“Fire, Water, and Wind”
(Based on the first sermon I ever preached, “God the Holy Spirit” in 1982)
Isaiah 44:3-4a and Acts 2:1-3 (GNT)
By John Gill ~ Pentecost, May 28, 2023

As I look out over the congregation this morning, I see that many of you remembered to wear red, because today is the Day of Pentecost, and red is the liturgical color for Pentecost. You may not realize it, but today is one of the most important days in the Christian year, for there are only two other days considered more sacred – and those, of course, are Easter and Christmas.

It’s ironic that, even though Pentecost is so important, most of us have very little understanding of what it means. What DOES Pentecost mean? What is it all about? If a friend who was not a Christian came up to you and asked you what the significance of Pentecost is, what would you tell her or him?

Of course, Pentecost is actually a Jewish festival that recalls the gift of God’s word to Moses on Mount Sinai, including the Ten Commandments. The apostles were gathered in Jerusalem on the Feast of Pentecost for the celebration of the Jewish festival as they probably had done every year before. But that particular Pentecost, God gave His people an even more profound gift – not just his word – but His Holy Spirit!

So, when your friend asked the significance of Pentecost you might say, “It is a celebration of the Holy Spirit,” and that would be true. But then your unbelieving friend might say to you, “O.K., so Pentecost is about the gift of the Holy Spirit. But what exactly, IS the Holy Spirit?” Then what would you say?

Maybe then you would tell them, “The Holy Spirit is the third person of the Holy Trinity – God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit – One God in Three Persons,” and again, you would be correct. But what would you do if then, they asked you to explain to them the mystery of the Trinity? How would you do that? It’s not easy – theologians have been debating that divine enigma for two thousand years. When you get that figured out, you can explain it to the rest of us!

Today, on this Pentecost Sunday, I will not attempt to solve the conundrum of The Trinity – I’ll leave that for another time. Instead, what I’d like to focus on this morning is helping us answer the question, “Who is the Holy Spirit?” and more specifically, “How can we begin to understand the workings of the Holy Spirit in our lives?”

In order to do that, I have selected two passages from God’s word, each of which reveals something of the nature of the Spirit of God at work in our lives. Listen again to how the Holy Spirit is described in these verses:

Isaiah 44:3-4 “I will give water to the thirsty land and make streams flow on the dry ground. I will pour out my spirit on your children and my blessing on your descendants. They will thrive like well-watered grass, like willows by streams of running water..” And…

Acts 2:1-4a - “When the day of Pentecost came, all the believers were gathered together in one place. Suddenly there was a noise from the sky which sounded like a strong wind blowing, and it filled the whole house where they were sitting. Then they saw what looked like tongues of fire which spread out and touched each person there. They were all filled with the Holy Spirit…”

I believe that both of these passages contain beautiful descriptive images – symbols that can help us to understand something of the nature of the Holy Spirit. And for our time together this morning, I’d like for us to explore these powerful symbolic images of the Spirit.

As we agreed a few moments ago, Pentecost is the celebration of the Holy Spirit – the third “person” of the Holy Trinity who we profess every time we recite the creeds of our faith . . . We believe in On God: God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit. Of these three aspects of God’s nature, it is the Holy Spirit that is, at one and the same time, both the most familiar to us, and the most mysterious. We feel the Spirit’s presence with us, we can see the results of the Spirit’s work, we know in our heart that the Holy Spirit is real – yet we cannot seem to describe his nature using words.

How would YOU describe the Holy Spirit to a non-Christian friend? How could you ever put into words the power and mystery we call “the Holy Spirit?”

Throughout history, whenever we have found ourselves at a loss for adequate words, we have turned to the use of symbolism. Instead of trying to define the Holy Spirit, we have used symbolic language to describe the Spirit’s characteristics.

Why do we use symbolism to describe things that we cannot define adequately? Louis Sherrill, in his book, Gift of Power, distinguishes between definition and symbol. A definition, he says, sets limits to meaning, and the meanings given are cut-and-dried. A definition does not encourage us to look beyond itself for meaning.

For instance, The American Heritage Dictionary tries to define “Holy Ghost” by simply stating, “The third person of the Christian Trinity, also called Holy Spirit.” That’s it! That’s all it says. Can a definition like that adequately describe the many aspects of the Holy Spirit? Of course not! A definition is not able to tell us anything about the character of God’s Spirit.

Symbols, on the other hand, set the mind soaring! They stimulate and challenge us to look beyond the symbols themselves.

For instance, to the Christian, the Cross is more than merely two pieces of wood connected – the Bread and Wine carry with them a host of meanings beyond merely food for our bodies – the butterfly represents more to us than just an insect – and the dove, more than just a bird.

You see, a symbol is a sign pointing beyond itself to deeper meanings. This is why I have selected our passages for the morning – because they are rich in symbolic imagery that can lead us to a deeper, more profound understanding of the Holy Spirit, and can help us experience the power and presence of the Holy Spirit in our lives.

There are many symbols of the Holy Spirit found throughout scripture. But this morning, I’d like for us to look at three of the most common images of the Holy Spirit we find in the Bible – three symbols that describe different dimension of the power of the Spirit of God that can make a profound impact on our lives. These symbols are fire, water, and wind.

