We live in an asymmetric world, one that lacks the sequence, logic, and predictability of the mid-20th century. The rapid development of Internet Marketing and AI has resulted in borderless retailing, which has shrunk the sales of once-dominant offline stores, which are “all bricks but no clicks”.
The same could likely have been said of the Jews’ religion in the 1st century, in the time of the first apostles. The gods of pagans were capricious and unpredictable, but not so Israel’s God, who had revealed Himself as symmetrical in His dealings with them, as a people and a nation, right from the start. The encampment of Israel was laid out in the form of a square, and after decamping the tribes moved in a known, prescribed marching order. The feasts of Israel were annual calendar events, and God’s inflexible laws were known and understood by all.
The Day of Pentecost, so beloved by Pentecostals, was an annual Calendar Day, and observant Jews from fifteen Mediterranean countries journeyed to Jerusalem to celebrate the Feast. They were amazed when at 9:00am a spiritual outpouring happened without notice. An asymmetrical spiritual era of praise and worship had begun, and its dynamism and effects would prove world-changing.
Ten years later, the Pentecost outpouring had become a memory, though its effects on the growing numbers of Jews who accepted Jesus as Messiah and received the Spirit of God continued. The Pentecostal experience had even reached the despised Samaritans! Jewish church leaders knew that the event was simply unstoppable.
When the apostle Peter arrived at the house of Cornelius, the symmetrical, calendar order of events went out the window. As soon as Peter said, “whosoever” the Holy Spirit “fell” as on the disciples in the Upper Room a decade earlier. It was Pentecost without the Feast of Firstfruits, one that had no link to the calendar event, one without a wait, one outside Jewish ethnicity.
Some say “God will do it in His time”, but He does so whenever we are ready! It took a sudden trance and a non-kosher vision to make Peter willing to respond to Cornelius’ invitation. But he was just getting into his introduction when the Holy Spirit interrupted him by falling on Cornelius and everyone else present — interrupting him!
Many evangelicals still think that God works according to timelines, with arrows pointing this way and that. Years ago they turned the verb “dispense” into the noun “dispensation” and think that most of the action stopped with the passing of the first twelve apostles. So, no miracles unless the Lord does them “in His time” and “according to His sovereign will”. Some people are robbed but others just rob themselves.
Historic churches happily keep to the ecclesiastical calendar year by year. They think God works “in mysterious ways, His wonders to perform”. I replaced “mysterious” with “miraculous” years ago, and believe “Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven” refers to now, the present, instantly, straight away — without delay! God likes to see things happen, and His angels are efficient messengers, not slow-moving bureaucrats.
In churches where things happen asymmetrically, i.e. without notice, the ordinary suddenly becomes extraordinary. There’s a basic order of service, but if Jesus has in mind to do a miraculous equivalent to turning washing water into fine wine, well, that’s his prerogative. Too much stress on symmetry can turn a church into a cemetery, in which all things are laid out in order, which is how a burial place should be; but in life — and occasionally in church life — things suddenly go asymmetric. I love it when unexpected, spiritual things happen suddenly and shake the house of God — don’t you?