In a few days Michelle and I are going to go to Michigan to see our oldest baby graduate from high school. We are super excited to go. I’m going to try not to calculate how much each step Jacob takes across the stage has cost me over the past four years. Instead I hope to just soak in the moment and celebrate this accomplishment with my son. One of the things I’m looking forward to is listening to the commencement speaker’s speech. You have heard one of those speeches before, right? They are all pretty much the same. In his commencement speech, former president Barack Obama once said, “Don't just get involved. Fight for your seat at the table. Better yet, fight for a seat at the head of the table.” Why sit anywhere other than the head of the table? Steve jobs once told a graduating class, “Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work.” The only way you will be happy is if you do great things. And the musician, Bono, once told a room of bright eyed graduates, “The world is more malleable than you think and it's waiting for you to hammer it into shape.” If you are great people who do great things you can change the world!
Graduation speeches tend to be grandiose in nature. Be great people! Do great things! Change the world! Kind of a heavy load to dump on a room full of people who are probably still covered under their parent’s insurance. It almost seems mean, doesn’t it? Be great people! Do great things! Change the world! It’s like we are setting them up for a life of failure and frustration. Be great people? - the odds of a graduate getting Obama’s seat at the head of the table are 1 in 300,000,000. They are 4 times more likely to be struck by lightning than they are of becoming great people. Do great things? - 1 out of 5,000 inventions have successful product launches. And those products include things like the Ronco rotisserie oven; makes a juicy thanksgiving turkey but I don’t think you can call it a “great thing”. Change the world? – How many people have actually accomplished that? Socrates, Da Vinci, Luther, Einstein maybe a dozen or so more. There are 7.6 billion people in the world. Should we really be telling graduates to go out there and do something that 7.59999 billion people have failed to do? We set before them these unrealistic expectations and impossible standards. It’s like a cruel joke we play on graduates.
I wonder if the disciples thought Jesus was playing a cruel joke on them? Before Jesus ascended into heaven, He delivered a commencement speech of sorts. Jesus told His disciples, “go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you.”[1] I wonder if the disciples thought Jesus was saying to them, be great people, do great things, change the world. Can you imagine how the great commission to go and tell must have felt like a burden for the disciples? Jesus was asking them to do something that He had not done in His three years of ministry here on earth. If God the Son could not make disciples of Jerusalem, Judea and the ends of the earth, how in the world were some unemployed fishermen supposed to accomplish the task?
I am sure you can empathize with those poor disciples, because Jesus has given you the same speech. Disciples of every age, including this age, have received the great commission to go and make disciples of the nations; to tell them everything God has done. Well, I don’t know about you, but I can’t even get my entire family to attend church on any given Sunday. I’ve got neighbors that I’m still trying to figure out how to share my faith with. And I have been studying that bible for decades, personally and professionally, and still I feel like I’m just scratching the surface of what God wants me to know. How in the world am I supposed to make disciples of the nations, when I can’t make disciples of my entire family? How in the world am I supposed to teach people everything God has done when I’m still learning it myself? Doesn’t it seem like God is messing with us a little bit? Doesn’t it seem like He has unrealistic expectations of us and holds us to impossible standards? Don’t you wonder sometimes if God’s great commission is a cruel joke?
I would not at all be surprised if the disciples had that thought rattling around in the noodles when the day of Pentecost came or as it was known to the Jewish people “the feast of the harvest.” Now, if you don’t mind, allow me a slight digression here. Last week Faith Harding sent me a video where Andy Stanley was talking about our relationship with the Old Testament. In Mr. Stanley’s -I guess you would call it a lecture, he said that we need to un-hitch ourselves from the Old Testament. He even went so far as to say the Old Testament is the reason why most people fall away from the faith. There is a great deal that I would say in response to that, but, let me use the great day of Pentecost or the “feast of the harvest” to give you at least one reason why the last thing we want to do is unhitch ourselves from the Old Testament. The Old Testament Feast of Pentecost was one of many festivals and celebrations in ancient Israel. You are probably most familiar with the Passover celebration where an innocent lamb was slaughtered in remembrance of God’s people being delivered from death and set free from slavery. About 50 days after the Passover, the Israelites celebrated a series of harvest festivals, of which Pentecost is one. Now let me hitch some of these Old Testament Festivals to some New Testament events. On a day when the Israelites were looking for a Passover lamb, Jesus rode into Jerusalem. On the day when the Israelites slaughtered their Passover lambs, Jesus hung on the cross. On the day when the Israelites gave thanks for their first-fruits, Jesus rose from the dead. And on the day when the Israelites brought their grain harvest to the Lord, the first ingathering of souls into the church (Pentecost) took place.