Throughout the scriptures, fire is used as a symbol of the Holy Spirit to indicate the first dimension of the power of the Holy Spirit I’d like for us to reflect on this morning – the Spirit’s life-changing power.

In Matthew’s Gospel, the author records John the Baptist’s words concerning the life-changing power of the Spirit. John proclaimed, “I baptize you with water for repentance, but he who is coming after me is mightier than I, whose sandals I am not worthy to carry; he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and with fire.”

The baptism of the Holy Spirit is like a fire, sparked deep within the soul that burns so strongly that you can scarcely hold it in! People who have this fire of the Spirit have a burning passion for Christ that can never be squelched. The Holy Spirit has set their hearts ablaze, and changed their life forever!

Just look at what happened to the disciples on the Day of Pentecost which we read from the Book of Acts a few moments ago. Even though they had known Christ and already believed that he was risen from the dead, their hearts were cold. They coward in a room in Jerusalem, afraid that the Jewish authorities might discover that they were still followers of Christ and arrest them. But then, “tongues of fire” came upon them and they were no longer ashamed of their Lord, or frightened by the world. Immediately they went out and boldly began to preach the Gospel of Christ to anyone who would listen, and with that, the Church was born.

When the Holy Spirit comes as fire, lives are changed forever!

Not only was this true of the origins of the early church, it was also true for the beginnings of Methodism. In addition to being Pentecost Sunday, today also is the Sunday closest to Aldersgate Day – the day when we officially remember the spark that began the Methodist movement. It was on May 24, 1738, that a priest of the Church of England went to a meeting of Moravian Christians in London. The prayer meeting was held in a building on named “Aldersgate.” That priest was John Wesley, the man who was to become the founder of the Methodist revival. Little did Wesley know when he went to that meeting that night how dramatically the Holy Spirit was to change his life! I’ll let Wesley himself tell you what happened, as he recorded the event in his journal:

"In the evening I went unwillingly to a society in Aldersgate Street, where one was reading Luther's preface to the Epistle to the Romans. About a quarter to nine, while he was describing the change which God works in the heart through faith in Christ, I felt my heart strangely warmed. I felt I did trust in Christ, Christ alone for salvation, and an assurance was given me that he had taken away my sins, even mine and saved me from the law of sin and death."

From that time on, John Wesley’s life was different. Just like the disciples after Pentecost, Wesley set out preaching to anyone who would listen. As a result he, and his brother, Charles (who was also an Anglican priest who had experienced his own “Aldersgate”-type conversion just three days before John’s) sparked a spiritual revival throughout the British Isles - and through his followers, in the American colonies, as well.

There is a great quote that has been attributed to John Wesley about the fire of faith: “Light yourself on fire with passion, and people will come from miles to watch you burn.”

It’s not by accident, therefore, that the emblem of the United Methodist Church is a cross and a flame – for when we speak of the Holy Spirit as being like fire, we are recognizing how God’s Spirit can transform lives!

What about you – have you ever “felt your heart strangely warmed?” Or on this Pentecost Sunday, does your life still need to be transformed?

Pray and invite the Holy Spirit to fall upon you. Pray, “Spirit of the Living God, fall afresh on me,” and He will.

Besides being a life-changing power like fire, the Holy Spirit is also a life-sustaining power.

This is symbolically represented in the Bible by the image of water.

Consider what you know about water. Water is one of the most basic elements needed for life. Scientists tell us that we can go without food for long periods of time, but we must have water on a regular basis.

In Florida, we are now moving into our rainy season. But we all know what it is like during the dry winter season – especially when we experience drought conditions, and the fire risk is high. Without water our plants shrivel up, our lawns turn brown, our forests burn, and our water table becomes dangerously depleted.

Our scripture from Isaiah reflects the sustaining power of water as it describes the Spirit of God descending like rain, causing a thirsty earth to bloom.

"I will give water to the thirsty land and make streams flow on the dry ground. I will pour out my spirit on your children and my blessing on your descendants. They will thrive like well-watered grass, like willows by streams of running water.”

Yes, water is the most essential substance for the sustaining of our lives and our world. But as important as water is, the Spirit of God is even more necessary for the spiritual life to thrive.

Remember how Jesus described the Spirit of God as “Living Water” when he spoke to the woman at the well, saying, “Everyone who drinks of this water will thirst again, but whoever drinks of the water that I shall give them will become a spring of living water welling up to eternal life.” (John 4:13-14)

If we have received this living water, then we know its life-sustaining power, for we experience God’s presence with us day-by-day, giving us comfort and strength enough to make us victorious over our troubles and difficulties.

We should be thankful for the image of water in the Bible, for it assures us that the Spirit of God is an abiding, life-sustaining power for our lives.

Every year I attend a spiritual retreat called “The Five Day Academy for Spiritual Formation.” That retreat has worship every day, with lots of great singing. One of my favorite songs we sing has the chorus: “Rain down, rain down, rain down your love on your people. Rain down, rain down, rain down your love, God of life.”

