05/26/2026
Pentecost Sunday
“The Language of Love”
Acts 2:1-13 / May 24, 2026
Thanks to your kind consideration, my wife and I had a wonderful vacation. We enjoyed good food, good rest, and beautiful experiences in lovely places. I have now been refreshed and recharged, so I am ready to serve the church and all of you faithfully again. If there is anything you need me to do, just treat me like your servant and ask away. I will do anything!
While I was away, I heard that our beloved and trusted lay leader shared another wonderful message with all of you. Rather than always eating the same meal prepared by the same cook, sometimes we need to enjoy a special meal prepared by someone special. I believe you all enjoyed that special feast last Sunday. I would like to express my deep gratitude to our lay leader for preparing and sharing that special meal with the congregation. I love you and thank you. I will gladly give another opportunity later this year for that special meal to be prepared again.
Today, we will pause our sermon series on the Gospel of John for a moment and instead reflect together on a message fitting for Pentecost Sunday.
1.
In a church---my friend is serving as a senior pastor in NJ, there is a custom on the Pentecost Sunday that some people among the congregation, who are from different countries, are invited to read Scripture reading from today’s text Acts 2---share a few verses in their native tongues. It’s been a good tradition since the church has a multi-cultural setting where the congregation is composed of diverse people, such as European Americans, Asian Americans---some are from India, some from Korea, and some from Philippine, and African Americans and people who have Hispanic heritage.
So once a year---on this special Sunday, the Scripture is read in different languages---English, Spanish, Korean, Indian native language, some African native languages. The idea, of course, is to remind everyone of the Day of Pentecost when people gathered from all other nations heard the disciples proclaim the good news in their native languages, as we’ve heard from the book of Acts today. It is an awesome moment to hear
God’s word in various tongues. It is a moment that God’s message proclaimed in different tongues unites everyone who is eager to hear it. It is a moment of the tower of Babel turned upside-down.
You know the story of the tower of Babel? According to the book of Genesis, back in the beginning of creation, everyone was still located in one place. And they all spoke the same language. As descendants of the faithful Noah, they still had some kind of cohesion as people of God. But as time had passed by, the people forgot that they owed everything to their creator. They began to see their own power as sufficient. So, they decided to build a tower that would reach to heaven---a tower to their own pride.
Now God knew if they stayed in one place and had one language, they would do all they wanted to do. So, God decided to give them a reason to stop building a tower to heaven and to move away with one another. He changed their language into many different languages. As a result, they stopped building the tower and were scattered over all the earth.
This story of the tower of Babel is simple. It is the story about humankind’s pride in trying to be like God on its own power and about God’s condemning them to the diversity that breeds trouble and confusion. In a way this story recognizes that differences of language can accentuate division itself and perhaps more than that. Each group tries to dominate other groups, thereby often brings about disharmony, strangeness, suspicion, hostility, and even destruction.
2.
Does this phenomenon happen only because of the difference of language? Probably not! There are always disharmony and conflict even among the people who have the same language. Perhaps, it is the human condition itself in which we, many times, fail to accept the differences in how we live and what we believe. But thanks be to God! At the Day of Pentecost, the condemnation of Babel was over. You see what happened on that day, right? On that day, there was a rush of mighty wind, fire, tongues of fire filled the entire house---filled each of the disciple. Then what happened?
They began to speak. They began to speak to the crowd---strangers who gathered outside. They began to speak about the Good News of Jesus Christ. And as the crowd listened, they were amazed because they could hear those messages in their own
languages. “Oh my Gosh! We can understand what these people are saying. They are speaking in our language---our mother-tongue!”
Whenever I read this story, I feel amazed. I feel wonder how it could happen. Imagine the situation. So many people who had come from all different places. Suddenly they heard the disciples speaking the Gospel of Jesus in their own languages. People who were truly different from one another could hear and be heard by one another. Amazing! This is amazing news! What does the author of the Acts try to tell through this event? What does this event mean to us now?
What happened at Pentecost was a sign of the beginning of a new community---faith community in which people began to live in a new age, new language, new life---new possibilities. In this new age the faith community was empowered by the Holy Spirit, and through power of the Holy Spirit, the Good News was proclaimed to all regardless of all barriers. The walls of despair and fear were broken down.
Suddenly the differences between peoples of the world---their accent, language, race or ethnicity---were not something to fear but became something to appreciate about God. In order to hear the Good News, they didn’t have to change their identity---their own language and their own culture. They didn’t have to pretend to be someone they were not. They just heard the Gospel and could understand it, were touched by it, and accepted it. They could be united with each other in the Good News of Jesus Christ.
3.
What happened at Pentecost still happens in our lives. It should be happening because the Holy Spirit is still working and prevails in our lives. Then, we may wonder “speaking in other languages” can really happen in our reality though we do not learn them at all.
Well, sometimes I really wish it could happen in my place. I can imagine. During the worship service, the Holy Spirit comes in this place. Through power of the Spirit, I preach the sermon in perfect English---like my mother-tongue. You understand it in a perfect way. What about in the Bible study class? When we talk about the Gospel with each other, I hear what you say in Korean, and you hear what I say in perfect English. Sounds wonderful, isn’t it? But it seems impossible now in our reality. Perhaps, some day when time comes, through the AI technology it may happen again.
However, if we think in a little different angle, we realize that what happened at Pentecost is really happening in our lives in a different way. No matter how different we are, the Good News of Jesus Christ is proclaimed any place in one common language---one universal language. Guess what? It is the language of human heart---the “language of love.”
Let’s see our faith community---our church. In the church, everybody is invited---the men and women, the old and young, the rich and needy, non-citizen and foreigners, those who live in the margins, the homeless, those who have a different theological position. Each one is invited, welcomed, and embraced regardless of all the differences. All the barriers that divide us are to come down, and none is excluded to the Good News of Jesus Christ. Indeed, the Good News is proclaimed, shared and practiced to each of us in the same language---the language of love. So, this language of love connects us and unites us with each other within diversity.
Yes, it is language of love, the language of the Holy Spirit, that breaks down walls and unites. We experience the language of love, the language of the Holy Spirit all the time. It means we find that Pentecost is happening in all times, all places, and all circumstances.
Every time we worship God in this Sanctuary… every time we baptize someone in this place…. every time we help and support our neighbors... every time we participate in a mission event... every time we pray for the sick and those in need... every time we pray for people we don’t know or pray for people we don’t especially like… every time we lay aside our self-concerns, self-preservation even for a moment and try and listen together to the voice of God... every time we gather at this sanctuary... I’m sure that we hear and share the Good news, the gospel of Jesus Christ proclaimed in the language of love.
My friends, what happened at Pentecost is still going on and on and on… As we continue to take our spiritual journey, the Good News of Jesus Christ keeps being proclaimed in the “language of love” beyond all barriers of our differences. Thanks be to God! Amen!
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