A couple of weeks ago, we had a staff retreat at Lake Martin which was a great time of deepening friendships and of learning more about each other. One thing we did was study our various personality types, which was fun and also helpful. So now the whole staff team has received confirmation of what they already knew: that there is a personality type for people who are terrible at making decisions, and I'm it. And I really am awful at making decisions. You should see me when I go shopping. Take bread. Do you know how many kinds of bread there are in Publix? I do, because I counted them. 117. And that doesn't include rolls or buns. 117. I mean, what is an indecisive guy supposed to do? Usually, when I have this much choice, I get anxious and spend 20 minutes going, "Ooh, that one looks nice, but, oh, so does that one. And I, I wonder if that one's good for toasting. And oh, this one's 10 cents cheaper, and I wonder what the nutritional values are in this one." And on I go. Sometimes I can be so anxious that I leave the shop without actually buying anything. And when I do make a purchase, I will think, after half an hour of thinking through all the calamities that could happen if I get it wrong, I will drive home stressing about whether I made the right decision. And then I will get home, and I'll take some of the bread, and I'll eat it, and I'll think, "I knew I should have got that other one." If you share my personality, then I want you to claim it and be proud of it, because we are not alone. A man named Barry Schwartz has written a book called The Paradox of Choice: Why More Is Less. And Schwartz claims that consumer choice greatly adds to people's anxiety. He conducted a study at a supermarket. He gave out samples of jam to customers. Uh, he set up a table that had three flavors of jam to sample and another table that had 24 jams to sample. Not surprisingly, 60% of the shoppers visited the table with the 24 jams, and only 40% stopped by the one with three. But here's the interesting thing Of all the people who sampled from the small table, 30% then bought some jam, while only 3% of those who had the 24 to choose from actually bought some. Thank you. Schwartz concluded the presence of choice might be appealing as a theory, but in reality, people might find more and more choice to actually be debilitating. Indecisive brothers and sisters, rejoice. We are normal, and science proves it. What kind of God do you want? If there was an assortment of gods, what sort would you pick? Would you choose God number one? This deity is loving and caring, nurturing and comforting, forgiving and intimate. This God is your friend, your dove, your fortress and shepherd. Or would you pick God number two? This almighty is, well, almighty. His power knows no bounds. His strength knows no limits. He torpedoes obstacles, smites evil, and births miracles. This God changes situations, and when he doesn't, he changes you so that you can endure them. Which Holy Spirit on the supermarket table would you opt for? Intimate Holy Spirit or powerful Holy Spirit? The Holy Spirit in today's gospel lesson, the one that Jesus calls the advocate, the one he promises will tenderly come to his disciples, fill their lives, and be the constant reassuring, comforting presence for all of life to be with them forever. Or would you choose the Holy Spirit that came at Pentecost, all fire and howling wind? The one who shakes things up, who transformed Paul in today's reading from Acts into the kind of person who courageously traveled the Middle East preaching the gospel. The Holy Spirit who is unpredictable and can't be controlled, who may even act in unsettling ways. Tough choice for a person who is terrible at making decisions Well, what if you don't have to choose? What if these two qualities are actually two sides of the same Holy Spirit? What a relief that would be for my personality type. And that is the beautiful truth of the Christian life. Our advocate is also our strength. Our friend is also our energizer. Our intimate companion is also the unpredictable enforcer who gets us off the couch and into God's world. What a desolate scene John describes in the Gospel lesson. Jesus is eating his final meal with his disciples. They are deep in conversation, not trivial table talk, but serious discussion about grave matters. It's the same conversation that Robert Marshall told us about last week. Jesus is going away. He's facing the cross, and he prepares his friends for this tragic event. They had been with him now for three years, learning from him, watching his life, marveling at his compassion, wondering at his authority, bathing in his love. How could they now get their heads around what he was telling them, that he was going away? But into these confused minds and troubled hearts, Jesus drops this precious promise, that when he goes, he will send another personality to be with them. The Advocate, it says in our translation, but others say Comforter, Counselor, Helper. This Comforter will be with them forever and will be in infinite re- in, intimate relationship with them. They will have the same relationship with the Holy Spirit as Jesus himself has with God the Father. Wow. And even though they will miss Jesus, it is right that he goes. The disciples will have a new closeness with God that they could not have had even with Christ, because this Spirit will live inside them. God inside them. You can't get more intimate than that. That word advocate, of course, uh, in some countries is the word they use for lawyer. So here's Jesus promising to send another lawyer. Thank you, Jesus. 