Pingstpredikan – Den helige ande

(Här är utkastet till söndagens predikan. Det är på engelska eftersom jag ofta skriver predikan på engelska för att vi ska kunna översätta den till karen)

Pentecost is here and it is time to talk about the holy spirit.
As some of you know my spiritual growth was at first in the Pentecostal movement. I was drawn to the concrete meetings with the holy spirit that was the foundation of the Pentecostal movement. The feeling of having a personal contact with God was amazing and I felt touched and used by God several times. I loved to sing worship songs, to really let go of myself and focus on God.

I had one problem with the Pentecostal movement that started right away and it was about speaking in tongues. It was a very strong focus on speaking in tongues and I was taught that speaking in tongues was the evidence of the baptism of the holy spirit.
But it didn’t make sense to me.
Because I knew that I was filled with holy spirit and I had even on a couple of occasions speaked prophetic words, but I had never speaked in tongues. And as I could read in the bible I couldn’t understand why the speaking in tongues should be so important. I totally disagreed with this teachings but also felt a growing doubt in my heart: Why can’t I speak in tongues, am I doing something wrong. Why won’t God give me this gift, am I not good enough?

I’m very thankful for my time in the Pentecostal movement and within it’s walls I have built the foundation of my faith. But on this matter I believe that the teaching I got was wrong. Even if I later on should experience speaking in tongues it only made in clearer for me that this was NOT the coolest or most important thing that being filled with the holy spirit was about.

  
312 Azusa street

Let me take you back to 1906, in a warehouse on Azusa Steet in Los Angeles USA. There started the Pentecostal revival But the most important and provocative thing was not the speaking in tongues, no it was the fact that this revival was an interracial church. Blacks and whites, people from all kinds of backgrounds came togheter to receive the Holy spirit. William Seymore ,the preacher in the middle of the revival stated :

And a Los Angeles Times reporter reported:

I think that this is amazing and i wish that i would have heard more about this social revival when I was a young pentecostal. It makes clear that when the holy spirit comes it changes everything!  
Another intersting fact about the first pentecostal movement is that in this house, the birthplace of the Pentecostal movement, there was a room where people got to pray and to recive the holy spirit, and it was a quiet room and only whispers was allowed. So the birth of the Pentecostal movement was a lot quiter then you could think.

The Charismatic church

The Pentecostal movement is often referred to a charismatic church. And It sure is, but lets get it straight what is “charismatic”. Because there is a lot of confusion on this point. Charismatic comes from the word charismata which in our bible is translated as Gift of mercy (from the holy spirit).
And it is Paul that talks mostly about the gifts of mercy, we need to understand that Paul doesn’t seem to make any distinction between “spiritual” and “practical” gifts. He talks of prophecy in the same sentence as serving, showing mercy and comforting and he suggests that we can receive gifts of very different kinds and nature when we let ourselves be filled by the holy spirit. And the spectacular “supernatural” gifts are not even the most important.

It breaks my heart to see people where the holy spirit works in an amazing way but they and we who stands beside don’t consider it spiritual or charismatic!
Let me state this once and for all: it is just as much a charismatic act of the holy spirit to help your brothers and sister with their homework as it is to speak in tongues or lay hands on the sick!

How do we know what is a “charisma”?

First of all: does the gift point towards Jesus?
Jesus himself said that you should know the tree from the fruit and the holy spirits main purpose is to in every possible way always point to Jesus, to show the world who he is.   

It seems also that in the new testament, the best way to know if a church was having a healthy spirituality was to see how they treated the widows, the poor, the fatherless. Remember that Paul in many letters corrects churches that have gone to extremes in spiritual and moral matters but always holds love and compassion as the way of Christ.

As I wrote in a  earlier newsletter: I’m no longer impressed by miracles and speaking in tongues. Christianity is not and have never been exclusive on this kind of acts. But don’t get me wrong, it’s not that I think that this is wrong and that I wouldn’t want to see more of it in our church. It’s just that it is just not enough for me. I want to be a part of a church that makes difference in not only peoples heart, but which makes difference in the city, that is a part of changing the world to a better place.

Finally I will recall what Jim Wallis said on the conference last weekend:

Final prayer:
Im praying that the Holy spirit will fill us, if he want’s to give us the ability to speak in tongues or to cure illness, it’s fine by me. But first of all I want him to fill us with the love for eachother and our neighbours, our city, our world.

Because that is the true miracle of Pentecost