What we might learn from these stories is how *not* to get the answer wrong. That means not answering from a place of fear, from the shadows of death and despair. That means not offering mistaken beliefs or lies we’ve come to believe but answering these simple questions with simple truths.
Believing that wisdom is intrinsic, that it has always been and will always be, that it is present in everything and every place, means that we can be “guided into all truth” by all that we encounter – from the simple meal of bread and wine here at this table to the banquet of experiences every day of our lives.
What is so astonishing about Pentecost is that it is not a once-upon-a-time story. The outpouring of the Holy Spirit is an ongoing, never-ending account of God’s refusal to give up on us. The Spirit which hovered over the deep way back in Genesis, the Spirit that overshadowed Mary to bring God into the world, the Spirit who descended on Jesus in the Jordan River, the Spirit who midwifed a book of prayers into being, that Spirit has been given to us. Baptism is the sign that this is so.