'Cause we really need more of them. Yeah. So let's stick to comforter. To the 11 who literally don't know what's about to hit them, Jesus promises a friend. To us, when we are trying to make sense of things that perplex and disturb, Christ promises a counselor. To you, when you feel stretched to the point of snapping, burdened to the point of crumbling, and torn to the point of exhaustion, Christ promises a healer. If we need strength, courage, resolve, resilience, the Holy Spirit will give us those things. But if we need comfort, soothing, healing, restoring, the Holy Spirit will supply that, too. Because the lives we live are not either/or lives. We are inconsistent in our discipleship, and life treats us inconsistently in return. Lord. Sometimes our walk is difficult. We face suffering. We experience loss. We need the intimacy of the Holy Spirit to reassure us, console us, and lift us up. Lord. At other times, we have a job to do. Uh, God calls us to go to work, to engage with other people, to use our gifts, to make this world a better place in some small way. And at those times, we don't need the intimate Holy Spirit. We need the Holy Spirit who takes us in our frailty and fills us with courage and the determination to do what God is calling us to do. Lord. When you are in primary school in England, they tell you about the year 1066, the invasion of the Norman king, William the Conqueror, and the terrible defeat of the English king, Harold Godwinson. And you study the Bayeux Tapestry. You've all seen pictures of it. It is a lavish and extravagant work of embroidery completed around the year 1080. It measures 230 feet long, and it tells the story of the Battle of Hastings. History, of course, is written by the winners, and so the Bayeux Tapestry tells the story of the battle from a decidedly French perspective. Not that I'm bitter. But did they really have to include an image of King Harold with an arrow in his eye? Actually, when you're a boy in primary school, that image is pretty cool, and obviously it stays with you for the rest of your life. Now, of course, when, uh, the Normans conquered England, uh, the culture re- rapidly changed, and the French language became the accepted tongue of the ruling classes. And the French introduced a new word to the English, confort, which in time became our word comfort, and it meant to strengthen. These days, comfort means something quite different. Uh, we have comfy chairs. We eat comfort food. We wrap our children in comforters. We comfort someone who is sad by giving them a hug. Comfort is warm, protective, cuddly even. Now, the Bayeux Tapestry gives us another angle on the word comfort. There is a little scene in the tapestry, scene 54 it's called, that depicts a bishop named Odo, a kind of chaplain to the, uh, Norman army. And Odo is urging the French troops onwards with his bishop's staff. So basically, he's swinging this stick around, poking the soldiers in the ribs, and forcing them to keep fighting. They may be tired. Some may be injured. Others may even be dying, but here is the good bishop, crook in hand, forcing them onwards. And underneath this image, there's the Latin phrase which means, "Bishop Odo comforts the boys." Aw. That's nice. Bishop Odo gives these big, hairy Frenchmen a teddy bear, reads them a story, and gives them a hug. No He pokes them with a big stick, with, get this, the symbol of his pastoral care and his shepherding presence. Because to the Normans, comfort does not mean providing a shoulder to cry on and an ear to listen. It means giving strength, even when that strength comes in the form of a big stick. How do you like that Holy Spirit? Wanna choose that one on a piece of bread at the sample table in Publix? Well, let me say it again. You don't have to choose. God has chosen you to be his home. We have the Holy Spirit with all his depth and beauty and power and gentleness and mystery and, yes, sometimes I need to be comforted with a stick. Sometimes I chicken out of doing the right thing, making the unselfish decision, having the hard conversation. Sometimes I just can't be bothered with the hassle involved with doing the right thing. But can there be anything better than the feeling that comes after you courageously do what God was asking of you? Let's be open to the comforter with a stick, and let's then, in Christ's name, change the world. Amen. Amen.