"When the day of Pentecost had come, they were all together in one place." I wonder what it was like in that room. This was a group who had been with Jesus from the start. They had seen him heal people. They had seen him feed people. They had seen him break the rules and welcome, even rejoice in, the "wrong" people. They had heard him tell them that he would oppose the systems that ran this world, and would die for it. They had seen him die for it. They had heard him tell them that he would be resurrected, and they had seen his resurrected body. And they had seen him ascend into heaven, promising that the Holy Spirit would come and not leave them orphaned.

I wonder what it was like in that room. You know they must have been anticipating this odd "Holy Spirit," or "Advocate, " or "Comforter" Jesus said would come.

I wonder what they were anticipating. I have my suspicions. You see, up until now, pretty much everything has been about Jesus. Jesus fed; Jesus healed; Jesus performed miracles; Jesus welcomed outcasts; Jesus was crucified; Jesus was resurrected. (Sure, he had sent them out, and they had preached and healed, but that was really a field trip, and in the end, Jesus had to bail them out.) It was clear enough to them that their job was to tag along and to believe that Jesus was the Son of God. So I think it is reasonable to assume that they are anticipating that God will send them something else to follow around, something else whose main demand on them will be to believe, something else they can stand by and watch working and cheer on.

Wrong. Wrong. Wrong. Wrong! WHAM! Guess what? Out of nowhere, with no warning, this "Holy Spirit" thing comes, and guess what? You can’t follow it around because you can’t see it — any more than you can see the wind. But most importantly, —and this is huge!— Guess what? The Holy Spirit does not speak to them. The Holy Spirit speaks through them. Through them!

You heard the story. The whole known world is gathered. (If you plot on a map all those funny-sounding places people came from, they form a big circle around Jerusalem.) The whole known world was there, and when the Holy Spirit wants to talk to the world, the Spirit speaks through the Apostles.

In that moment, the task of being a follower of Jesus fundamentally changed. It’s not about following any more. The task isn’t just to hear and believe and cheer on. At that moment, when those twelve began to speak and it was God talking, when God’s way of working was now through them, everything changed. No more was it about a passive statement of faith. No more was it about believing. Now faith and belief are assumed, and we’re on to the next step. Now it is about doing, risking, acting, being God’s agent in this world to change this world.

Now, look here, professing Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior, that’s a good thing. But it’s a passive thing. After Pentecost, passive acceptance of Jesus, passive belief in Jesus, just won’t fill the bill. There has been a fundamental shift. God’s work in the world is no longer going to be delivered to us; God’s work in the world is going to be enacted though us.

Probably the most amazing thing about the Pentecost story is not the tongues of fire or the miraculous understanding. Probably the most amazing thing is that the Apostles got it. I mean, we know these guys. They don’t get anything. Ever! But they got this. They got it that there was a fundamental shift; they got it that passively staying on the sidelines offering support to God as a spectator was simply no longer an option. They got it that God will now be active in the world through us, and if you believe, you must be God’s agent for change in the world, and if you are not God’s agent for change, if you merely passively profess your belief, if you are just a consumer of God’s grace, well, then, say what you will, but you don’t believe in Jesus’ God because the Holy Spirit has to work through you.

They got that. We know because there is simply no other explanation for how this diverse, feuding, incompetent, bone-headed, untrained, uncredentialed group could have turned, almost instantly into a force of twelve nobodies from nowhere who devoted the rest of their lives to turning the world upside down — and accomplished more than anyone (except God) could possibly have imagined.

But before all that happened, they were gathered together in a room, sitting, looking at each other, probably waiting for God to send them someone or something to follow, to listen to, to passively offer their support to, to cheer on.

I wonder how much time we spend in that room. I think most of us move in and out of it. I think we’re in that room when we spend years fretting over whether we believe in God, fretting over whether our faith is strong enough, fretting over whether we have too many doubts, fretting that God surely could not forgive us, fretting that we are not skilled enough to do God’s work, fretting over all the things that keep us from acting.

Look, those are real concerns, and I don’t want to disparage then in their place, but I can’t tell you how many times I’ve talked to people who have been stuck on them for years. And I want to say to them, "Excuse me, but a decision is required of you. Make it. Because, one way or another, you have to get out of that room. You can’t stay there because of two things. First, if you want to be a disciple of Jesus, you have to be out there doing God’s work in the world. That is non-negotiable. Pentecost has happened! And second, every day you spend in that room is a day the Holy Spirit is not working through you, and you are going to run out of time."

That’s actually what I tell people, usually a little more tactfully.

As I wrote in the Eagle Notes, it’s not clear to me precisely how we at St. John’s are going to be Pentecost people, God’s agents in the world. I think we are experiencing some frustrations about how we are going to be organized to do God’s work. Will we continue to have a relatively small circle of folks that handle a large part of the leadership responsibilities and the work, or will we expand our circles of leadership and involvement so that more people are involved, more things get done? It’s actually a quite challenging problem, and I’ve decided to back off and let God and you (prayerfully, I hope) decide. I don’t know precisely how the Holy Spirit wants us to be organized right now.

And, you know, there are lots of places and ways to be Pentecost Christians. You can and should be an agent of the Holy Spirit at home, at work, with friends, with enemies, in short, everywhere. Church is only one place. But it is a good place, a place dedicated to the task. In a few minutes we’ll go downstairs to food and a Ministry Fair. Some of you will have opportunities to practice your faith in a new way. Whether that is what God is calling you to in this time and place I’ll leave up to the Holy Spirit, and I hope you will too.

But whether you do it at church or not, there’s one thing I’m certain of: you can’t practice Christianity unless you practice Pentecost Christianity; if you follow Jesus, you have to be an agent of the Holy Spirit working in the world. So please, whether it is through one of our ministries or through service in some other part of your life, serve. Not serving is not an option. After Pentecost, with this Holy Spirit blowing all around us, all through us, it is simply not an option.

And, you know what’s really wonderful about that? This being a Pentecost Christian, being God’s agent in the world, is exciting, thrilling, meaningful, wonderful; it is everything. And why not? After Pentecost, what else is there?

The Rev. James H. Pritchett, Jr. St. John’s Episcopal Church, College Park, GA