Episode Transcript
Hello, friends, and welcome to this week's episode of Gritz and the Gospel. My name is Reverend Katie Griffiths. The now Reverend Katie Griffiths since I have been commissioned officially as a provisional elder in the United Methodist Church and I'm proud and thankful that that has occurred and I'm very thankful for all of those of you and of the rest of my tribe that have helped me get to this point. I cannot express with words how full my heart is these days. I welcome you this morning for our service of worship for Pentecost. It is that wonderful day when we celebrate the Holy Spirit and what it did and is continuing to do in all of our lives and throughout the world. So today on this day of Pentecost, let us come together in a time of worship. The Lord be with you and also with you. Today's Old Testament lesson is from the Book of Genesis. It is the story of the Tower of Babel, here now the 11th chapter verses 1 through 9. Now the whole earth had one language and the same words. And as they migrated from the east, they came upon a plain in the land of Shinar and settled there. And they said to one another, come, let us make bricks and fire them thoroughly. And they had brick for stone and bitumen for mortar. Then they said, come, let us build together a city and a tower with its top in the heavens and let us make a name for ourselves. Otherwise, we shall be scattered abroad upon the face of the whole earth. The Lord came down to see the city and the tower which mortals had built. And the Lord said, look, they are one people and they have all one language. And this is only the beginning of what they will do, nothing that they propose to do will now be impossible for them. Come, let us go down and confuse their language there so that they will not understand one another speech. So the Lord scattered them abroad from there over the face of all the earth and they left off building the city. Therefore, it was called babble because they're the Lord confused the language of all the earth and from there the Lord scattered them abroad over the face of the earth. The word of God for us, the people of God. Thanks be to God. Words are important. Let us come together now in a time of reciting the words that tell us the tenets of our faith. Friends, what do we believe? I believe in God, the Father Almighty, maker of heaven and earth, and in Jesus Christ, His only Son, our Lord, who was conceived by the Holy Spirit, born of the Virgin Mary, suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, dead, and buried, the third day He rose from the dead. He ascended into heaven and siteth at the right hand of God, the Father Almighty, from thence He shall come to judge the quick and the dead. I believe in the Holy Spirit, the Holy Catholic Church, the communion of saints, the forgiveness of sins, the resurrection of the body, and the life everlasting. Amen. Let us pray. Dear Lord, we come to You today so thankful that You left this earth with the Holy Spirit and tact, that we may be filled with Him. We may never be apart from it. We may be inspired by it that tongues of fire light our way. Thank You for the day of Pentecost and every year when we celebrate that beautiful moment in time. Hear us now as we pray the words that Your Son taught us to pray. Our Father, 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 trespass against us and lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. For thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever. Amen. I am a lectionary girl. I've confessed that to you all before. And for the most part, I will stick to it probably. It's a good way to preach through the liturgical year, but in ordinary times or as we mere mortals call it the summer, I may venture off the lectionary path and do something different. You all will be my guinea pigs this summer. I'll be doing a sermon series outlined by one of my fellow Canter seminarians, Alexa Lahorn. For our worship class project, she paired notable and yet much overlooked mothers of Methodism with scriptures. I think we can all learn a new thing or two about what being a united Methodist means by the women who worked hard to found our denomination. Today, I thought I would test the waters with a sermon that is both of the lectionary and about a family full of strong and brave United Methodist women. I'm excited to see where the Lord leads us in worship this summer with our Methodist balcony saints. I hope you will be too. Let us now listen to the story of the first day of Pentecost. You know the words of Acts chapter 2 verses 1 through 21. When the day of Pentecost had come they were all together in one place and suddenly from heaven there came a sound like a rush of a violent wind and it filled the entire house where they were sitting, divided tongues as a fire appeared among them and a tongue rested on each of them. All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other languages as the Spirit gave them ability. Now there were devout Jews from every people under heaven living in Jerusalem and at this sound the crowd gathered and was bewildered because each one heard them speaking in the native language of each. Amazed and astonished they asked. Are not all of these who are speaking Galileans and how is it that we hear each of us in our own native language? Parthians, Meeds, Elimites and residents of Mesopotamia, Judea and Capitose, Hauntus and Asia, Fai-Fraigia and Pamphalia, Egypt and the parts of Libya belonging to Cyraine and visitors from Rome, both Jewish and Pastelites, Cretans and Arabs, in our own languages we hear them speaking about God's deeds of power. All were amazed and perplexed, saying to one another, what does this mean? But others sneered and said they are filled with new wine, but Peter standing with the 11 raised his voice and addressed them fellow Jews, all who live in Jerusalem let this be known to you and listen to what I say. Indeed these are not drunk as you suppose for it's only now a clock in the morning. No, this is what was spoken through the Prophet Joel. 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 drink drains, even upon my slaves, both men and women in those days I will pour out my spirit and they shall prophesy. And I will show portance in heaven above and signs on the earth below, blood and fire and smoky mist. The sun shall be turned to darkness and the moon to blood before the coming of the Lord's great and glorious day. Then everyone who calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved. The word of God, for us the people of God. Thanks be to God. Would you pray with me? To rule I let the tongues of fire leap forth from my mouth and from my heart. Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of all of our hearts be acceptable and my sight, O Lord, our strength and our redeemer. Amen. My red shoes get taken out of the closet once a year. They were originally inspired by our friend at St. Paul Chapel, the Reverend Creed Hinchaw, who wears this amazing pair of oxblood red loafers every single year on this holy day. So when I went into ministry I felt compelled to get my own pair. However, in true Katy fashion, mine had pearls and rhinestone buckles. When I got these shoes, I had no idea that there would be a couple of other very special times that I would wear them. A fellow female clergy member asked if I had my pair of red shoes, and I told her that I had them ready to go for Pentecost. And she said, you will need them from ordination for ordination too. And then she told me the story of Abigail Hartness and her great granddaughter, Georgia. Abigail Hartness and her husband Daniel were both Quakers. Well, at least he was. She was considered a flashy dresser because she wore a red coat. Daniel was warned that if he continued, if she continued to wear that red coat, then he would be thrown out of the Quaker community. But he stood up for and refused to tell her not to wear it. And because of that red coat, Abigail and Daniel were promptly thrown out of the Quaker community and found a home in the newly formed Methodist Church. Her great granddaughter loved to tell Abigail's story. But she was also very accomplished on her own. Georgia was born in 1891. She tried to apply to Boston University to attend seminary, but was promptly told no because she was a heaven forbid a woman. She went on to get a PhD and become the first woman to teach theology here in America. She wrote 37 books. She confronted the world-renowned the theologian Carl Barth on some of his theology on female subordination. Hartness spoke out against racism and spoke up for the rights of women, and especially the rights of women to become ordained. She also penned many of the prayers and hymns in our humble. Dr. Georgia Hartness famously said that she wore red so that people could see she was coming and know that she was going to preach. The red that was worn by Abigail and by Georgia was a way to give themselves a voice when many tried to silence them. We see throughout the scriptures that God uses voice and language to mark the mental events or to start something new. In the Genesis text that we read today, God uses language to scatter people back across the world. The flood had just occurred and to help spread the people around and move people out of Shinar. God changed their languages to help repopulate the earth. And then an axe on the day of Pentecost. God wanted to spread the good news of the resurrection of Jesus across the known world. And so with tongues of fire he changed the language of the people of Jerusalem so they would be forced to leave and take the Holy Spirit and the gospel with him. You don't have to use words or a different language to speak a new thing into existence. Abigail Hartness spoke a new life into existence for her and for her husband by wearing a red coat. She let her clothing speak for her. She let it shout out to all that would hear and see that she would not be defined by men trying to control what she wore. Abigail's red coat could be heard from him all the way. She was saying that she could love God just as much with a red coat on as she could with one that was not considered fancy. And her great granddaughter Dr. Georgia Hartness used her written words and spoken words to stand up for what she believed in and fight back against men who tried to silence her and fight with people like Martin Luther King Jr. that she inspired with her writings. That's been happening in the United Methodist Church as well. This week an annual conference a constitutional amendment was voted on that stood up against racism. Here are the first two sentences. The United Methodist Church proclaims that from God's goodness and love God created all persons as God's unique and beloved children. Racism opposes God's law, goodness and love and diminishes the image of God in each person. My first thought when I read this amendment was why in the world. Do we even need this language in our doctrine? Why is this not just a given? How is it not part of who we are to begin with? But I'll find that when I talk to my friends in the black community and in the Hispanic community that words matter. Standing up and saying these things, stating what most of us should see as obvious matters. Because for a very long time no one said these words at all. A lot of people use language that was the opposite of this idea. So this amendment and the changing of the language throughout our look of discipline. On all kinds of issues, from acceptance of people and the LGBTQ community to speaking out against slavery and the practice of taking child brides is important even though it's unimaginable that we still have to say it out loud. We may all be speaking English here in this part of the world. But at times it does seem like we're speaking a totally different language, one of inclusion and acceptance. We are speaking words and standing up in places where we are not always welcome. But we keep talking anyway. We see changes made in our doctrine when we see injustice and we stand beside people who need our help. For a lot of people, that's a new language. Myself included. I've always been a mouthy brawl but I never thought I would see the day when my words would be needed for justice and kindness and love. I've lost a lot of friends over some of my beliefs. I've angered some very close to me over the things I know to be true in scripture and the teachings of Jesus. And as painful as it is sometimes, I know that this new language I am speaking is not one that some of them hear often enough. So I just keep talking. I keep talking. Like we all should keep talking with a language of love and acceptance. And hopefully one day in the places I am sent by the tongues of fire, the language I am speaking will become one that others cannot just understand. Let's start to speak themselves. What language are you speaking? Do you speak things that are contrary to popular opinion when you need to because they are your beliefs? It's never easy. But to make these languages easier to understand to those around us, we have to just keep using it. The Red Shoot tradition started at Gaman University. The place where Hortonus taught for 11 years. The moment has grown and now women throughout the United Methodist community where Red Shoot's for commissioning and ordination in honor of Georgia Hortonus and her great-grandmother Abigail Hortonus. We do it so they can see us coming so they can see the legacy that these women started over a century ago. Long before women had the right to be ordained. This same legacy is now being carried out by a new group of bold and courageous women who still from time to time have to defend our right and call to preach the gospel. Even this preacher has to do that very thing. So why do we wear red at Pentecost? Not just to make this Auburn fan extremely uncomfortable. We were red because the tongues of fire that the Holy Spirit put into each person as they went out into the world spreading the good news of the new covenant and the life death and resurrection of Jesus Christ are still present in us today. We were red as a reminder of the men and the women who have stood up for what they believe in who have preached and spread the gospel when people warned them not to and to remind ourselves that we are spreading the word of God with the unspoken and spoken language of love and kindness throughout the world. So let them see us coming. Amen. As we go throughout our week, friends, let us all look for ways where we can be spreading the Holy Spirit with our tongues of fire because in life, in death and life beyond death, God is with us. We are not alone. Thanks be to God. Amen.
