Of all the achievements of human genius, nothing is more wonderful than language. And yet, it is also true that nothing is more destructive than language. For language unites us and yet, language also separates us.
Of all the gifts we have been given, nothing is more useful than language. With language we can communicate almost anything. We can speak forcefully and vigorously and make sure that our point of view is heard. Or we can whisper sweet subtleties and keep others guessing about what we really mean. Language is a wonderfully versatile gift.
With language we can declare our love for one another. It may take many forms. Whether it be the sublime simplicity of "How do I love thee, let me count the ways", or, more likely, these days, the raucous rap of, "I gotta have ya, baby, yeah, yeah, yeah", still it’s using language to open our hearts to each other.
With language we ask for food, we write laws, we create road signs to find our way around. Our world is unthinkable without language, for language unites us.
And yet language also separates us. Language can be destructive. For every word or love, there is a word of hate. For every time we speak peace, someone declares war. For every truth, there is also a lie. Language separates us and can even destroy us.
Maybe that’s why there is a movement on to declare an official national language. Several states have declared English to be their official language, and one group is trying to get a constitutional amendment passed so that English will be the official language of the United States. There is a fear that if we do not all speak the same language, we will be badly divided. People point to Canada, officially bilingual but experiencing a great deal of tension. Others point out that only two countries in the world have more Spanish speakers than the United States. So maybe there is reason to worry about our being a divided country. Language can separate people from one another.
This past week I saw a vivid illustration. As many of you know, we have moved my wife’s mother into a retirement home. In its dining room, one of the workers is a Russian lady; her sole task, it would appear, is to pour coffee. As nearly as I can tell, she knows only one phrase of English: "Regular or decaf’. If you speak to her about anything else, she grunts, turns away, and murmurs, "regular or decaf’. That’s it! Not much of a basis for understanding!
And the news services carried the story of a deaf teenager who asked to be taken from her father’s custody because that father, among other issues, refused even to try to learn the deaf sign language! If we do not have a common language, we are separated. Small wonder that there are calls for an official language!
But the Christian church already has an official language. The Christian movement has a distinctive way of communicating. Our official language is Spirit. Spirit is the speech of the Christian church. But Spirit speech is not just words, but something lying down deep beneath the words. Spirit speech is not just ideas, but someone who speaks beneath what we say. Our official language is Spirit.
On the first day of Pentecost, when all the believers had gathered in one place, on them came something some felt as a rushing wind, some saw as tongues of fire. Something, no, someone, came on them and gave them a gift. The someone was the Holy Spirit of the living God; and the gift was this Spirit language.
The text says, "All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other languages, as the Spirit gave them ability."
I want you to notice two things about the official language of the church, Spirit language.
First, Spirit language means that you and I can learn to speak to one another’s deepest needs. We can understand one another, despite our differences. Spirit language means empathy for one another, real understanding.
And, second, Spirit language means that, someday, all of us may be taught the key words that will bring us together. Spirit language holds out the wonderful promise: that one day all of us will be understood and given wholeness by God Himself.
Spirit language: understanding and being understood. Let me explore this with you.
I
First, Spirit language means that we can speak to one another’s deepest needs, and we can understand one another, despite our differences. Spirit language means that, with the help of the Holy Spirit, we can speak to the deepest needs of those whom the world separates from us. The gift of Spirit language means that you and I are can be empowered to address the heart hungers of persons who are very different from us and whose ways are quite foreign to us. "Amazed and astonished, they asked, ’Are not all these who are speaking Galileans? And how is it that we hear, each of us, in our own native language? Parthians, Medes, Elamites, and residents of Mesopotamia, Judea and Cappadocia, Pontus and Asia ... [and so on and so on.]’" At Pentecost, the believers could speak to the needs of others.
Pentecost is sometimes misinterpreted. Sometimes we talk about Pentecost as if it were a time when people spoke in unknown tongues, so-called spiritual language. But you can see that it was not a matter of people speaking in some sort of special spiritual language. It was a matter of the disciples being able to speak in the languages of all those around them, the disciples being able to communicate with people in the people’s own languages. In other words, the gift of the Spirit, Spirit language, is a deep empathy. It is a willingness so to enter into the world and needs of another person, however different he may be, that the truth of God’s grace can be shared. Spirit language means that, by the power and love of God, you and I are enabled to love others enough to speak our truth the way they need to hear it said, rather than the way we like to say it.