I have no idea why anyone would want to be un-hitched from the Old Testament. Imagine what being hitched to the Old Testament meant to the disciples. It meant that Jesus’ great commission to go and tell was not some sort of last minute decision where the Almighty was in a bit of a pinch and since the great heavenly hosts were all busy, Jesus had to settle for the disciples. No! Jesus was not desperate to find people for the task. The disciples weren’t a convenient choice or last-minute option. The Almighty not only meticulously planned out the manner and means of our salvation, but He also meticulously planned out the manner and means of salvation’s proclamation. And that plan included people like the disciples.
And notice, that plan did not require the disciples to be great people. These guys were day laborers. Later, the apostle Paul would muse, “26 Brothers, think of what you were when you were called. Not many of you were wise by human standards; not many were influential; not many were of noble birth. 27 But God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong. 28 He chose the lowly things of this world and the despised things—and the things that are not—to nullify the things that are, 29 so that no one may boast before him.”[2] The disciples were not great people, but they were the people that God chose to go and tell.
And so are you. The same God who meticulously planned out the events from Passover to Pentecost, has also planned out the days of your life. Odds are, none of us are going to be president of the United states. Odds are, none of us is going to be considered a great person. But you are part of God’s plan. You are the foolish, you are the weak, you are the lowly. You are the people that God has chosen to go and tell.
The disciples were not great people and they did not do great things. Now you may say, wait a minute preacher. How can you say that? On Pentecost, of all days, how can you say that the disciples did not do great things? The disciples stand before a crowd of nations speaking at least a dozen languages they had not previously known. Luke tells us that the crowds that gathered around the disciples were bewildered, they were amazed and perplexed. How can you say this is not a great thing? The answer is, I can’t. but I never said the events of Pentecost weren’t great. I simply said the disciples did not do these great things. Take a second look at verses 1-4. There saint Luke tells us who it is that does these great things. Luke writes, “1 When the day of Pentecost came, they were all together in one place. 2 Suddenly a sound like the blowing of a violent wind came from heaven and filled the whole house where they were sitting. 3 They saw what seemed to be tongues of fire that separated and came to rest on each of them. 4 All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues as the Spirit enabled them.” The one responsible for the great things that happened on the great day of Pentecost is the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit used the sound of a violent wind and tongues of fire to gather a crowd of nations around the disciples. The Holy Spirit filled the disciples with the courage to go and stand before that crowd of thousands. The Holy Spirit enabled the disciples to tell those nations “11 the wonders of God”. God did not need the disciples to do great things for Him. Rather, God, in His mercy, decided He would do great things through them.
God has made the same decision about you. God knows you lack the confidence and courage to go and so He fills you with the Holy Spirit. Saint Paul encourages us with these words, “15 you did not receive a spirit that makes you a slave again to fear, but you received the Spirit of sonship. And by him we cry, “Abba, Father.” 16 The Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are God’s children.”[3] You are a child of the heavenly King! Who are you unworthy to stand before? Who should you fear? God knows you lack the words to tell and so He enables you by the Holy Spirit. Saint Mark encourages us with these words, “do not worry beforehand about what to say. Just say whatever is given you at the time, for it is not you speaking, but the Holy Spirit.[4]” That is not to say that we shouldn’t Study the scripture and learn all we can about the wonders of God. It simply means we don’t have to be afraid to open our mouths and share our faith with people. God does not need you to do great things for Him. In mercy He chooses to do great things through you.
Finally, just because you are not great people who have done great things does not mean that the world isn’t going to change. Do you recall how Pentecost; this festival harvest day ended? A miracle on the level of Ezekiel’s valley of dry bones occurred. This verse isn’t part of our text but listen to how Luke concludes his account of Pentecost. In verse 41 he writes, “41 Those who accepted his message were baptized, and about three thousand were added to their number that day.”
I don’t know if the Holy Spirit is going to add 3000 to our number. I don’t see any reason why we can’t pray for it. Clearly its within Holy Spirit’s abilities. Wherever the word is preached, wherever the sacraments are administered, wherever there are disciples willing to go and tell the wonders of God, the world is being changed. May it be changed around us.
When I was a young man I listened to a commencement speech or two or three. And I was convinced that I was going to go out into the world to become a great man who would do great things and change the world. But as the years passed me by and I failed to achieve greatness I began to think something was wrong. But then I stumbled upon this quote from an anonymous author. It is a quote that is has become the theme of not only my ministry but my life. The quote says, “I was never of much use to God until I realized, God did not intend for me to be a great man.” You see my friends, it is not necessary for us to be great people who do great things in order for the world to change. The Holy Spirit chose us. We have the Holy Spirit filling us, enabling us, working through us. The Holy Spirit is changing the world, one soul at a time. All that we are asked to do is go and tell. Amen
[1] Matthew 28:19-20
[2] 1 Corinthians 1:”26-29
[3] Romans 8:15-16
[4] Mark 13:11