This upcoming Sunday is the Day of Pentecost. On this day, we remember the coming of the Holy Spirit to breathe new life onto the disciples (Acts 2:1-21). Many people refer to this day as the birthday of the Church (“church” with a big C, not just Ardmore).

On Pentecost Sunday, we focus on the Holy Spirit. We will talk about this more in the sermon on Sunday, but many of us have a strange relationship with the Holy Spirit. We tend to at least embrace (if not understand) the concept of a Creator God and we certainly connect with the reality of Jesus Christ, but the Holy Spirit is the most mysterious, misunderstood, and ignored member of the Holy Trinity.

Perhaps it is because the Holy Spirit often leads us into places where we would rather not go. One of the great tensions in Christian faith is finding the balance between tradition and innovation. And, believe me, we need both.

We need the rootedness that comes with tradition. The wisdom of those who have come before us, those who have wrestled with the same questions of the human heart, and those whose faith has been sustained are invaluable perspectives. Every once in a while, when my brain is too full from reading or meetings, I take a walk around the building and I almost always spend a few minutes in the columbarium. I look over the names of the sisters and brothers who came before me and who helped build Ardmore into the church it is. I say a pray of gratitude for their wisdom and example. And I try to honor them by cultivating deep appreciation for the systems they put into place. We need tradition.

But, we also need innovation. We cannot simply rely on what has come before us, but God calls each generation to live out faith in different ways. I am reminded of the verses from the prophet Isaiah when he says:

Do not remember the former things
    or consider the things of old.
I am about to do a new thing;
    now it springs forth; do you not perceive it? (Isaiah 43:18-19)

During Eastertide, we spent time in the Book of Acts and we saw how the Holy Spirit was continually pushing the early Christians past the boundaries of their comfort zone and into the unknown. Philip and the Ethiopian eunuch (Acts 8:26-40), Saul’s radical transformation into Paul (Acts 9:1-19), Peter and Cornelius (Acts 10:1-11:18), the Jerusalem Council (Acts 15:1-35), Paul’s ministry to Lydia in Philippi (Acts 16:6-15) are all examples of moments when the apostles were called, by the Holy Spirit, to a new thing God was doing.

So, how do we, as Ardmore Baptist Church, need both tradition and innovation? What are ways that we need to honor the past and call upon the great cloud of witnesses who have gone before us? But what are ways we need to think beyond our comfort zone? Where is the Holy Spirit calling us to go?