The Pentecost readings from Acts last week are always stimulating to me. When I was a teenager, my brother Mark and I had friends we used to visit to play pinochle or Canasta on their screen porch and laugh and talk. They were brothers, Tom and John Williams. They were both talented and eccentric. Tom, who had a full printing press in the basement of their home, and who had a penchant for impersonation, was particularly entertaining. When we were about 14 or 15, Tom taught me a phrase in Hebrew, which I have never forgotten. The family was Episcopalian, not Jewish, so I'm not sure where he got it. Phonetically it is "Hoy, ruach hacheshaw no shevis," which I'm told means "Behold there is a strong wind blowing", and refers therefore to the strong wind of Pentecost. The experience of the Upper Room is a Cecille B. DeMille (maybe George Lucas) moment. The strong wind, so strong that it summons the townspeople to the place in large numbers, the tongues of fire descending on those gathered, the debouching of the assembled out into the crowd speaking in all the languages of the people present, Peter's sermon and conversaion of 3,000 to the way. All these things are so exciting. The church is born in a burst of breath from God.
Hallelujah!