I’m always amused by people from outside the South who seem to think we have no appreciation for true art. And while there are many among us who have – ahem – interesting taste in something they refer to as “lawn art,” I would definitely object to their defining art simply as “fancy paintings in museums.”
One of my favorite forms of Southern art is BBQ. And it’s definitely an art form. While I lack the culinary skills of Bob-Dawg, I don’t need to be a painter to appreciate a Monet. I remember in college, the day before a home football game. The old alums would back their massive RVs into their spots and unpack their smokers. Several locals in pickup trucks had trailer-sized smokers they’d bring in with them, too. They’d break out large coolers of meat covered in a super-secret mix of spices they referred to as “rub.” As with all true art, every detail was intentional. Everything from the choice of wood to the ratio of individual spices in the rub to how long and how hot to cook it. And sometime in the very wee hours of the morning, when most college students were heading to bed, these guys would be up stoking the fires in their smokers.
Armed with gallons of coffee and a bottle of water to spray down the occasional flare-up, these artists filled the air around the stadium with the some of the most incredible smells in the world. And while all that preparation seemed to take forever, it was always worth the wait.
(Hungry yet?)
While you evaluate your options for dinner tonight, think back over what you know of biblical history. Every major work of God in the Bible seems to come out of two things: 1) dark times for God’s people, and 2) sustained, emotional cries to God for action. Moses was sent to Pharaoh after centuries of God’s people crying out to God. The Judges were appointed to deliver Israel from foreign oppressors. Jesus came “in the fullness of time” as the Messiah, the Deliverer. And the Holy Spirit came at Pentecost after sustained prayer by Christ’s fearful band of followers following Jesus’ very public execution, resurrection and dramatic exit from the Mount of Olives. They must have felt very alone.
So they prayed.
And the Spirit moved…
And three thousand men were added to their number in a single day.
But the Spirit wasn’t done. In America, we’re kind of immune to news of a church split because it happens so often. Fights break out over music style, small group curriculum, and obscure line items in church budgets. Or churches compete for members, “negative recruiting” the members of their town. Unity among believers seems like a myth. But it wasn’t for that first church. The Spirit knitted their souls together. Acts 2:42-47 tells how they shared their property, their time. They valued each other more than they valued their own individual priorities. They no doubt shrugged off insults and slights (real or perceived) from other believers and responded instead with genuine love (not fake smiles). This was a one-of-a-kind group, characterized by supernatural unity – and it didn’t go unnoticed.
“And the Lord added to their number day by day those who were being saved.” (Acts 2:47)
The world is still feeling the effects of that spiritual explosion in Jerusalem 2000 years ago. The drama of Acts is miraculous, an awesome display of the Spirit’s power to change the lives of whole groups of people. But it’s easy forget that something else came before. It wasn’t an isolated event, a “Big Bang.” There was time, preparation. The fire of the Spirit that exploded at Pentecost began as a slow burn that was stoked by the desperate prayers of the saints. Like good BBQ, the time spent in the silent, slow burn of the Spirit made it so that the church born at Pentecost was totally characterized by the Spirit’s consuming fire. And the world couldn’t help but notice.
Times are tough for so many these days. The nightly news seems to show a world that’s getting darker. Closer to home, the suicide rate is climbing as more and more people of all ages give up hope. Our community is in desperately in need of God’s presence. We need Him to act in a big way… and soon. But too often, our response is dictated by our short attention spans. Just like raw meat doesn’t transform into delicious BBQ in an instant, God prepares His people to participate in something big by a slow – often painful – burn.
Our community needs us to endure that burn. Our friends and family need us to pray for them. Our church – if we are to be the light of God in a hopeless world – requires us to pray. And not the formal, dignified prayers at dinner, but the emotional, desperate prayers that the Bible – in its understated way – calls “crying out to God.”
If we want God to move in our church and in our community in a Pentecost kind of way, we need to be transformed by the same kind of slow burn that happened in that upper room in the days leading up to Pentecost. Let’s you and I commit – really commit – to spending some time on our knees (or faces) and beg God to act. I can’t help but think that’s just the kind of prayer he’s itching to answer.
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