The Words

 Eastern Parkway United Methodist Church 

 

A warm welcome to each worshipper today. We celebrate you and offer you our friendship and love. We are a congregation of people who seek to grow spiritually, to become more like Christ in His compassion and acceptance of everyone while growing more aware of what it really means to be Christians today. 

 
As a Reconciling Congregation, EPUMC affirms the sacred worth of persons of all sexual orientations and gender identities and welcomes them into full participation in the fellowship, membership, ministries, and leadership of the congregation. 

  

 943 Palmer Avenue, Schenectady, NY 12309 / 518-374-4306 epumc943@gmail.com / www.easternparkway.org 

 
 
 
 
 
 

Order of Worship 

June 5, 2022 

Pentecost 

10:00 a.m. 

*You are invited to rise in body or spirit. 

  

Prelude Immortal, Invisible, God only Wise L. Shackley 

 

Greeting and Announcements 

 

Mission Statement: 

We are a faith community striving to be, to nurture, and to send forth disciples of Jesus Christ. 

  

Call to Worship:  

When the world divides us, Come, Holy Spirit, make us one. 

When the world calls us orphaned, Come, Holy Spirit, make us family. 

When the world leads us astray, Come, Holy Spirit, call us home. 

Come, Holy Spirit, come! Come and fill this place! 

Ciona D. Rouse, The Africana Worship Book, Year C, edited by Valerie Bridgeman Davis and Safiyah Fosua, Discipleship Resources, 2008, 94. 

 

*Hymn Every Time I Feel the Spirit   #404               

Prayer of Confession: 

God of majesty and power, we tremble when we become aware of who you are. Who are we that you should visit us or expect something from us? We confess our preference for the predictable. We admit your resistance to your Spirit. We acknowledge our misuse of your gifts to us. We prefer our divisions to your unity. Forgive us, O God of power and might, that we might forgive. Draw us back into a right relationship with you, and with one another. Amen. 

  

Assurance: 

God has reached out to us once again, offering salvation, making us whole, drawing us into community where life is integrated and filled with meaning. The Spirit comes to us, making holy the commonplace. We are forgiven. 

Mary Emaline Kraus, The Abingdon Women’s Preaching Annual, Series 2, Year C, edited by Leonora Tubbs Tisdale, Abingdon, 2000, 142-143. 

 

Scripture Reading Acts 2:1-21 

The Coming of the Holy Spirit 

2 When the day of Pentecost had come, they were all together in one place. 2 And suddenly from heaven there came a sound like the rush of a violent wind, and it filled the entire house where they were sitting. 3 Divided tongues, as of fire, appeared among them, and a tongue rested on each of them. 4 All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other languages, as the Spirit gave them ability. 

5 Now there were devout Jews from every people under heaven living in Jerusalem. 6 And at this sound the crowd gathered and was bewildered, because each one heard them speaking in the native language of each. 7 Amazed and astonished, they asked, “Are not all these who are speaking Galileans? 8 And how is it that we hear, each of us, in our own native language? 9 Parthians, Medes, Elamites, and residents of Mesopotamia, Judea and Cappadocia, Pontus and Asia, 10 Phrygia and Pamphylia, Egypt and the parts of Libya belonging to Cyrene, and visitors from Rome, both Jews and proselytes, 11 Cretans and Arabs—in our own languages we hear them speaking about God’s deeds of power.” 12 All were amazed and perplexed, saying to one another, “What does this mean?” 13 But others sneered and said, “They are filled with new wine.” 

Peter Addresses the Crowd 

14 But Peter, standing with the eleven, raised his voice and addressed them, “Fellow Jews[a] and all who live in Jerusalem, let this be known to you, and listen to what I say. 15 Indeed, these are not drunk, as you suppose, for it is only nine o’clock in the morning. 16 No, this is what was spoken through the prophet Joel: 

17 ‘In the last days it will be, God declares, 
that I will pour out my Spirit upon all flesh, 
    and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, 
and your young men shall see visions, 
    and your old men shall dream dreams. 
18 Even upon my slaves, both men and women, 
    in those days I will pour out my Spirit, 
        and they shall prophesy. 
19 And I will show portents in the heaven above 
    and signs on the earth below, 
        blood, and fire, and smoky mist. 
20 The sun shall be turned to darkness 
    and the moon to blood, 
        before the coming of the Lord’s great and glorious day. 
21 Then everyone who calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved.’ 

