April 17: Pentecost
♫ Music:
Day 52 - Friday, April 17
Hymn for Pentecost: Blessed are You O Christ Our God. You have revealed the fishermen as most wise by sending down upon them the Holy Spirit. Through them You drew the world into Your net. O Lover of Man, Glory to You! When You distributed the tongues of fire. You called all to unity. Therefore, with one voice, we glorify Father, Son and Holy Spirit!
Scripture: Joel 2:28-32
It will come about after this that I will pour out My Spirit on all mankind; and your sons and daughters will prophesy, your old men will dream dreams, your young men will see visions. Even on the male and female servants I will pour out My Spirit in those days. I will display wonders in the sky and on the earth, blood, fire and columns of smoke. The sun will be turned into darkness and the moon into blood before the great and awesome day of the Lord comes. And it will come about that whoever calls on the name of the Lord will be delivered.
Poetry:
Excerpt from Little Gidding
in Four Quartets
by T.S. Eliot
. . . The dove descending breaks the air
With flame of incandescent terror
Of which the tongues declare
The one discharge from sin and error.
The only hope, or else despair
Lies in the choice of pyre of pyre-
To be redeemed from fire by fire.
Who then devised the torment? Love.
Love is the unfamiliar Name
Behind the hands that wove
The intolerable shirt of flame
Which human power cannot remove.
We only live, only suspire
Consumed by either fire or fire . . .
PENTECOST
It may not seem obvious (it wasn’t at first to me) to read Joel 2 as we think about Pentecost. True, both describe the pouring out of the Spirit, both involve a rushing wind and fire, but the wind and the fire seem so much tamer in my flannelgraph imagination of Pentecost than in the apocalyptic vision of Joel. I find myself resisting the association because I want to separate the descent of the Spirit on the day of Pentecost with the terrifying coming of the Spirit in the great and awesome day of the Lord.
This is probably in part because I skip over the truly frightening nature of the Spirit’s sudden coming in Acts with violent wind and flame. Moore’s painting captures this ambiguity, with an image that might be Pentecost or a raging, terrifying fire. I think more, though, that the story of Pentecost seems less frightening because I know that in Acts the fire of the Spirit is received and accepted by the disciples. The Day of the Lord is only a calamity for those who will not submit themselves to him, and so for the disciples it is not an encounter with God’s fury but with his saving and sanctifying presence.
Like the Israelites in the desert, the disciples encounter the flame of God as a source of direction and protection, rather than destruction. The fire of God that has always been guiding his people has now made its residence within each believer, and rather than separating them, these individual relationships with the Spirit bring true unity to God’s people just as Joel anticipates. They are those who call on the name of the Lord, and they are saved.
In John 14, when Christ promises the Spirit, this coming is inextricably tied with the love of God, with Christ’s indwelling, and with Christ’s ultimate return. The disciples received the Spirit with joy because they had chosen, as Eliot would have it, to be redeemed from fire by fire. They chose the purifying fire of Pentecost which burns away their sin and error, and so the Day of the Lord was ultimately a day of joy for them, though it required them to submit themselves to the terrifying power of God.
The message of Joel and of Eliot’s poem is clear. We have no choice – we must encounter the flame of God. If we do not meet him in the fire of Pentecost that purges our hearts through the sanctification of the Spirit, then in the flames and smoke and blood of Christ’s final coming, manifest to the world. Our challenge in this Easter season is to decide whether we will choose the fire that love ordains to purify us, or by refusing it subject ourselves to the fire that Christ will bring when he returns.
The order of this world will pass away. The fundamental orderer of this world is forever beyond it, and in the terrifying day of the Lord, the order we have grown comfortable with will be upended. On that day (as in this) we will be in the power of Christ, and only safe because of his love for us.
Prayer:
O God the Holy Ghost
Who art light unto thine elect
Evermore enlighten us.
Thou who art fire of love
Evermore enkindle us.
Thou who art Lord and Giver of Life,
Evermore live in us.
