Some years ago, I heard a wonderful story about a minister who was having a hard time and was desperately trying to find a way to impress his congregation. Nothing that he tried worked. He preached longer sermons, and people said they were bored because he was too academic; he preached shorter sermons and people said they weren't getting enough “meat” because he wasn't well enough prepared. He tried using new music and people complained because they missed the old songs; he tried using the old music and people complained that the music was always the same. He dressed formally and people said it made him seem distant; he dressed casually and people said he didn't look like a minister. In short, he couldn't win. But then he came up with an idea – a sure-fire way to impress this difficult to impress congregation. He went to one of the teenagers in the youth group and asked if the boy would help him play a little trick on the congregation. The boy liked the idea so he said “yes” without hesitation. So, the minister went out and bought a dove and put the dove in a cage. The dove was trained to fly on to the minister's shoulder whenever it was loose. The minister took the dove to the boy on Saturday night and told him to get to church early the next morning with the bird in the cage and to hide up in the balcony. Then, he told the boy that in the midst of his sermon he was going to suddenly lift his hands toward heaven and cry out “Come, Holy Spirit” - at which point the boy was to release the dove, which would immediately fly to the minister's shoulder. Now – that would impress the congregation! Sunday morning came. The minister was having his usual difficulty getting the congregation involved with the sermon, so he suddenly lifted his hands to heaven and said “Come, Holy Spirit.” Nothing happened. The congregation exchanged unimpressed glances. With his hands still lifted to heaven, the minister cried out louder “Come, Holy Spirit.” Still, nothing happened. He could tell by the looks on their faces that the congregation was beginning to think he was a bit insane. Frustrated and increasingly desperate – his hands still held up to heaven – the minister cried out in a loud voice “Come, Holy Spirit!” To the amazement of the congregation a voice answered back from up above: “Reverend, a black cat just got in and ate the Holy Spirit!”

 

     In the light of that story I've often wondered whether there isn't a population explosion of black cats in churches! So many Christian congregations seem either unwilling or unable to allow themselves to be led by the Holy Spirit, for whatever reason. Here at Central, we do get the odd bat in the building, and I sometimes fear (just the odd time) that we may have left our own church doors open now and then and that the odd black cat may have wandered into our midst as well, quite frankly. I say that not as any particular criticism, but because I don't really think that we're any different from most congregations I'm familiar with. We struggle with the Holy Spirit – generally because if we let the Spirit loose, we can't control the Spirit, and the Spirit might lead us in ways we don't want to go and to opportunities we don't want to seize and to ministries we don't want to take on. And yet, I can't help but refer back to my chat with the children. A church without the Spirit isn't unlike butter-less butter tarts. Sitting on the kitchen counter, it looks perfectly fine, but when you take the first bite you notice the difference! If you're missing an essential ingredient, things aren't going to work the way they should – and the Holy Spirit is as essential an ingredient in the church as butter is in butter tarts.

 

     In today's reading, we discover that – as oxymoronic as it may seem – it is very possible to have a church that does not have the Holy Spirit. The passage today told us that “Samaria had accepted the word of God.” This was an amazing enough event to the apostles back in Jerusalem that they sent a couple of folks to investigate, which suggests that the apostles hadn't planned any evangelistic missions to Samaria or sent anyone to preach there. They were puzzled by this turn of events – to refer back to last week for a moment, this was perhaps the beginning of taking the good news “to the ends of the earth” - a task that at the time must have seemed so overwhelming (and even impossible) to them. What Peter and John found when they arrived in Samaria was equally puzzling – it was, indeed, a church without the Spirit. The Samarians had heard the word of God and they had accepted the word of God – they were believers; this doesn't seem to have been in question – but something was missing in their faith. The Spirit of God – the power that animates faith and allows faith to move beyond being merely what a Christian believes and makes it instead how a Christian lives – was missing.passage tells us something interesting. “They had simply been baptized into the name of the Lord Jesus.” Apparently the Samarians were equating faith with ritual – in response to having heard the word of God and believed it they had been baptized (presumably water baptized) but they believed that engaging in that ritual alone was sufficient; that there was nothing more required.

 

     Is there anything we in Port Colborne today can learn from this Samarian church of centuries ago? What do we have in common with them? Perhaps a lot – perhaps at least three very important things, that I can point out with three questions. Do we suffer from a lack of faith? In fact, I think that we – like the Samarians - are a people who passionately believe the word of God and who possess a deep faith in God. Undoubtedly we are different people with different levels of faith, but I believe we all have deep faith. But there are two other questions that we have to ask of ourselves that force us to reflect upon the two challenges the Samarians seemed to have. Do we, like them, suffer from a lack of the Spirit? Maybe. We do, after all spend a lot of time worryiong about having things done the way we want them done without always thinking about how God wants things done. Do we, like them, suffer from an addiction to ritual? Sometimes. We do like things to be comfortable; we like things the way they are. Anything too different is jarring to our senses! The Samarians had to have these problems pointed out to them – and then they needed the power of prayer to release them to be the people of God that God wanted them to be.

 

      I wonder if we don't need to take more seriously the need to pray for the Holy Spirit's power to be upon us more often – not because prayer makes the Spirit (Who is always present) any more present, but because such prayer reminds us to be aware of the Spirit's presence, and once we're aware of the Spirit's presence, we can be empowered by that same Spirit. The promise of the passage for the Samarians is that “they might receive the Holy Spirit” That's God's promise for us too, but how do we know whether or not we've taken advantage of the Spirit's presence to empower our community of faith? Let's briefly look at two kinds of churches.

 

     What would a church without the Holy Spirit look like? There are some who would take the view that a church without the Holy Spirit would be a church without what are known as “signs and wonders.” Well, if that's the case then there's a lot of churches that don't have the Spirit, but I have to say – with great respect to my charismatic Christianfriends – that if we use the church at Samaria as our example, then tpresence of the Spirit doesn't seem to be shown by the appearance of sign and wonders (those miraculous seeming gifts such as speaking in tongues and healings.) The passage ends by telling us that the Samarians “received the Holy Spirit” but had we read on we would have seen nothing to suggest that any dramatic miracles occurred afterward, so the presence of the Spirit today can't necessarily be equated with the presence of “signs and wonders” in spite of what many charismatic Christians say. Such things may be present, but they aren't inevitably present. , a church without the Holy Spirit would be a church that's stagnant; a church that's unopen to change; a church that's unwilling to risk; a church that doesn't want to be challenged; a church that's unable to allow God to guide. That's what a church without the Spirit would look like. 

 

     But I don't want to end on a negative note. I don't want to close on the word “without,” I want to close on the word “with.” I want to ask the positive question: what does a church with the Spirit look like? It seems to me that it would be just the opposite. A church with the Spirit is a church that risks boldly; it's a church that acts creatively; it's a church empowers its people fully; it's a church that loves its neighbours abundantly. It's a church that does all that because it trusts God implicitly. I'm thinking of what happened when that poor minister tried to impress his congregation. I love animals. I admit that I'm more of a “dog” person than a “cat” person – but cats are fine too. But I don't want any black cats in this church - because I want the Holy Spirit active and present with us at all times!