Today’s multi-channelled Digital and Satellite Television with its range of choices is a far cry from the time when the BBC ruled the roost with only one channel.  In those day there were occasions when the programme would come to a sudden halt and we experienced what was called a technical breakdown.  At such moments the screen would switch to an Interlude, transmitted whilst frantic engineers tried to restore the programme.  One of my favourites – and the most calming – was The Potter’s Wheel which showed a piece of clay being formed and shaped by a potter on a spinning wheel.  When the breakdown was more serious the film would be a much more exciting one – London to Brighton in 4 minutes- a speeded up film of a railway journey from the heart of London to Brighton with a view from the engine as the steam locomotive rushed us down the line.  Meanwhile, we would wait patiently or otherwise for the programme to be restored.

There is a sense in which today is one of those interludes. It comes between the feast of the Ascension which St. Luke’s reading from his Acts of the Apostles reminds us of and the Feast of Pentecost which we will celebrate next week.

It as if the programme has been interrupted and we are left impatiently waiting for it to be restored.

The disciples returned to Jerusalem and went to an upstairs room – possibly the same room where Jesus had celebrated the Last Supper with them. We are given the names of all 11 of them but already others joined them, including our Lord’s Mother Mary and his brothers.

The Jerusalem (Roman Catholic) Bible insists, of course that these so called brothers were actually his cousins but the original Greek is quite unambiguous that they were brothers and therefore siblings and this is interesting not only because it puts paid to the belief that Mary was a perpetual Virgin (on which so much seems to hang in our Sister Church) but, more importantly, we see that, from the very beginning, our Lord’s family are fully involved in the emerging Christian Church. In particular Mary had a special place from the outset.  We know from Mark's Gospel (Chapter 3) that there was a time when his family not only didn’t understand Jesus' mission but were actually hostile to it.  That they were now reconciled to it and fully involved is a sign of the power of the Gospel to convert the most sceptical and uncertain.  Not only were Our Lord’s family converted by the events of Good Friday and Easter but, James, the Lord’s brother, was to become the Leader of the new Christian Church in Jerusalem.

We need to remember too that when the Holy Spirit descended on the Disciples at Pentecost it didn’t just single them out but gave power to all who were gathered together. Mary, the other women and our Lord’s own family received the gift of the Spirit too.  Pentecost was not an event exclusive to the chosen disciples but was an inclusive event which touched the lives of all who were gathered in our Lord’s name.  This is an important point for the Church today which can sometimes make the assumption that only certain people receive the Spirit to the exclusion of others.

We are all capable of being Spirit-filled – indeed that is the Gift Jesus showers upon us all.   We must always be careful that our notion of Church is not a narrow, exclusive one. All who believe in the Lord Jesus are empowered by the Spirit.

This is quite important when we think of the ministry of the Church because it is not something that empowers the few – those ordained, say, or those who exercise what is sometimes called ‘official ministry’. The empowerment of the Holy Spirit is given at Baptism not Ordination or Licensing. It is not exclusively reserved for certain chosen ones, though there is a sense in which some are indeed set aside through prayerful invocation to be leaders or exercisers of particular ministers.   The thing to remember is that such persons are not set aside from the people but rather on their behalf in order to help and resource all Christians to fulfil their Baptismal vocation to be the People of God, the Church.

Those chosen for particular ministry – ordination, readership, evangelism, Sunday School leadership, churchwardens, singers and so on are not some kind of spiritual elite but people who have their particular gifts consecrated in order to help us all to grow in understanding of what it means to be the Spirit-filled body which is Christ’s Church on earth.  Such people are set aside for the work they do by the people of God, chosen by them for whatever office they carry out.  So, when Gill, Sally and Shaun are ordained deacon on St. Peter’s Day there will be a question asked of the congregation – Is it your will that these persons should be ordained. The whole Church chooses its ministers.  In a different way the Church has already chosen those whom the Archdeacon will admit to the ancient office of Churchwarden next Tuesday and that choice is sealed with prayer at the Visitation service.

