"What do we do now?"
or to put it another way
"What are you doing here?"
The first quotation is the last line of "The Candidate" (1972) a movie about a young guy running for Senate.
The second is what the Rev. Paul Pfotenhauer greeted us with one Sunday in spring 1974 at a sunrise service on the campus of UC Santa Cruz, overlooking Monterey Bay.
As I'd just dragged myself out of bed, I reacted kind of intemperately to the question... but it was the Sunday after the Ascension and what he asked us is what "two men in white robes" ask the disciples as they gaze up toward heaven. (Acts 1:11)
And the first question is one they began to address in the first chapter of Acts, verse 12ff. They gathered, prayed, and picked a new leader to replace one that had fallen. And then as the Holy Spirit came upon them they continued to meet together in the evenings, teach and pray in the Temple during the day, share all in common, and add to their number... and in time go forth into the world, care for the sick - whoever they were, spread the good news by word and example, and in all things act with compassion as their master had done.
"What do we do now?" Donald Nicholl used to say that doing what has to be done next is the beginning of wisdom: what he refrained from saying is that that can be hard to do.
Jesus, in his resurrection appearance to the disciples just before his ascension, had said, 'you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.’
What that means, to be his witnesses, in all its implications, becomes the business of the church.
Good thing the Spirit showed up. It's time to get on with it.
Christ the King Episcopal Church, Tucson. 16 May 2021.
Seventh Sunday of Easter
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