronounceable Biblical names, and these are the top three:
In third place was Joseph’s Egyptian name from Genesis: Zaphenath-paneah
In second place was King Cushan-rishathaim of Aram-naharaim
And in first place was Isaiah’s son Maher-shalal-hash-baz.
For centuries, English speaking Christians have tried to cope with ancient Hebrew names. And over those centuries a number of strategies have come up, and I’m going to share them with you now.
There are the mumblers: who speak loud and clear all the way through the reading until it comes to mentioning Pokereth-hazzebaim. It’s not really the best method because the mumbling draws more attention to the difficult word.
There are the researchers: who get copies of audio Bibles and listen to the name being pronounced, and then write it out as it’s pronounced. That works okay, but it’s a bit of a faff, and involves buying an audio Bible, which can be expensive.
Then there are the bluffers: those who argue that no-one really knows the pronunciation of a word from three or four thousand years ago, and so long as you say it with confidence, it doesn’t matter what you say.
There is another method. One that we don’t use in church, which is funny because it the most Biblical method of all. In Matthew 10.19, Mark 13.11 and Luke 12.11 Jesus tells the disciples not to don’t worry about what to say in front of the authorities, because it isn’t them speaking, it’s the Holy Spirit.
And that’s exactly what happens in the Acts reading: the Holy Spirit descended upon the disciples, and you’ll notice it says that tongues of fire rested on them. The Greek word is ‘glossa’ and it means an actual tongue, and also a language, like the mother-tongue: Cumbrian.
So these tongues, rested on the disciples, and gave them the ability to speak in foreign languages.
They use this new ability to speak about ‘God’s deeds of power’, His wondrous works. And the question we have to ask is ‘why?’ Why do they get this amazing ability?
One thing is for certain, it wasn’t so that they could travel the world and tell everyone about God. Which I have to say I find a bit strange. The twelve men who followed Jesus every day, who knew him intimately, and would probably be the best possible witnesses, ended up in Jerusalem. When all the other believers left as the Jewish leaders started persecuting them, the twelve original believers stayed in Jerusalem. So it can’t be that.
There are a couple of possibilities. One nice idea is that this is like the Tower of Babel in reverse. In that story the people of the world were separated by language, they were suddenly confused because in their pride they thought they could build a tower high enough to reach Heaven, and here, the people are suddenly united by language: despite coming from across the Jewish world, Europe, Asia and Africa, everyone hears their own language. The Spirit brings them together.
The other idea is that this is a foreshadowing, that although the disciples don’t themselves go out of Judea, the message of God will, and does, until the entire world knows about him.
The message that I want you take home today is a word of comfort, and a real challenge.
The comfort is that with God anything is possible: the disciples were able to stand in front of the authorities and speak about God’s majesty, they were able to communicate in languages that they’d never spoken in before, and we are able to stand at the lectern and read from Isaiah or Judges or Genesis without making fools of ourselves.
The challenge is that for God to help us, we need to trust him. We need to not rely on our own abilities, because when we do that, we can get in God’s way. To really take advantage of the gifts that God is offering, sometimes we need to step back and let him be in charge.