 

Sermon The Words 

 

Today is a sacred holiday that we call Pentecost. It’s special to us for so many reasons: it’s the day Jesus’ disciples received the Holy Spirit, and because of that Pentecost is what many call the birthday of the Church, and it’s also the day everyone gets to show up looking super fabulous in red. 

Pentecost is a very special day to me because it’s an anniversary, of the very first time I preached a sermon! The year was 2004, and I was 17. Pentecost that year fell at the end of May, and the church I grew up in had a tradition of having the youth lead the entire service if there was a 5th Sunday in the month. So, as luck would have it that year, the youth group led Pentecost worship. Other people volunteered for easier jobs—my little sister lead the children’s moment, where she used a Mr. Potato Head and talked about how many parts all make up one body and therefore we all have a place in the church even though we’re all different, and my then-boyfriend-now-husband Sean unwittingly signed up to read a text more full of hard-to-read place names than any other pericope in the Bible. But the most important job was wide open—who would deliver the sermon? Despite the gifts that I hope come through (at least a little) now, 17 year old Natalie was not a person you would expect to enjoy public speaking. I had a very reserved personality, I was a huge nerd, I didn’t talk much, and I generally wasn’t a person you’d expect to volunteer for a job where a podium and a microphone are involved. But when my youth group leader asked us who wanted to try to preach, and no one else had any interest in that task, there was something so alluring about that idea that I couldn’t walk away from it. It was like I’d had a steady diet of broccoli, and eagerly consumed it before, but suddenly I was sitting in front of a big plate of chocolate ice cream and I had to try it. As it turns out, I like chocolate ice cream quite a lot. I don’t have a ton of memories of what I said that Pentecost morning—I scribbled down all my notes on paper I tore out of my history notebook—but I do remember that I started that sermon relating a story about a time the orchestra I was playing with had to rehearse for an upcoming musical with very sloppily handwritten sheet music that was missing a ton of critical information, like a key signature and dynamic markings. For some of you those nerdy music words might have gone right over your head, but if you get why it would be really hard to support the cast of a musical with a badly written score, then you can understand why it’s so hard to live in this world when there’s no instructions and you have to make it up as you go along. And thus today 35 year old Natalie is essentially bringing you the same Good News that 17 year old Natalie brought back in the day: we get by only by the leading of the Holy Spirit. 

It’s a darn good, and necessary, thing that we do have the Spirit leading us, because boy howdy would we be lost in the wilderness without her. These have been very, very troubling times. The last 3 weeks we had to go virtual because of a covid outbreak in the church that took down my whole family and afflicted a lot of people right in our neighborhood, some right in this room today. Such a horrible 2 years we’ve endured. Last week, if you had a chance to watch that sermon, I mentioned that there have been 213 mass shootings in the US in this calendar year. That number is no longer accurate, and the CDC estimates that seventeen more public shootings have taken place since the shooting in Uvalde, Texas. Trauma, upon trauma, upon trauma. An unexpected gift that comes with a tragedy is that community trauma often brings with it a brief, glorious time of unity and good will. 

I was in 6th grade when the Columbine school shooting happened. I’ll never forget the concern the grown ups around me had for us kids, as we watched the news in stunned confusion, trying to understand this world where kids hurt one another. I’ll never forget how my teachers talked to me and my friends, how they prayed with us, and cried with us, and dropped that thick wall that usually stands real firm between adults and 12 year olds. They told us they were heartbroken, too. 

When Hurricane Katrina happened in 2005, American people sprang to action to assist folks they had never meant who were displaced, and we showed nationwide support in particular for the city of New Orleans, even if we had never been there. I started college that year, and the University of Rochester, where I went, arranged the transfer of credits and tuition money so that students from Tulane University, in New Orleans, could finish their education at the U of R. 

I was still in college two years later when the shooting at Virginia Tech left university students reeling. We held prayer vigils and called friends and family we knew were in the area. 

