Sunday, May 27, 2012

Pentecost Sunday

The Church has a love/hate relationship with divine revelation. Revelation gave birth to the Church, but it must be controlled for the Church to maintain its power and influence. One problem. Does the Holy Spirit seem like someone who can be controlled? Perhaps they'd be more successful herding cats, but you have to respect the effort. Who else would be arrogant enough to think that they can control whom God speaks to? More importantly, if the Holy Spirit came to the Church at Pentecost, why would she ever leave? Would she really say "that's good enough" after inspiring the apostles and their students? Does it really make sense that public revelation ended with the books of the New Testament? I say that revelation is ongoing and never ending. Jesus did not culminate the time of revelation, he blew the doors wide open. And we desperately need to walk on through, because we still don't get it. Jesus offered us the chance to forgive the sins of our siblings, but we choose to retain them instead. It would be absurdly funny, if it wasn't so damn pathetic.

The Spirit and the flesh "are opposed to each other." Is that what the Incarnation teaches us? This example is why we still need public revelation. Prior revelation is never perfect or complete, because we never truly get it. Our love is limited, God's is not. He always has more to teach us. Jesus and his apostles built upon the revelation of the Hebrew Scriptures. I have been given a revelation that builds upon the Christian Scriptures. And someone will come after me to build upon all of it. This is the way God works. She always has something to say. It may be inconvenient for our corporate masters, but God does not shut up just because it is inconvenient to the power men. We all need to remember who's really in charge around here, and it's not the babbling monkeys.