"And I believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord and giver of life," so we confess in the Nicene Creed. Yet we live in a dying world: the massacre at Columbine High School; the shootings at another school in Georgia. A father in rural Minnesota murders his three-year-old son. Many ask, "why?" How could these things happen? We live in a culture that tells us that there are no absolute truths. We are told that each individual is free to create his or her meaning. We should not really act surprised, therefore, when people do just that, even when it means that they "create their own meaning" by causing senseless death for themselves and others. All around us we hear voices that defend death by choice when it comes to the unborn or critically ill. Why should we be shocked when this logic is carried through to its logical outcome? Now, over and against this culture of death stands the gift of Pentecost, the festival of the Lord and Giver of life.

Pentecost Day was fifty days after Passover. It was a harvest festival for the Jews, something akin to our Thanksgiving Day in November. It was originally a time to bless God for the first fruits of the harvest. Later Judaism came to use this festival as a time to commemorate the giving of the Law at Mt. Sinai. No doubt that many of the pilgrims who came to Jerusalem to celebrate Passover remained through Pentecost. But just as God had fulfilled the Old Testament Passover by the death and resurrection of His Son, so He would now bring Pentecost to fulfillment.

The Day of Pentecost will take on new meaning, for God now blesses His people with something more precious than a good harvest of wheat. He pours upon them His Holy Spirit in fulfillment of the prophetic word of Joel:

"And it shall come to pass in the last days, says God,
That I will pour out My Spirit on all flesh;
Your sons and your daughters shall prophesy,
Your young men shall see visions,
Your old men shall dream dreams.
And on My menservants and on My maidservants
I will pour out My Spirit in those days."

The Spirit's coming is made manifest by the things that happen on that first Pentecost Sunday. Luke tells us that "there came a sound from heaven, as of a rushing mighty wind." The Old Testament Hebrew word for Spirit is ruach. This word also means "wind" or "breath." As the Prophet Ezekiel stands before that congregation of skeletons, God tells him to prophesy to the bones and the wind sweeps through that valley of death and brings the house of Israel to life. When our Lord speaks of the Holy Spirit in John 3, He says, "The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear the sound of it, but cannot tell where it comes from and where it goes." In John 20 Jesus breathes on His apostles and they receive the Holy Spirit. The Spirit is the wind, the breath of God, and He now rushes through the room where the Lord's disciples were sitting.

There is wind and there is fire. It was from a burning bush that God revealed Himself to Moses on Mt. Horeb. It was by a pillar of fire that God led His people at night through the wilderness. The Book of Hebrews says that our "God is a consuming fire." Fire indicates the holiness and presence of the Lord. Tongues of flames appear on the apostles. God is with them. Medieval artists often painted this scene with fiery flames dancing on top of the heads of the apostles. Martin Luther suggested that the artists would do better if they painted the flames over the mouths of the apostles, for the Spirit would be present and active in the preaching that would come out of their mouths.

Now the apostles do open their mouths to speak. Luke says in verse 4 of Acts 2, "And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak with other tongues as the Spirit gave them utterance." This is not ecstatic gibberish. Rather, the Holy Spirit enables the apostles to proclaim Christ in languages understandable to all those gathered in Jerusalem. Each hears in his own native language the wonderful works of God. Each hears the Gospel of Jesus Christ crucified and risen in a tongue that he can understand. The wind, the fire, the miraculous ability to speak in languages which one had not learned are not the main features of Pentecost. They are signs that point the way to the real work of the Holy Spirit and that is the preaching of the Gospel. Where God pours out His Holy Spirit, there tongues are unloosed to confess Jesus Christ, to tell of what He has done to save us.

So now on Pentecost the Holy Spirit delivers that precious gift of salvation through faith in Christ. The Holy Spirit is the UPS Deliveryman of the Blessed Trinity. Sent from the Father, He delivers to us everything that our Lord Jesus accomplished for us by His atoning sacrifice on the cross. He brings us the forgiveness of our sins. He bestows on our troubled and hurting hearts the peace that passes all human understanding. He applies to our wounded souls the medicine of salvation. And all these things the Holy Spirit does through the Word. That is why Jesus says in today's Holy Gospel: "If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word; and My Father will love him, and We will come to him and make our home with him." The Spirit brings us the treasures that our Lord won for us on the cross through His Word. It is that Word that the Spirit caused to be preached on Pentecost. It is that Word that makes the waters of Holy Baptism a life-giving bath of regeneration by the Holy Spirit. It is by the power of the Spirit's Word that we are given the Lord's body to eat and His blood to drink in the Holy Supper.

The Spirit is still at work in the Word today. You remember those words from the Small Catechism: "I believe that I cannot by own reason or strength believe in Jesus Christ, my Lord, or come to Him; but the Holy Ghost has called me by the Gospel, enlightened me with His gifts, sanctified and kept me in the true faith; even as He calls, gathers, enlightens, and sanctifies the whole Christian church on earth and keeps it with Jesus Christ in the one true faith." The Holy Spirit does for us what we cannot do for ourselves. He brings Christ to us and He brings us to Christ. Sinners apart from Jesus Christ are spiritual corpses; they cannot make themselves alive. The Apostle Paul writes, "No one can confess that Jesus Christ is Lord except by the Holy Spirit." The Spirit works, not to produce in us some kind of mystical experience or to fill us full of high-powered emotions, but, very simply, to bring to us the forgiveness of sins that Christ won for us on the cross and to keep us connected with that Christ until we are brought to the resurrection of the body and life everlasting. If you have Jesus Christ you have the Holy Spirit.

And the Holy Spirit does not call attention to Himself but to Jesus. Listen again to the words of our Gospel, "But the Helper, the Holy Spirit whom the Father will send in My name, He will teach you all things, and bring to your remembrance all things that I said to you." That is what happened on Pentecost and it still happens today where the Spirit causes God's Word to be proclaimed. "Come, Holy Spirit, fill the hearts of the faithful, and kindle in them the fire of your love. Alleluia." Amen.

The peace of God which passes all understanding keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus to life everlasting. Amen.