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Occasionally, while flipping through the channels on my television, I pause for a moment at a network sponsored by a consortium of those churches called Pentecostal. They are a loosely related confederation of individual congregations and denominations held together by their belief in the active presence of the Holy Spirit in the church today, just as the active presence of the Holy Spirit was with the disciples of Jesus while they were in Jerusalem for the minor Jewish festival of Pentecost, little more than a month following the resurrection.

Naive as I am, I often pause to listen for a few minutes to what is being said on this network, hoping to find some additional insights which will help me understand better the elusive presence of God's Spirit among us.

But, invariably, rather than a celebration of the gifts of the spirit poured out on all, what I hear is a rather narrow-minded celebration of spiritual provincialism - "We have the spirit and you don't!"

It makes me sad that claims of the presence of the spirit of God should be made the exclusive possession of any one group of Christians, no matter what they call themselves. And it makes me ask, what are the signs of God's spirit in the church today? The spirit which God has promised to pour out "on all flesh."

Considering that question reminds me of two pastors I once knew. The first was a scholar. He spent hours carefully preparing for every sermon. He came to the pulpit with more notes than he could possibly use in the time allotted for his sermon (though sermons were considerably longer in those days). He was a quiet man, a gentle and loving man.

The other was a very different person. He had the Spirit. We knew he had the Spirit because he himself told us he did, and that quite often. He preached fiery sermons, with nary a note. He said he preached what the Spirit wanted him to say. He was an angry man. He was a competitive, bitter, driven man.

I have to admit that every time I hear someone say you have to get the Spirit (like you get a new car or get a new suit), I remember those two men: the angry one who told us he had the Spirit, and the gentle one who never claimed it in so many words, but seemed more filled with the Spirit of God than anyone I have ever met.

I suppose that is part of the reason why I continue to have trouble with a great deal of the traditional religious language which is being thrown around more and more these days. It has always seemed to me that our deepest beliefs are to be lived, more than they are to be talked about.

I am concerned that we remember what great diversity there is in the vastness of God, and I become wary when someone tries to convince me that the Holy Spirit is the property of any one group of Christians.

I once had an encounter with a former member of one of my congregations. She had gone through what is called a charismatic experience, a Pentecost-like experience. She told me about how she had "found Jesus," and been "reborn in the Spirit." And I thought, "Good for you, some burning need in your life has been filled by God in a very special way."

But then she went on to try to convince me that I needed to have the same experience in exactly the same way that she had. "Wait," I said, "it is true that our experiences of God differ, but why do you assume that your experience of God is more real than my experience of God?"

Yet, so often, this is what it comes down to, is it not? We are confronted with an exclusivism which says, "My way is not a way of understanding God, but the one way and the only way and the true way of understanding God!"

In many mainline pastors I have seen a similar, though opposite, reaction from those who are Pentecostal Christians. These pastors want nothing whatsoever to do with charismatics, or any others who talk about the Holy Spirit, saying such talk is misguided and deluded, that it will split the church.

They say they believe in the Trinity, but concentrate their preaching and teaching on the first two persons, rarely having anything to say about the Holy Spirit (except perhaps on Pentecost).

So I am left with this question: does the Holy Spirit come to the church in only one way? Does the Holy Spirit come only with signs and wonders, as many Pentecostal Christians would claim? Does the Holy Spirit come only through scripture and tradition, the hearing and preaching of the Word, as many mainline Christians would claim?

Only one way? I don't think so. Let me tell you of an experience which helps me understand the wonder of the diversity of God's presence with us. I am not a musician, but I love music. There are two or three pieces of music which affect me profoundly. Not all of them are as well known as Handel's Messiah or Beethoven's Ninth Symphony. My favorite pieces are rather obscure, but something in them touches a resonating chord in me, and when I hear them, I soar!

Once I invited a close friend to listen to one of these favorite pieces of music with me, expecting him, of course to be as moved as I was. Yet as the piece ended, his only reaction was, "That's nice." Nice? This piece which moved me so did absolutely nothing for him! I had to accept that my friend and I were different in the way we experienced this piece of music. Yet when we hear the music of God reverberating in our lives in a certain way that is so right, so real to us, we say to our friends, "You've got to experience God in the same way I have!"

We miss the possibility that God may have an entirely different experience in mind for you than God has in mind for me. It is not so much a matter of wondering why God's Spirit hasn't spoken to you in the same way it has to someone else, as it is a matter of listening for the particular way God is speaking to you right now.

That is what is really important, and that is what we seldom bother to do, for we are great readers, listeners and collectors of the experiences of others. Yet the Spirit does not want to touch us through their experiences, but through our own: through the empty or needful spaces in our own lives which are the locations of our greatest anxiety and our greatest potential.

Somewhere within each of us is a great hunger, a great empty space which will never be filled until we identify it correctly for what it is - a hunger for God. Nothing else can fill the emptiness which that hunger creates. Yet most of us, most of the time, will try to fill ourselves with just about anything else we can think of, rather than seek to hear God's Spirit calling to those places of need in us. Perhaps one reason our resistance is so powerful is that we have often been pressured to hear God calling in someone else's way, rather than in our own.

The Spirit of God is vast and diverse, and God probably chuckles at the way we compete for possession, for exclusive rights to the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit did come at Pentecost with wind and fire and speaking in tongues - and still does!

But that same Spirit was at the beginning, moving over chaos, creating life - and still is!
That same Spirit spoke to Elijah not in fire and wind and storm, but in a small voice - and still does!

That same Spirit caused the old to dream dreams, and the young to see visions - and still does!

The Spirit of God which moved over the face of the waters is moving over our lives to mold a new creation out of whatever chaos we are caught up in!

Listen for the Holy Spirit who is calling to the empty places, to the need within you: and God's Spirit will come. I am not going to predict how it will happen for you, but it will happen: "... for I will pour out my Spirit upon all flesh."

Holy and Almighty God, your Spirit has been moving among us since before creation itself took form and shape. As you hovered over chaos itself, you move about today calling to the empty places in our lives. Fill us with your fire, your passion, your amazing presence. Storm through our lives like a raging wind. Light our path with the flames of your presence. Called, may we answer. Summoned, may we follow. Filled with your Spirit, may we live as those who have learned to love. In Christ our Savior. Amen.