Likely the most salient example of this that we could call to mind is what our country looked like in the weeks following the September 11th terrorist attacks. Birth records reflect a small baby boom in 2002 because there was such a strong emphasis on family and togetherness. Flag sales went through the roof. Relief efforts to New York City and Washington DC were widespread. But beyond those obvious, measurable acts of patriotism, selflessness, and cultural change, everyone just became softer and kinder. We held the doors for one another. We waved to one another on the street. We exchanged words of love that we held back before, because we suddenly saw how precious it was to be alive.  

But those sentiments didn’t last, and, worse, some of them warped into something bad. Patriotism gave way to nationalism. Harassment and hate crimes toward Muslim Americans spiked, and within eighteen months America was at war with two different countries. We stopped honoring survivor stories and hero stories, and instead shared conspiracy theories. We became impolite, gruff, selfish, and hard of heart. Some of that happened because of mistakes we all made, but to be fair, most of that happened simply because we couldn’t stay in trauma mode forever. For the sake of our personal and communal health, we had to move on. But when we do move on from disaster, we should be careful to move on toward a Spirit-led path. 

By the time of this morning’s scripture reading, quite some time—seven weeks—has passed since the communal trauma of a young, poor rabbi being crucified during Passover. We saw the shock and horror the disciples dwelled in in the days immediately after Jesus’ death—how they hid in their upper room, behind locked doors, and wouldn’t even talk to their friend Mary Magdalene. But a lot has changed since then, and for God’s glory. Jesus revealed his resurrected body and ascended to Heaven. He helped Peter find redemption, and established him, once again, as the Rock of the Church. He taught his disciples how to fish for people and told them he would always be with them. The disciples have started to move through their grief, and some healing has happened. 

Unfortunately, they still live in the same society that yelled “crucify him!” to Pontius Pilate. And undoubtedly many more defenseless, poor Jews have been killed by Rome since Passover, enough to make Jesus’ death look like ancient news. The disciples’ neighbors are as unable to perceive a miracle as they were seven weeks before. 

But into this world that can’t properly process trauma, that encourages violence, and that turns a cold shoulder to the hurting comes the gift that Jesus promised us all: the Holy Spirit. And the disciples, receiving it like wind and flame, become overwhelmed with the ability to speak the languages of their neighbors. But still, the neighbors can’t hear the message. Maybe the ancestors of folks who see images of people crying after mass shootings and accuse people of hiring crisis actors were right there, listening to the disciples speaking fluent Persian and Arabic and sneering “man, look who’s day drinking again.” For some, it’s easier to believe that alcohol intoxication makes you bilingual than it is to believe that the Spirit is at work within us, recreating this broken world for good. Nevertheless, she persisted. And She, the Holy Spirit, gave Peter words that connected the trauma Jerusalem wanted desperately to forget with what lovers of Jesus needed to do in this moment. 

I thank the Spirit that she does the same for us today. She manages, over and over and over, to put words in our mouths when we must speak, we must reach out, we must communicate, we must connect, yet our tongues feel like sand paper and our minds are blank. She gave a whole sermon to a bookish 17 year old girl and turned her into a preacher. She gave words of fire to the First Century Disciples that set a whole Church ablaze, and that tied together a community that had little in common except a love for Jesus. She finds us words to speak in crisis, words to reach someone in the depths of grief, words to introduce yourself to a new friend, words to inspire someone who’s feeling hopeless, and words to pull a community forward in this time after a traumatic event when the “thoughts and prayers” have been lifted, and enough time has passed that we’re tempted to forget the tenderness that’s helped us survive. 

Today, in such a time as this, on such a day as this, in such a culture as ours, the Spirit tells us this: today, as then, the people around us are fractured in a million small pieces, and the love of Jesus needs to be the glue that holds us all together. As we move forward after a community trauma, what the world needs now is actions of justice and love, and lots of glue in the form of relationship-building kind words. Don’t harden up and move on. Stay soft enough for someone else to see the Image of Jesus in your vulnerability and selflessness. 

May it be so. 

Amen. 

 
 

*Hymn As a Fire Is Meant for Burning     #2237 

 
 

Offering 

Offertory  

 

*Doxology                                                                                      #94 

*Prayer of dedication             

  

Pastoral Prayer and Lord’s Prayer 

 

Come, Holy Spirit, 
and fill us with your love. 

Open our eyes to see the presence of God all around us, 
in the stillness of this sacred space, 
in the busyness and noise of our city streets, 
in the joys and celebrations of our lives, 
in the tragedies and struggles that break our hearts. 

Come, Holy Spirit, 
and comfort those who grieve. 

Grant them the peace that only you can bring. 
Stir within us a trust in life beyond death, 
as we ponder the mysteries of Christ’s resurrection 
and the hope we have in new and everlasting life. 

Come, Holy Spirit, 
and bring wholeness to the sick. 
 
Strengthen those who are weak; 
heal the wounded and broken; 
give rest to the weary. 

Come, Holy Spirit, 
and inspire our warring world to seek peace, 
to love our enemies, 
to put away our weapons, 
to remember the price paid for our freedom, 
to care for those who have served. 

Come, Holy Spirit, 
and ignite a fire in our bones, 
a passion for justice that cannot be quenched 
until all of your children are loved, 
until no one is marginalized or oppressed, 
until everyone has the opportunity to thrive, 
until the world is transformed and renewed. 

Come, Holy Spirit, 
and revive your church. 
 
Liberate us from complacency and apathy; 
inspire us with Christ’s vision for a world reborn; 
help us to recognize our gifts for ministry 
and to use them in service of others; 
transform our hearts and our minds; 
fill us with love that overflows; 
remind us that there is no greater calling 
than to love you with all that we are 
and to love our neighbors as ourselves. 

Gracious God, 
give us a glimpse of your kingdom 
emerging around us 
and drawing us into the new things 
you are doing in the world. 

It is for your kingdom that we now pray, 
filled with your Spirit, 
using the words Jesus taught us. 

~ written by John W. Vest, and posted on John Vest. http://johnvest.com/ 

 

Our Father, Mother, Creator God, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy Kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who have trespassed against us. Lead us, not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. For thine is the Kingdom, and the Power, and the Glory forever. Amen. 

 

The Lord’s Supper 

God, who led Israel with a pillar of cloud by day and of fire by night, you lead us in ways of righteousness. You have taught us that wandering does not mean that we are lost. You have taught us that the journey is just as important as the destination. We give thanks that you call us your people. 

Jesus, giver of the peace that surpasses all understanding, your peace has settled on this gathering today. We have come because you first came to us. We gather to hear your word just as the disciples gathered in Jerusalem. We have both heard your word of eternal life and your word that sends us out. We give thanks that you trust us with your name. 

Holy Spirit, who prays on our behalf when we have no words, you are both our counsel and might. You convict us with truth when we forget your word. You lead us with wisdom when we do not know where to go. You comfort us when we feel we are without hope. We give thanks that you are in us and around us and ever-present with us. 

Now, as people gathered in your name, we pray that you would make your presence known to us. Holy Spirit, as you have done before, breathe your breath of life through this place making this simple loaf and cup communion with you. May God, Jesus, and Holy Spirit abide with us as we share this meal. May this meal bind us to you and to one another. 

The thing about wind is that when it is before us, we feel like we are pushing against it. And when the wind is behind us, we feel as though everything is possible. Both are true. The Holy Spirit both pushes and pulls us as we try to live faithfully in the world. 

In some ways this meal is the same. It is a reminder of the death of Jesus – the breaking of his body in the bread and shedding of his blood in the cup. But it is also a promise of the great feast yet to come. 

Come to table both remembering and looking forward with hope; being challenged by and accepting of God’s grace. 

Creator, Redeemer, Sustainer, may we overflow with thanksgiving for who you are, all you have done, and all you have yet to do. May we remember the taste of this meal in our mouths – how nourishing and sweet it is – in both good and difficult times. With your breath in our lungs, you have prepared us to be your witnesses in this world. To you be the glory, amen. 

  

Provided by the Rev. Michelle Henrichs on lifeinthelabyrinth.com 

 
 

*Hymn Many and Great, O God   #148 

 
 

Benediction 

 
Postlude I’m Gonna Sing/Ain’t That Good News  

 
 

Staff 

Natalie Bowerman Pastor 

Betsy Lehmann Music Director 

Joe White Custodian 

Cassandra Brown Nursery Attendant