May 18-20, 2024 Pastor Timothy J. Spaude Text: John 15:26-27 “HARVEST TIME!”

 

CONFIRMATION/PENTECOST

May 18-20, 2024

Pastor Timothy J. Spaude

Text: John 15:26-27

 

“HARVEST TIME!”

1.     The Holy Spirit does His work.

2.     We do ours.

 

John 15:26-27 (EHV) “When the Counselor comes, whom I will send to you from the Father—the Spirit of truth, who proceeds from the Father—he will testify about me. ²⁷ And you also are going to testify, because you have been with me from the beginning.”

 

          It’s a big weekend for the St. Jacobi church family. We are celebrating Pentecost. Pentecost is often called the birthday of the Christian Church. As you heard in the reading on that first Pentecost day the Holy Spirit gave special gifts to the Apostles so the Gospel message could be heard by people in their own language. Many were added to the Christian church that day. It’s also Confirmation weekend here at St. Jacobi. 18 more young people will be added to the communicant membership of our church as they make their public promises to faithful to Jesus. Lots to celebrate.

          Now if we were Old Testament believers, we would still be celebrating on Pentecost but something a little different than we are today. We would be celebrating a Harvest Festival. Kind of like an old time Thanksgiving. Because of the affluent times we live in we don’t always realize just how important a successful harvest is and how thankful we can be for a good harvest. Back in Jesus’ time they found it much easer to be thankful that they’d gotten another year’s harvest in safe from drought, insects and raiders. They could live another year.

          It strikes me that the harvest, Pentecost and Confirmation have some similarities. There is work only the God can do and there is work for us to do. Jesus words in John 15 remind us of that. He was with His disciples in the upper room. It was the night he was betrayed, the night before He gave his life on the cross. He was building up those disciples and us, praying for them and us and providing them and us what we need. The Holy Spirit. This is what He told them, “When the Counselor comes, whom I will send to you from the Father—the Spirit of truth, who proceeds from the Father—he will testify about me.”

          Can you imagine how Jesus’ disciples must have felt? Jesus had told them He would be leaving them. All the details of what would happen that night, on Good Friday and Easter were too much for them to absorb. The leaving part they probably could. Jesus told them that they would be the ones who would go throughout the world teaching all the things He had taught them. How would that work? How would they know what to say? No worries. The Holy Spirit, called here the Counselor, would do His work. And there are some things only God can do. Just think of harvest time. While there is plenty of work for farmers to do, only God controls the weather, the rain, the temperature and the sunshine. Only God controls the path of the locusts. Only God makes photosynthesis work. So He does His work.

          Same thing for Pentecost and Confirmation. So on Pentecost the Holy Spirit gave the Apostles the understanding of Scripture that they needed. Peter who had poorly wielded a physical sword thinking that was what Jesus needed when He didn’t, all of the sudden is an expert at wielding the sword of the Spirit which is God’s word, making all the connections between Old Testament prophecy and what was happening. Peter’s boldness, which had so often been used to promote self now promotes Christ. The other Apostles speak in the foreign languages they were immediately gifted to speak and are no longer concerned with an earthly kingdom but connecting people to Christ and His eternal kingdom. And there was a harvest of souls for the Lord. Harvest Time! A time to celebrate.

          Just like today is a time for us to celebrate. The Holy Spirit is doing His work among us. Your very presence here today in a church which holds to all of the Bible’s teachings is evidence of that. In case you haven’t noticed being with an only Christ as Savior church and only God’s morality as right and wrong will not get you elected to public office or make you the talk of the workplace in a positive way. Yet here you are. You are here because the Holy Spirit has been working in you, adopting you into God’s family through Baptism, feeding your faith every time you have heard the Word. Now you are part of the harvest of souls for Jesus He has made.

          And you are part of harvesting souls for Jesus too. Just like in a harvest of crops. There is some work people need to do as well. They plant seeds. They cultivate. They weed. They fertilize. They gather in the crops that they didn’t make grow but now get to enjoy. Jesus told the disciples there was some work for them to do for His harvest.  ^“And you also are going to testify, because you have been with me from the beginning.” The job of Jesus’ disciples on Pentecost was to testify, to be witnesses that Jesus is the Messiah, the world’s one and only Savior. They did their job, not just on Pentecost, but also for the rest of their earthly lives until Jesus took them to eternal life they did their work.

          Today on this Confirmation weekend it’s good to remember there is work for us to do. All of you here either were confirmed at one point or are looking forward to it and if you know nothing about it please speak with me after service.  It took work to get to that point, hours spent learning God’s Word. All the time the Holy Spirit was doing His work. Now, like the Apostles of Jesus we have ongoing work to do. Testify. Tell the truth. God’s truth. That all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. That Jesus is the only solution. We don’t have to convince anyone of these truths. We do need to testify. Our families need us to. Our community needs us too. Our country needs us to. And then look forward to Harvest Time!

          Like a pebble dropped in the center of a pond the Gospel message proclaimed at Pentecost caused a ripple that has spread and grown and continues to grow. The Holy Spirit does His work. We do ours.  An Old Testament Pentecost was a cause for rejoicing. There was a new harvest. God had done His work. His people had done theirs. And it was time to enjoy. On this Pentecost and Confirmation day we do the same. We thank God for a new harvest of young people that will join us in testifying. We rejoice and celebrate. And we look forward to the time when we will know just how much harvesting God got done through us. Amen.