CLOSE ENCOUNTERS

Scripture: Acts 2:1-13

INTRODUCTION

When Steven Spielberg’s film “Close Encounters of the Third Kind” hit the movie theaters back in 1977, it was an immediate box office sensation. You may remember the actor Richard Dreyfuss who played the role of an innocent but obsessed bystander as he and an entourage of scientists witnessed the landing of a space ship in the Mojave Desert and were dazzled by their encounter with extraterrestrial beings from a far away world.

The long and unforgettable scene in the movie, enhanced by Hollywood’s special effects, depicted bright flashing lights, ear shattering sounds and earth-shaking tremors as the UFO spaceship finally touched down. And although I have watched that scene on television re-runs many times, I am always amazed by the awesome display of celestial power – a close encounter of the third kind.

Now there was another scene, similar but not exactly the same, which happened nearly 2000 years ago and is recorded in Acts, chapter 2. The place was Jerusalem, the day was Pentecost, an ancient Jewish festival, and Luke describes with wide-eyed wonder what happened:

When the day of Pentecost had come, they were all together in one place. And suddenly, a sound came from heaven like the rush of a mighty wind, and it filled all the house where they were sitting. And there appeared to them tongues as of fire, distributed and resting on each one of them. And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues, as the Spirit gave them utterance.

(Acts 2:1-4)

As Christians, we believe that Pentecost event marked the birth of the church, when God’s Holy Spirit descended with power upon those first century people at an extraordinary moment in time. It was then, and still is today, a close encounter of an awesome kind!

From Genesis to the Book of Revelation, the Bible records other similar moments when God’s Spirit moved in a mighty way:

· At the dawn of creation, as the “Ruach” (the Hebrew word for Holy Spirit) moved over the face of the waters and shaped the world in which we live (Genesis 1 and 2)

· In the exodus of the Hebrew people, as the Red Sea parted and they followed a cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night to show them the way (Exodus 13:21)

· In the great temple of Jerusalem, as Isaiah saw seraphim – angels – high above him and holy smoke swirling around him and heard the voice of God speaking to him (Isaiah 6:1-9)

· In that little town of Bethlehem, when the Christ Child was born on a silent, holy night and suddenly the sky was filled with singing angels and a dazzling display of light (Luke 2:8-14)

· And on that first Easter morning, when the tombstone was rolled away and Jesus, who was dead, was miraculously raised from the grave (Matthew 28:1-6)

You see, sometimes we forget or don’t pay much attention to the awesome power of Almighty God, and the myriad of ways that His Holy Spirit has moved among us. On this Pentecost Day, as we celebrate the birth of the church, it is good for us to remember something Annie Dillard once wrote, words which you have heard me quote before:

“Why do we people in churches seem like cheerful … tourists on a packaged tour of the absolute? … Does anyone have the foggiest idea what sort of power we so blithely invoke? ...(Instead of wearing) straw and velvet hats to church, we should all be wearing crash helmets! Ushers should issue life preservers and signal flares … and lash us to our pews. For the (so-called) sleeping God may awake … and draw us out to where we can never return.” (Annie Dillard, “Teaching A Stone to Talk”)

What do we expect, my friends, as we have come to worship today? We are here to anticipate and celebrate the Pentecost power of God’s Holy Spirit, and to sense the presence of His Son our Savior Jesus.

It was Palm Sunday, and a five-year-old boy had to stay home because he was sick with the flu. When the family returned with palm branches, the boy asked what they were for. His mother explained, “The congregation held them up to celebrate Jesus’ triumphal entry.” “Wouldn’t you know it” answered the boy. “The one Sunday I don’t go, Jesus shows up.”

Well, that is what we come here looking for, hoping for, praying for every Sunday in worship – the presence of God, the love and grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and the power of the Holy Spirit, strengthening us and inspiring us to become the people whom we have all been called to be. That is a close encounter of an awesome kind!

II.

And yet, with all of that said, I have also discovered in my own life and in talking with and listening to so many of you, that we have experienced close encounters of another kind – not public or dramatic events like a Billy Graham Crusade, but rather quiet and personal moments as we felt the Holy Spirit invade our lives and draw us closer to the Lord than we had ever been before.

The poet Alfred Lord Tennyson described it this way:

“Speak to Him, thou, for He

hears,

And Spirit with spirit may

meet.

Closer is He than breathing,

And nearer than hands and

feet.”

(The Higher Pantheon)

We, all of us, have felt that presence, that close encounter with God’s Holy Spirit at one time or another. Think of the day when you gave your life to Jesus Christ, and you welcomed His love deep down in your heart. It could have been when you were ordained as an elder, kneeling down as the leaders of the church came forward to lay their hands upon you. Perhaps it happened as you stood in the chancel and were married with the promise, saying “I do.” Maybe it was when your child was born, and the delivery room was flooded with joy. Or it might have been when a family member or friend looked you in the eye and said, “I love you just the way you are.” Those are the close encounters with God’s Spirit which mark the good times in our lives.

But we also know what it’s like to go through those close encounters of the painful kind. During the past month, I have met with a number of church members facing surgery, dealing with financial difficulties, or working through some degree of anxiety about their relationships and careers. I have spent time with an apprehensive high school student preparing for exams, with a recent college graduate recovering in the hospital from a traumatic accident … and just the other night, I talked long distance on the telephone with a close friend from Pittsburgh I have known for many years whose dear wife suddenly and unexpectedly died.

Each situation has been different, yet the common theme running through all of those conversations was and is the same: in the good times, but even more so in the hard times, when we need help and healing and hope, God is ready, willing and waiting to come ever so close to us as we fervently seek and need to draw near to Him.

CONCLUSION

If that is what you have come here looking for today – a close encounter with the Lord and the assurance that God is with you every step of the way – then you have come at the right time to the right place. For as we gather at this table to celebrate the Lord’s Supper, He has promised to give us bread for the journey, wine for the wilderness, help in the hard times, joy for the good times and grace sufficient for our every need. The table is set, so let us now draw near, knowing beyond the shadow of a doubt that God is here.

In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen.