I think I've shared this story before, but it seems to fit the world today and this wonderful miracle of Pentecost. So, Andrew Forsthoefel was 23 years old when he decided to try walking across the Continental United States from his home in Philadelphia all the way to the Pacific Coast. No rides. No smart phone. He carried a backpack containing camping equipment, a camera, a food bag stocked with jerky, tuna fish and PB&J, and a sign hanging off the pack that said, "Walking to listen."
He also carried a voice recorder that he used to collect the stories of those he met along the way, asking them the question, "If you could go back, what would you tell yourself at 23?" The question yielded some remarkable answers, which Andrew curated into a radio show which appeared on This American Life in 2013.
Andrew admits that along with his spirit of adventure he traveled with an acute sense of vulnerability. At times he said he was "fear-walking." And this fear was heightened by those that he met along the way. Not one person said that they would tell their 23-year-old self to be more cautious or more fearful. To the contrary, their messages were full of boldness and daring. Nonetheless, Andrew described how when people would take him in they were constantly warning him – telling him to watch out for the others down the road. "Don't trust them," they would say. "They're not like us." Sound familiar?
"What I wish," Andrew said thinking back, "is that these people could have experienced what I did and seen that the people that they had warned me about were the very ones who took me in later on, and fed me, and told me their stories." Of course most people never had the chance to learn that, hidden behind their own doors.
None of us want to believe that we're not as brave as we once thought we would be, but we see and hear enough from people who gain their power by gaining power and selling fear...and soon we start installing deadbolts and security cameras. These days you don't even have to peer out the door. Why, for just $200, you can get a detector installed to your doorknob that notifies your phone when anyone comes near. Yes, there's an app for that, and it can leave us latched inside, or if we venture out at all, locked in place. Constantly afraid that “THEY” are just over the horizon, ready to invade.
But this day of Pentecost reminds us that sometimes the things we end up closing ourselves off from are the things that can renew us and redeem us, the things that flow from the very Spirit of God.
Fifty days ago the disciples were afraid. They had locked themselves in a room, cowering behind bolted doors. Afraid that the authorities would burst in and do to them what they did to Jesus. But that wasn't good enough for their resurrected Lord. So, he breaks the laws of nature and physics and appears to them.
And he breathes on them. And tells them of a most remarkable gift that will be theirs...and the world's, if only they open themselves up to it.
And so the disciples have stayed in Jerusalem, as Jesus had instructed. They've gathered again in one place, this time hopeful and anticipating Jesus' earlier promise.
And the Spirit arrives as a forceful wind that seems to rush down the streets and alleyways of Jerusalem. Replacing fear with awe. Replacing cowering inside their walls with celebration outside their walls. For the Spirit is driving them out. Out into the fearful world with a new sort of courage – a courage based in love. A courage of knowing that Jesus is with them always. Maybe not in body, walking and eating, laughing and praying. But with them in this new Spirit. With them – and within them.
I wonder where I would find myself if I were there? In the house? Out in the street? Crouched in the corner? Or peering out a wide-open window?
The songwriter Deb Talan – in a song called “Forgiven” – asks the question, "So my dear, will it be faith or fear?" That might be the question of Pentecost. How will we greet the Spirit that visits us? How will we respond to a God that invades our lives and says, “Come out here into this world that I love. Come see it as I see it. Come love it as I love it. For this is where my Spirit is rushing through streets and rounding corners to bring people together across the boundaries of background and status and language. It's out here that the young are seeing visions and the old are dreaming dreams. Out here where in this new church, we have diverse people gathered together, all being treating equitably under God, all included in God's glorious plan.” Pentecost as the original DEI program.
Y'all, Pentecost is the invitation of the one who was always finding his way out ahead of us, stretching out arms and calling us forward in faith through unlocked doors. It's what we hear and see throughout the gospel. We hear it when he opens his mouth and says, "Sell what you have and give it to the poor." When he speaks out, "Whoever gives her life, will gain it in the end." When he says, "Fear not. I am with you always." We see it as he heals and touches those that so many in the halls of power tempt us into looking on with fear and loathing.
So my dear, will it be faith or fear? Well, the truth is that in times like these and places like this world, it is always both. And we are left to decide how we will walk: stay with those who profit from loathing or follow the one who gives all while calling us forward. Do we walk with the trans woman or toss her in the ditch? Do we welcome the migrant or make him disappear. Do we care for the sick or leave them to fend for themselves? Do we uplift the poor or enrich the already rich? Will it be faith or fear?
I don't know if it was the Spirit of God or the spirit of youth – or if it was both – that sent 23-year-old Andrew Forsthoefel out his door that day. But whatever it was, it carried him coast to coast. Some 4,000 miles. 11 months. 85 hours of recorded conversations. 5 pairs of shoes. And plenty of fear-walking along the way.
The last night he spent on the road he was camped out in the forest 20 miles from the Pacific Ocean. He set up his tent for the last time. He ate his last dinner of PB&J from his food bag. There were cars passing him on the road, and he had a thought: "If I was in one of those cars right now looking into this dark forest, I would think the dark forest was a scary place. But I'm in the forest. And so I know that I don't have to be afraid."
And if we were in that house fifty days before Pentecost, locked inside or cowering in the corner, well then, we'd think the world was a frightful, fearsome place. A dark place full of those who threaten us. But if we're in the world – if we've opened the doors of this house wide – then through the miracle of Christ's Spirit, we've will know that we don't have to live afraid.
Ever. Thank God.
Amen.