Calvin Synod Herald, 2010 (111. évfolyam, 1-12. szám)
2010-05-01 / 5-6. szám
4 CALVIN SYNOD HERALD Speaking God’s Word - Our Mother Tongue “Even before a word is on my tongue, lo, O Lord, Thou knowest it altogether.” Psalm 139:4 What is your Mother Tongue? English? Hungarian? Or another? Everyone has one, almost always taught by our mothers. The first voices we hear - and first we speak. Sometimes, too, when we’re close to our last breaths we forget languages learned later, but we slip back to the words and songs of our childhood. At Pentecost it’s enlightening to read in the Bible two stories about people who spoke many different languages. One is at the beginning of the history of Israel in Genesis 11: \ff, the Tower of Babel, where it relates, “Now the whole earth had one language and few words. ” Because they attempted to build a tower into heaven, which they presumed would make them like gods, “... the Lord confused the language of all the earth; and from there the Lord scattered them abroad over the face of all the earth. ” With Christ’s first coming, immediately after His resurrection and ascension, God reverses His action and enables Jesus’ disciples to understand the words of other languages, skills they could use when they took the Good News of resurrection to the world. In Acts 2:1ff as the apostles were gathered, it relates, “And there appeared to them tongues as of fire, distributed and resting on each one of them. And they were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues, as the Spirit gave then utterance. ” The key point was not that of language, rather that they were given understanding, a gift of the Spirit, as fulfillment of what Jesus had promised earlier. Babel’s Successors Looking through the eyes of archeologists, we get glimpses of humanity’s earlier years, and one after another reveals some sense of divine presence and of preparation for a life beyond death. As Trinitarian Christians we know that the Holy Spirit also was in the beginning, before the foundation of the world, with the Father and the Son. But the same rebellious nature of humankind is also revealed in the selfish and cruel deeds such as human sacrifice, oppression, slavery, abandonment of the weak, and wars. Just as flat feet, bad tickers or bald heads run in families, so too the readiness to go Satan’s way led many to follow in Adam’s rebellious way - and it still does. In the last century — “when will they ever learn” echoes the protest song - we have suffered the failure of atheism’s empires of the “Third Reich” and Marxist Communism. Each was to be the springboard to a superior human in sole charge of his destiny. They were big flops like Babel. “The Big Bang Theory: God Spoke and BANG! It happened.” This is one of my favorite bumper stickers because it tells it like it is. It is the only plausible explanation of the creation, not only of the origin of things but of us human beings as well. Scientifically we know that things just don’t happen, there is a cause. Why do we marry and have children (properly in that order)? We have an innate desire to be in loving families. Even with God there is a reason for it all, God’s desire to have a loving family. That He loves His children is unquestionable, in that when they messed up He sent His only begotten Son to save them from their due reward of chaos on earth and then of Hell. As His children, we are only asked to love our heavenly Father. Unfortunately, like sassy kids, we have often said, “No! Not only shouldn’t we “fool mother nature,” but we’re not supposed to say a fresh “No!” to our parents - and especially not to God. In this world of know-it-alls, only the ruins of empires remain while their fabled glories have faded. Pentecost to “Surround Sound” The new world of God’s children living together in loving harmony is the task of Christ’s holy Church. As the Acts of the Apostles relates the deeds of His faithful followers in their day, it is the acts of church members today that fulfill His mission - acts and more acts, just as at Pentecost - to make disciples and teach them. As Christians speak and act, they write Jesus’ message on the hearts of others. But how? It is the Word of God that is spoken by the Holy Spirit and in the Church that needs to be written on the heart of each person. We know that a child’s first days are surrounded by the sounds of the parents, but also of sights and scents, tastes and touch. Each leave its own impression, communicating something happy or stressful in the child’s world. The child learns by ideas through words, but also by music, culture, and even taboos - written on the mind and the heart. Just as the things of the world surround the child, the youngster learns - or not! - the ways of God’s people and of God’s house of prayer. Because this is of even more importance, of eternal consequence, the child’s environment should be saturated even more with all that would build up godly knowledge and faith. Further, as it is true of children, it is equally true of adults since we all need to mature in our faith. Then that means all of us should saturate our lives with the sounds and sights, the music and art, culture and knowledge, of our Bible and of Christian history. Rev. Albert W Kovács HEIDELBERG CATECHISM Question 53; What do you believe concerning the Holy Spirit?- First, that, with the Father and the Son, he is equally eternal God; second, that God’s Spirit is also given to me, preparing me through a true faith to share in Christ and all his benefits, that he comforts me and will abide with me forever. Question 54: What do you believe concerning “the Holy Catholic Church?” - I believe that, from the beginning to the end of the world, and from among the whole human race, the Son of God, by his Spirit and his Word, gathers, protects, and preserves for himself, in the unity of the true faith, a congregation chosen for eternal life. Moreover, I believe that I am and forever will remain a living member of it. A.D. 1563