My wife says that one of my foibles, and I’m sure she’s right, is that I want to make people say things correctly. I like to insist that you use my language, my phrases. If you don’t give something its right name, I sort of pretend not to know what you’re talking about! And I will confess to you -- the church staff knows this already -- that I am completely unable to let a misspelled word or a grammatical error get past me. I have this overpowering need, to correct people.
But, you see, Spirit language means that we work to cross over into others’ worlds. It means that we are more interested in sharing the truth with others in the way they can understand than we are in satisfying our own need to look good. Spirit language, at its root, means that in the church we are a community of people who love and care about each other so much that we will enter into one another’s worlds, we will strive to understand, we will do more than listen to the sounds of our own jaws flapping. We will speak what others need to hear in the way they need to hear it. And that is love. That is Spirit language.
II
But, second, Spirit language also means that, someday, all of us will learn the things that will bring us together. Spirit language holds out a wonderful promise: that one day all of us will be able not only to understand one another, but, better yet, to be understood, even understood by God Himself.
These earliest Christians at Pentecost received a foretaste of glory divine. They received something so wonderful, so thrilling that it is almost impossible to describe. They felt understood themselves. Listen to how they interpreted the coming of the Spirit, the Spirit language. "Peter … raised his voice, ’This is what was spoken through the prophet Joel, "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. Even upon my servants, both men and women, in those days I will pour out my Spirit and they shall prophesy ... then everyone who calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved.’’’
Spirit language means that one day all of us can be empowered with insight. All of us can be gifted to see visions and dream dreams and prophesy. Spirit language means that all of the old barriers are dropped. All of the old battlegrounds, male versus female, young versus old, bond versus free … all of these old barriers and walls will come a tumblin’ down, and whosoever will call on the name of the Lord will be saved. The language of the Spirit means that one day, you and I will be fully known, completely understood, speaking to the Father and for the Father, and He will hear us and we will hear Him. And the love which the Spirit has for His people will some day be complete.
I know of no deeper heart hunger than the need to be understood. If you and I can feel that someone truly listens to us and genuinely hears us, then we feel fulfilled. And so Peter speaks of all the voiceless ones being heard. That is Spirit language. Sons and daughters prophesying …
children, who were supposed to be seen and not heard, now being cherished. Young men seeing visions ... in an era when tradition ruled, and young people were not supposed to imagine anything new, now being heard. Old men shall dream dreams ... in an age when the elderly could be cast aside as worthless and outmoded, now being respected. Both men and women shall prophesy ... in a society where women were expected to keep their place, now being valued. Oh, do you see it? The church’s language is Spirit, and when the Spirit empowers us, He takes us beyond the old barriers of distrust and suspicion; when the Spirit enables us to speak, everyone’s voice is valued, everyone’s mind is worthy, and, best of all, everyone’s heart is understood.
Then whosoever calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved. For the Spirit language allows everyone to speak and to be heard, truly heard. Heard by the Spirit, listened to by the church, understood. Whosoever.
The other day I received a very special communication. It was an e-mail communication. Do you know about e-mail? Now there is a language I didn’t know anything at all about until recently. But my son is a computer programmer, and he has taught me many things, including the rather special language you use when communicating electronically. In some message to him I had told him that I was sending him something, but that it couldn’t go over the telephone wires; I used a phrase of computer jargon. I said I would send have to send this item by "snail mail". Now you who work for the postal service will have to forgive the cyberspace world that rather negative term. "Snail mail", in other words, slow!
Well, my son sent a message back and said something like this: "Dad, when you used the words "snail mail" I saw just how much you are growing in your ability with the computer. I saw that you are entering into my world. It just struck me, he said, how much we are alike and how much we are together. My grandfather, your father, was a messenger, delivering "snail mail"; you are a messenger of God; and I (he said of himself) am helping to build a global interactivity network. Do you see how we connect? Dad, I want you to know that I do love you." What an incredible and beautiful result just from using someone else’s language. When we know that we are understood, love is born!
Spirit language. When we begin to speak in the way that another person needs to hear it, and leave room to be understood as well, then there is a community of love. Then we are together. Whosoever. Whatever your accent, whatever your education, whatever your profession, whatever your culture, whatever your ability: know that the language spoken here in God’s church, the official language, is Spirit. Spirit language, understanding and being understood. Whosoever will call on the name of the Lord shall be saved.