Thou who bestowest sevenfold grace,
Evermore replenish us.
As the wind is thy symbol,
So forward our goings.
As the dove, so launch us heavenwards.
As water, so purify our spirits.
As a cloud, so abate our temptations.
As dew, so revive our languor.
As fire, so purge our dross
---- Christina Rosetti
Janelle Aijian, Ph.D.
Associate Professor of Philosophy
Torrey Honors Institute
Biola University
For more information about the artwork, music, poetry, and devotional writer selected for this day, we have provided resources under the “About” tab located next to the “Devotional” tab
About the Art: (2 images)
Artwork #1
Hildegard Receiving a Vision
from the Liber Scivias 1151-52
St. Hildegard of Bingen, O.S.B.
Original manuscript destroyed in World War II
In this illumination Hildegard von Bingen, a Christian mystic and Benedictine abbess, is seated recording her visions on a wax tablet as the Spirit of God, depicted as bright red tongues of fire, comes down from above and begins to engulf her head. The monk and scribe Volmar, who would translate her writings into proper Latin, appears close at hand and peers in at her as she receives a vision. The unique qualities of the illustrations of her visions and her descriptions of the showers of light, wavy lines, and pain that accompanied her visions have caused some neurologists to speculate that she may have suffered from severe migraines or a form of epilepsy.
About the Artist #1
Hildegard von Bingen (1098-1179) was a Christian mystic, Benedictine abbess, and polymath proficient in philosophy, musical composition, herbology, medieval literature, cosmology, medicine, biology, theology, and natural history. She has been considered by many in Europe to be the founder of scientific natural history in Germany. She wrote theological, botanical, and medicinal texts, as well as letters, liturgical songs, and poems, while supervising miniature illuminations in the manuscript of her first work, Scivias. The work consists of 26 visions that are prophetic and apocalyptic in form and in their treatment of such topics as the church, the relationship between God and humanity, and redemption. There are more surviving chants by Hildegard than by any other composer from the entire Middle Ages, and she is one of the few known composers to have written both the music and the words. One of her works, the Ordo Virtutum, is an early example of liturgical drama and arguably the oldest surviving morality play. She refused to be defined by the patriarchal hierarchy of the church and, although she abided by its strictures, pushed the established boundaries for women almost past their limits. About 1147 Hildegard left Disibodenberg with several nuns to found a new convent at Rupertsberg, where she continued to exercise the gift of prophecy and to record her visions in writing.
https://www.britannica.com/biography/Saint-Hildegard
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hildegard_of_Bingen
Artwork #2
Pentecost
Hyatt Moore
Oil over acrylic on canvas
60cm x 120cm
Collection of Mr. and Mrs. Glenn and Cheryl Chalkley
East Corinth, Maine
“The title says it all,” writes the artist, “how things could have looked . . . though it was only nine o'clock in the morning. There was a rushing wind, then cloves of fire and no one knew what to make of it. It was the first birthday of the church and it was like candles were ablaze. And nothing has quenched it since, or ever will.”
About the Artist #2:
Hyatt Moore is a prolific American artist, speaker, and poet. Moore’s paintings are on display in galleries, public buildings, and private homes. He paints in both figurative and abstract styles and is drawn to subjects ranging from Western and ethnic themes to portraiture depicting the figures of historical Christianity. One of Hyatt’s most public works is The Last Supper with Twelve Tribes, which was painted in the year 2000 to commemorate the inclusion of all people under God. Hyatt’s work is in galleries all over the world from South Africa to India and he maintains his own gallery in Dana Point, California.
http://www.hyattmoore.com/
About the Music:
“Jesus, We on the Word Depend” from the album Pentecost Songs
The Lyrics:
Jesus, we on the word depend
Spoken by thee while present here,
The Father in my name shall send
The Holy Ghost, the Comforter.
That promise made to Adam’s race,
Now, Lord, in us, ev’n us fulfil,
And give the Spirit of thy grace,
To teach us all thy perfect will.