Had we been able to read on from our lesson from Acts today, we would have found this exercise of choice being carried out by those who gathered in the upper room. Judas had to be replaced as a leader of the new Church and two candidates were offered – Matthias and Joseph known as Justus. This also adds to our knowledge of who was actually present in that early gathering.  After prayer, the assembly cast lots and Matthias was chosen.  This is probably the earliest form of Selection in the Church after our Lord’s own choosing of the disciples. 

What especially marks out this interlude is not, however, the activity of selection but the quiet waiting.  We hear from St. Luke that this waiting was a time of prayer together.  Before any work is done in the Lord’s name and as part of a sharing of His continued mission to love and save the World for God’s Kingdom, there must be preparation through prayer.

I guess that those who are to be ordained this Petertide are already champing at the bit, in one sense, eager to get on with the job God is calling them to do and maybe there is a time not just of anticipation but also of anxiety and uncertainty because this is a bit of limbo time. But like the early Christians in the upper room awaiting the gift of the Spirit this is a time of preparation and is given so that this preparing is prayerful. 

One of the effects of the change in our Team Ministry post Chris and Carol is that we are exploring new ways of being the Church and of ministering to our communities. This includes Upfront and Pastoral Visiting – but we are still in a bit of an interlude period.  We are still not quite certain what is being asked of us.  All we really know is that things have changed and will go on changing.

We are having to get used to life with fewer clergy and readers and yet we are in danger of carrying on as if we still had many ministers. All our 4 churches, for example, are learning to have Communion by Extension, conducted by Readers authorized to do so. Without this ministry we would simply have to reduce the number and frequency of services that are on offer. It is physically impossible for two clergy to do everything – and nor should they be expected to do so.  That would be inhuman.

But, as I repeatedly say, the changes are not simply pragmatic ones. The Church is on the threshold of something new or at least of rediscovering what is present in the Pentecost event – that of being empowered by the Spirit to be the Church in whatever way God leads us to be.  So, like the early group of Christians after the Ascension we are being given a time to prepare ourselves in prayer.

Part of that prayer is to reflect not on the events that have brought us to this situation but far more importantly to reflect on our Lord’s preparing of us.  When the disciples gathered with the others they no doubt reflected on the events which had led them to this period of waiting. Indeed, as we heard at the beginning of the reading from Acts, they were already questioning Jesus and asking him for clear signs of what was about to happen. All he told them was that they weren’t to ask about things that only God was able to plan and they were to wait for the Spirit after which they would be His witnesses. 

So in the period after Jesus had Ascended they were able to quietly work out what it meant to be witnesses – witnesses to what, to whom? In what way?

And nowhere would that reflection be more profitable than to dwell on the final prayer of Jesus which John’s Gospel so meticulously records in Chapter 17.  It came at the end of a long teaching about what was to happen to Jesus and about how they were to behave towards each other and how they were to be His witnesses to the World – the section which fills Chapters 14 to 16.  Then Jesus prays and at the heart of the Prayer is his concern for his disciples – for their protection, their unity and for their sanctification – their setting apart by the Holy Spirit for the work of witnessing to the saving love of God. Most of al he prays that they will have the vision of God’s glory as shown to them in his own person and which they will see more clearly in his self-offering on the Cross when the glory of God triumphed over the evils of the world.

Just as Jesus glorified his Father and made him known through his teaching, his life, and his dying and rising, so those who follow Christ – who are his witnesses in the world – must live in unity not only with each other but with God who gave everything and was prepared in Jesus to suffer everything so that the world might believe.  If, as I suspect, the disciples reflected on all this in their Interlude period, they would need no convincing that when the promised Spirit came upon them they would know what to do – and that is simply to proclaim the saving Gospel – the good News of Jesus Christ to all – and that is still the absolute mission of the Church.

What they would not then know was how they were going to do it or the way they were going to do it. We have to read the rest of the New Testament to discover that, especially the Acts of the Apostles which is the open ended book we are all still writing in our own lives of faith.

I do not know where God will lead us as a Church, as a team, in the months and years ahead.  What I do know is that we are in the time of Waiting, Reflecting, Preparing and if we do that faithfully, then I dare say that the explosive power of Pentecost – the Spirit-giving which energized the Church and goes on doing so –will lead us into God’s truth and God’s mission.

No Church can pray for anything better.