Ruby Slippers

Acts 2:1-21, Romans 8:14-17

May 27, 2007 Pentecost

Rochelle A. Stackhouse

 

            My husband gave me an interesting Christmas gift this year. Knowing I am a huge fan of the Wizard of Oz (and the musical “Wicked” and the book by Gregory Maguire on which it is loosely based), he gave me a sign that hangs in our kitchen reading “Don’t make me get the flying monkeys!” as well as this doorstop showing the legs of the Wicked Witch of the East in the ruby slippers.

 

            Since red is the color of the day today, it seems a good day to talk about ruby slippers, and since Pentecost is a day to dwell in the Holy Spirit, it seems a good day to talk about what these slippers represent, which is power.

 

            Power. I was telling the Bible Study on Wednesday that as I read the Pentecost story again this year, I was struck by how much it is not a gentle and sweet story; this is not a “sweet, sweet spirit” coming to Jerusalem. Listen to how Luke describes it. The Spirit does not waft in slowly or gradually, but bursts “suddenly” on the scene. The sound is not rustling leaves, but the “rush of a violent wind” (some translations read “powerful” or “mighty”). Tongues of flame – rather dangerous – appear around the disciples, and people reacted to this not with polite applause, but with amazement and confusion. What the people heard those disciples telling about in their various languages is described not as complex theology or stories of gentle Jesus, meek and mild, but about God’s deeds of power. This is the God, after all, who had recently made the dead come alive!

 

            Then Peter quotes a passage from the prophet Joel telling how not only is this strong Spirit (not strong spirits as in wine) being poured out on all kinds of people, (Slaves? Women? Children?), but that even the universe itself will have a powerful reaction to the pouring out of this Spirit.

 

            This Spirit moves 3000 people that very day to seek baptism and sell their possessions to come and live as a community. 3000 people! This is the same Spirit that made the lame walk and the blind see, the same Spirit that sent John the Baptist to confront the king with his misdeeds, the same Spirit that sent the tables of the moneychangers who exploited the poor scattering across the temple steps. This is the same Spirit that freed a man from demons and made an illiterate fisherman and a woman outcast in her village into powerful evangelists. This is no Christmas tree angel, but a Spirit powerful enough to start with 12 frightened men and a few women who had followed Jesus and make the great Roman Empire so upset that it tried to kill Christians to keep them from making trouble! That is a Spirit of power.

 

            Which brings me to the ruby slippers. Greg Maguire’s book, Wicked, presents an imagined story of what happened in the lives of Glinda the Good Witch and the Wicked Witches of the East and West (whom he names Nessa and Elphaba) before the events told in the L. Frank Baum “Wizard of Oz” stories. In his story, both Nessa and Elphaba understand that they are powerful women, and the red shoes are only a part of that power. They know the power can be used for good, but, for many reasons, they end up turning that power to destruction, to the exploitation of those weaker than they are, and to the pursuit of revenge.

 

            Now if you remember your Wizard of Oz (and I deeply apologize to anyone out there not familiar with this story, but it is way too complicated to sum up), you’ll remember that after Dorothy Gale is blown to Oz in a tornado and her house falls on the Wicked Witch of the East, killing her, the ruby slippers that used to be on the Witch’s feet come to Dorothy. Because the Wicked Witch of the West wants them so badly, Dorothy knows they are powerful, but she doesn’t understand the power – nor does she seek such understanding or try to use the power until the very end when Glinda tells her these slippers can take her home. She has power and she knows it, but she doesn’t explore or acknowledge it or seek to use it either for herself or others.

 

            So often in the church, we are in the position of Dorothy wearing those ruby slippers. At baptism and confirmation, we proclaim the presence of the powerful, Pentecost Holy Spirit in our lives, but too often we don’t explore or acknowledge or seek to tap into that power in our life and work outside of Sunday morning, either in the church or the world. Yet I do not think we were given the Holy Spirit just to help us sing lively songs on Pentecost. Peter said we were to be given power to prophesy. Despite the common usage of that word, prophets did not spend a lot of time predicting the future. What they did most is call people to listen for God, to relate to other people in compassionate and just ways, to speak truth to power, to advocate for widows and orphans, to take leadership. Peter said we would see visions and dream dreams, and Jesus told his disciples the Spirit would empower them to do greater works than he did. Greater works than Jesus!!

 

            Have you ever thought about what that might look like in your life? In the life of this church? Healing, feeding, transforming communities, lifting up those who are outcast and lost. Are our dreams too small? Have we even begun to explore the power that is within us in the Holy Spirit? Are we afraid of it? Is it easier to dismiss that power by saying people will think we are drunk or impractical or naïve or foolish if we take aim at any one of the issues that bedevil us as a church or our society as a whole the way Jeremiah or Amos took on their societies? Wonderful things happen when we stopped assuming we are powerless to do anything to change things like war and poverty and the violence that marks the division of people one from another in our society. In Germany a couple of decades ago fired-up church folk had a lot to do with bringing down a wall most of us thought would never come down! Wonderful things happen when we put on the ruby slippers of the Spirit, the flames, the wind, the power to speak of God’s power like those disciples did. We still have a ways to go, though, to catch up to Jesus! Not using the power of the Spirit at all is as unfaithful as using it for wicked purposes.

 

            Red shoes. Pentecost shoes. Some years ago I heard another story about shoes, this one attributed to the great Howard Thurman. It seems a traveler came to a town where she saw a huge, ornate and active factory. She asked the first person she met on the street what was made there. “Oh,” he replied, “that’s where we make our famous shoes! They are the finest shoes that are made anywhere in the world and we are very proud of them!” and so he continued proclaiming at some length the greatness of the shoes. Then the traveler looked down and saw her new acquaintance was barefoot. Looking around, she noticed that everyone else she saw was also barefoot. When she drew that fact to the attention of her acquaintance, he said, “Oh, we wouldn’t actually wear the shoes, and I’ve actually never seen the shoes, but we are very proud of making them in our town.”

 

            We dare not come today, proclaiming that the Spirit exists and how grand it is, but keep out of the wind and douse the flames and control carefully what we say and to whom when we leave here. The power is there and it is meant to be a gift, not to make us wicked witches, but children of God, kin of Jesus. With God, we are not powerless in any part of our lives. The sign out front today says “The Spirit Moves Within.” I believe it does. Let’s walk it outside, shall we? We can go barefoot, or we can try on the ruby slippers. Amen.