That heavenly teacher of mankind
That guide infallible impart,
To bring thy sayings to our mind,
And write them on our faithful heart.
He only can the words apply
Through which we endless life possess,
And deal to each his legacy,
His Lord’s unutterable peace.
That peace of God, that peace of thine
O might he now to us bring in,
And fill our souls with power divine,
And make an end of fear and sin.
The length and breadth of love reveal,
The height and depth of deity,
And all the sons of glory seal,
And change, and make us all like thee!
About the LyrIcist:
Charles Wesley (1707-1788) was the founder of the Methodist movement and is known for writing over 6,000 hymns. In 1738 Wesley had a powerful conversion experience and as a result felt renewed strength to spread the Gospel to ordinary people. It was during this period that he began to write the poetic hymns for which he would be revered. Many Wesleyan hymns focus on the personal indwelling of the Holy Spirit, the sanctifying work of the Holy Spirit, the depravity of mankind, and humanity's personal accountability to God. His hymns have had a significant influence not only on Methodism, but on modern theology as a whole.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Wesley
About the Composer:
Jered McKenna is an American musician, audio engineer, and the music minister at Mitchell Road Presbyterian Church in Greenville, SC. He is in charge of organizing volunteer musicians, arranging music, performing, and leading in congregational singing and liturgical music. He has contributed several songs to Cardiphonia albums, including “Arise, Shine, For Your Light Has Come (Isaiah 60),” “The Brightness of God’s Glory (Heb. 1:3-4),” and “Praise the Lord (Psalm 117).”
https://www.linkedin.com/in/jered-mckenna-72b3756/
About the Performers:
Cardiphonia Music and Jered McKenna
Cardiphonia is a non-profit organization that seeks to encourage liturgical artists in the service of the church. Bruce Benedict, founder of Cardiphonia, is currently the Chaplain of Worship and Arts at Hope College in Holland, Michigan. He has been published or featured in Worship Leader, Reformed Worship, Liturgy, Christianity Today, and Doxology and Theology: How the Gospel forms the Worship Leader (B&H, 2013). He has been the recipient of a number of grants from the Calvin Institute of Christian Worship. You can find his hymns in Psalms for All Seasons, Lift Up Your Hearts and online at Cardiphonia.Bandcamp.com, but he is most famous for his work setting the Westminster Shorter Catechism to music. Through Hope College, Bruce is also the Director of Worship for the Awakening Institute and is busy launching the Retuned Hymnal – a new online music resource for the 21st century. Today’s song is written and performed by frequent Cardiphonia contributor Jered McKenna.
https://cardiphonia.org/about/
About the Poet:
T. S. Eliot (1888–1965), one of the twentieth century's major poets, was also an essayist, publisher, playwright, and literary critic. Born in Missouri to a prominent family, he moved to England in 1914 where he settled, worked, and became a British subject. It was poet Ezra Pound, in his role as a friend and editor, who helped establish Eliot as a preeminent figure in the modernist poetic movement, particularly through his editorial assistance of The Waste Land (1922). With its collage of voices, its violent disjunctions in tone and wealth of cultural allusion, Eliot’s The Waste Land resonated as a depiction of the ruins of post-war European civilization. The 1920s also saw Eliot become increasingly conservative in his outlook, particularly following his conversion to the Anglican Church. His religious conversion would have a far-reaching impact on the rest of his career, culminating in the Christian meditations found in Four Quartets (1943), which garnered him the 1948 Nobel Prize for Literature. He was also known for his seven plays, particularly Murder in the Cathedral (1935) and The Cocktail Party (1949).
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/T._S._Eliot
https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/t-s-eliot
About the Devotion Writer:
Dr. Janelle Aijian, Ph.D.
Associate Professor of Philosophy
Torrey Honors Institute
Biola University
Dr. Janelle Aijian is an Associate Professor of Philosophy teaching in the Torrey Honors Institute at Biola University. She studies religious epistemology and early Christian ethics, and lives with her husband and their two children in La Mirada, California.