B, Pentecost Sunday – Acts 2:1-8,13,14 Ezekiel 37:1-10 “Dead Men Walking”

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So how does this all work; Holy Spirit, baptism, Jesus' death two thousand years ago, his resurrection and ascension and you? It's a fair enough question since many these days have not grown up in the church and have no idea how it all works. Even for many in the church, if asked and put on the spot, would be hard up to give an outline of why they believe, and what happens in a believer. Why? Because much of it happens due to God's work hidden from our conscious minds and understanding!

In fact, it takes greater conscious effort to walk away from believing! And added to this, once one rejects what God has freely given, the evil one accuses and makes one feel guilty.

Not that this guilt is bad. If we see it for what it is then we can use it to God's advantage and return to him. When the devil accuses, he seeks to tell us we are not worthy to be before God, that he would condemn us if we did, and so the devil's attack shows us that by ourselves we are not worthy.

However, he uses more spin than a politician on the campaign trail! He's not going to remind us of what God has done and is doing. He is not going to remind us that he really cannot attack us anymore once we are covered with the righteousness of Jesus Christ. And so we come to the original question, "How does this all work?" Or, "How do we get and remain under the righteousness of Jesus Christ?" You need to know so the devil can't play with your doubts and drive you away from the wonderful effective gift which gives life upon life into eternity.

The first thing I would like you to picture is what happens when you hold your breath. Just say for argument sake you decided you were going to be very childish and stop breathing to get your way. What would happen? All would start off well, then after about thirty seconds you body would say, "Hang on mate, I need air!" After a minute you would be going red in the face, and only if you were stubborn enough could you hold on any further. If you could you might continue for some time until the oxygen in your blood started getting low, you would get light headed and finally pass out. But what happens once you go unconscious? Your body forces you to breathe again, that why people drown in water because the moment you pass out you cannot hold your breath any more, and you begin to automatically breathe regardless of where you are.

In fact, anyone who holds their breath knows it takes more effort not to breathe than it does to breathe. The human body wants to breathe, that's what it's created to do, and that is why you and I are human beings. We are not people who rise in the morning needing to remind ourselves to breathe because we have been doing exactly that unconsciously the whole night through. We don't have to "do" breathing it's a part of our being. And because we "are", we have "being", we are humans being!

For Christians it's the same. I will come to what gives us our being in a moment, but the devil seeks to tell us time and time again we are not Christians being, but rather we need to be doing more. It's like if he was to convince us we are humans not being, that breathing won't give us life, causing us doubt that breathing oxygen is the right thing to do and that we need to do something else to be human. Can you imagine how hard it would be to be a human and to exist without oxygen?

Yet this is what the devil does to those who have been given life as a Christian. He condemns and confuses Christians to stop being Christians, because he causes doubt over the very thing that freely gives us the life breathe of forgiveness, peace, hope and love.

Something very important happens through the disciples at Pentecost, the same thing can also happen though any Christian who is asked, "What is all this Christian stuff about?" Do you realise you have been given the same power as them in your baptism. This is the power of God, the power of the Holy Spirit, the power of Jesus hidden within, and it's promised to all who are baptised in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.

Yes, they were apostles with a very important job on the day of Pentecost, and most of you are not called into an ordained ministerial office. Nevertheless, like them you and I are believers, and it was in trusting and believing that God could do anything, big or small, through them. They, like you, were believers and therefore doers of the tasks God had set for them. We are all very different human beings, but unless every person trusts the breath they receive no one is able to do anything.

So let's look at the apostles for a moment. Their job as apostles began a long time before the day of Pentecost. Jesus had worked with them for three years — teaching, correcting, and sending them out to witness while he was walking on earth. Then after the crucifixion and resurrection he came to them on that first Easter Sunday evening and gave them the Holy Spirit and opened their minds. After this time Jesus was still present but not always seen. God caused him to be seen at various times over the next forty days until Christ finally ascended from their sight. How could these terrified men remain in the very place where their Lord was crucified? Surely if they showed their faces they would have been arrested and received the same fate as Jesus on the cross? It was the Holy Spirit whom Jesus breathed into them!

Then fifty days later, we hear the twelve were gathered in one place, the sound of wind rushing occurred and tongues of fire appeared over their heads. And thirdly they spoke in different tongues so others present could understand what was going on. We are not necessarily going to have this happen to us audibly or visually, nor will we necessarily be able to speak in other languages. But all Christians receive the breath of life from the Holy Spirit, when God breathes his word and Holy Spirit into us at baptism. And what God chooses to do through those who trust him, is then only limited by God's will and what he needs to do to make himself known to those he would have us meet.

We hear a strange occurrence in Ezekiel 37 where Ezekiel recounts being caused to see a valley of dry dead bones.

And he said to me, "Son of man, can these bones live?" And I answered, "O Lord God, you know." Then he said to me, "Prophesy over these bones, and say to them, O dry bones, hear the word of the Lord. Thus says the Lord God to these bones: Behold, I will cause breath to enter you, and you shall live. And I will lay sinews upon you, and will cause flesh to come upon you, and cover you with skin, and put breath in you, and you shall live, and you shall know that I am the Lord." (Ezekiel 37:3–6 ESV)

So he did what God commanded and the bones came to life. Don't underestimate the power of God the Holy Spirit, given the right circumstances he might chose to use any of us in ways we might not even begin to comprehend. So don't let the devil make you doubt what God has done and what he can do!

What happens to the valley of dry bones and the apostles on the day of Pentecost is the same. And the same happens with us.

There is a movie starring Tom Hanks based on a novel by Stephen King called "The Green Mile". In it Hanks plays a prison officer in a death row prison. When the prisoner is walked to the electric chair from his cell past all the other prisoners in their cells, the guard cries out, "Dead man walking!" The valley of dry bones and the apostles on the day of Pentecost were "Dead Men Walking". And so are you.

But we are not walking in the same doomed and deathly way as those prisoners. We are walking to death, but through it by faith. In fact, before we were made eternal beings by God in baptism, we were "dead men walking" in hopelessness through this life, never content, never finding true peace, always knowing something was missing in our lives. But now having received the Holy Spirit we, who were once dead and as lifeless as bones in a valley, or as frozen in fear as the disciples were after Jesus' death, are called to see that God has put his life in us and us in the life of his Son.

We may not be able to speak in all sorts of tongues but we have all been given the same being. And this being enables in us the language of love, to forgive, to encourage, and to tell others the hope we have.

So how does it all work? It works because God makes it work. The Holy Spirit continually reveals the kingdom of heaven is with us. His job is to give us the being of eternal life; he is sent from the Father and the Son, to bring us to and reveals Jesus Christ in us. He puts the wind of life as Christians in us; he is the doer and the shaker, the deliverer and maker of faith.

All humans are "dead men walking". But those who trust the being of eternal life and allow the Holy Spirit to walk them in it are no longer dead men walking in death, but rather dead men walking in life. Don't let the devil deceive you with only half the story! Yes, on your own you are guilty! But, your guilt has been drowned in baptism; so let the Holy Spirit daily raise you to a life of faith, hope, and eternal love. Amen.