Acts of the Spirit: Gift of the Spirit

SERMON TITLE:  “Acts of the Spirit:  Gift of the Spirit”
SERMON TEXT:   Acts 2:32-47
PREACHER:         Rev. Kim James
OCCASION:         June 6, 2021, at First UMC
 
 
INTRODUCTION
 
                Nearly all day Friday, I participated in an online clergy meeting.  It was the clergy session that usually happens at our Mountain Sky Annual Conference.  Due to COVID, this year’s annual conference has been postponed until October, so we can meet in person here in Ogden at the Eccles Convention Center.  But some of our clergy business had to be conducted before July 1, so we got it done in a long Zoom meeting on Friday. 
                Part of that essential business was voting on candidates for ministry.  Before all of us ordained ministers made this one last vote of approval for the new candidates, they each appeared online and told us a little bit about their faith journey and call to ministry.  Each ministerial candidate told their story differently, of course.  One of them quoted a mystic poem from the 1300s that says, “I am the hole in a flute that the Christ’s breath moves through.”  Since I used to play flute back in my younger years, I liked that poetic image.  “I am the hole in a flute that the Christ’s breath moves through.”1
                I also like that image of Christ’s breath blowing through a flute because, ever since May 16, we’ve been talking about the wind-breath-Spirit of God.  On Ascension Sunday, we talked about Jesus’ promise to his disciples that, after he was lifted up to heaven, he would send the Holy Spirit upon them, and that this would make possible the succession of Christian ministry and leadership.  On Pentecost Sunday, we wore red clothes in commemoration of the flames that hovered over the disciples’ heads as the powerful winds of the Holy Spirit blew among them.  Then, last Sunday, we talked about the witness of the Holy Spirit that gave evidence and testimony to the truth about Jesus’ divinity and resurrection.  Today, we progress to the final verses of Acts, chapter two.  As we contemplate the rest of Peter’s sermon and how the crowd in Jerusalem reacted, let’s see how we’ll respond to the “Gift of the Spirit.” 

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