On this Pentecost Sunday, is your spiritual life parched and thirsty? Has the rain of God’s Spirit fallen on you? Do you have a spring of living water welling up within you that will see you through the desert times in life? If not, invite the Holy Spirit to fall afresh on you today!

In addition to being life-changing and life-sustaining, the Bible also describes the Holy Spirit as being life-directing.

We can see this quality of the Spirit in the symbol of the wind. The wind is one of the most important symbols in the Scriptures. It’s interesting that, in both the Hebrew and Greek languages, the word for “spirit” can also be translated “wind” or “breath.” So, anywhere in your English Bible, when you come across any of these three words, try substituting one of the other possible translations, and see if it doesn’t enrich your understanding.

For example, the Creation story in Genesis is the first instance we have in the Bible of this symbolic play on words; We are told that, after creating Adam, God blew the breath of life into his nostrils, not only giving him life, but a spirit.

And much later, in John’s Gospel, when John describes a Pentecost-type event between Jesus and his disciples, the same symbolic shorthand is used again. John says that the risen Christ breathed on his disciples and said, “Receive the Holy Spirit.”

And, as we will soon be singing: “Breathe on me, breath of God, Fill me with life anew…”

So, it’s clear that the wind has a long and rich history as a symbol of the Holy Spirit.

But I’d like to focus on a different implication of the symbol of the wind. In John 3:8 Jesus says this to Nicodemus: “The wind blows where it wills, and you hear the sound of it, but you do not know whence it comes or wither it goes; so it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit.”

We can feel the wind and see the trees move by its force, but we can not see the wind itself. Isn’t this also true of our experience with the movement of the Spirit in our lives?

In this passage, Jesus is careful to broaden the analogy. Not only is the Spirit a mysterious force like the wind, but those who are born of the Spirit are ALSO like the wind. THEY go wherever God leads, allowing themselves to be scattered by the winds of the Spirit. But to be led by the Spirit, you must surrender your will to the will of the Spirit.

A sailboat with its anchor down will not sail very far. But when you raise the anchor and hoist the sails, the wind of God’s Spirit will direct your life.

Personally, I know something of the power of God’s spiritual wind. As I mentioned in my sermon last Sunday, I had no intention of becoming a minister. As a matter of fact, I was down-right hostile to the idea!

I tried to chart my own course, pursuing a music education career. But the force of the wind of the Holy Spirit was too strong to resist. Finally I surrendered my will and lifted the sail of my life – and the winds have brought me on a long journey to this moment as I stand before you.

Throughout my sixty-four years, I have felt the power of the wind of the Spirit directing my life – often in directions I did not intend to go. But it took pulling up the anchor of my stubbornness, and letting God’s Spirit fill my sails and set my course.

Friends, have you pulled up your anchor, hoisted your sails, and caught the power of God’s wind moving you in the direction he would have you go? Or are you trying to sail the ship of your life against the wind? As long as you try to sail against the wind, your life will be a struggle, and you will never reach the destination God has in mind for you. But if you catch the power of God’s wind in your sails, what a joyous journey it will be!

So – your friend comes to you and asks, “Who, exactly, is the Holy Spirit?” What would you say?

You COULD try your best to give him or her a definition, something like: “The Holy Spirit is that power of God that can change your life, sustain your life, and give your life direction.” That is a pretty good definition – as definitions go.

Or you COULD turn to the symbols of fire, water, and wind, and let them speak for themselves – as we have tried to do this morning.

Or perhaps, you might try the method Jesus preferred and use a parable to teach your friend about the Holy Spirit. I came up with parable I’m calling: “The Parable of the Dandelion Seed.” I’ll let this parable summarize all that I have been wanting to share with you this Pentecost Sunday:

“Once upon a time, there was a dandelion seed buried in the dry soil, its great potential lying dormant within its crusty shell. As the gentle spring rains began to fall upon the thirsty earth, the fire of new life was sparked within the seed. As the seed began to grow, it burst out of its shell and began pushing its way toward the Son. It grew and blossomed, its golden peddles out-stretched reflecting the image of the Son it worshiped. In time the dandelion plant bore its fruit, new seeds that were scattered, floating on the winds, giving its life away.”

Of course, you and I are the seed, full of potential, but trapped within our crusty shells. The Holy Spirit, falling like rain, sparks a fire that burns within our souls, kindling new life and growth. This causes us to strive toward the light of the Son, toward the radiance of Jesus. When our lives blossom, we reflect the likeness of Jesus, mirroring the color and brightness of the Son, himeslf. And finally, as we are scattered by the winds of God’s Spirit, seeds are planted so that others might grow by the power of the Holy Spirit.

On this Day of Pentecost, as we celebrate the birth of the Church, we also celebrate the gift of God’s Spirit that offers us new life. May the showers of the Spirit of God spark within us the flame of his love, that our lives may burn brightly for him. And then may we dare to trust the winds of God’s Spirit to direct us, that the fruit of our lives might become the seeds of new life for others.

Let that be our Pentecost prayer on this Pentecost Sunday. Amen.

© 2023 by John B. Gill, III