Homily Notes Pentecost 2019

Pentecost/ “The Spirit is About Embracing Life”

“In the beginning God created the heavens and earth.  And the earth was without form and void; and darkness was on the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God move over the face of the water.”

            The Bible does not wait very long to introduce the whole concept of the Holy Spirit to all who read the sacred text.  We all have questions about the Holy Spirit.  We can ask what the Spirit may want us to do in life.  We might hear someone declare that they have been moved by the Spirit to undertake a certain path in life. 

            We might doubt those declarations when we hear them.  But how can we argue with a person who might feel convicted about what they intend to do.  What is the measuring stick for the inspiration? The third person of the Trinity is such a mystery! The Old Testament describes how God the Creator, the first person of the Trinity, interacts with his chosen people. The New Testament that tells us what Jesus, the second person of the Trinity, taught. But sorting out where we see the Holy Spirit at work in Salvation history is more difficult. 

            The Holy Spirit is not described in anthropomorphic terms.  God the creator walked and talked with people like Adam, Abraham and Moses.  Jesus became human.  He was someone who people could touch, hold, listen too.  But the Spirit is in the wind.  The Spirit is in fire.  The Spirit never is described as having a body.  Because of this, we think of the Spirit as being like a ghost which is always on the edges of things.  The Spirit is ready to guide us, but the guidance is more nebulous.

            We might feel that to get specific about what the Holy Spirit wants is to do is presumptuous.  But if we paint the will of the Spirit in broader strokes we still can benefit from the guidance of the Spirit.  What do we want to pay attention to?

            One thing that we notice is the Spirit is about relationship.  What prompted God to create the world?  One thing every Christian Theologian would agree about is that God is love.  But in order to have love as an attribute a person needs to have something or someone to love.  God’s Spirit was motivated to move over the water because God wanted to love others.

            God made the world because the Creator desired intimate relationships with other living things.  Because self-love can lead to narcissism. Love of others can lead to a virtuous way of being.  One of the things we can say about the action of the Holy Spirit is that the Spirit always prompts us to embrace life.  If we take the word life and we spell it backward it is the word, “evil.”  The opposite of embracing life is to reject it.  To feel like life is not worth is never a feeling that is prompted by the Holy Spirit.

            The evil one is the one that speaks to us in the subconscious that tells us that we are not lovable.  The voice of the evil one is that voice that tells us that other people can’t to be trusted.  The voice that is in opposition to the Holy Spirt prompts us to look at the world only to see darkness and chaos. 

            When we move with the Spirit, we move in life giving directions.  Like Abraham and Sarah, we can set out to seek the promised land.  Like Moses we can leave our isolation to go down to Egypt to lead the People of Israel out of slavery.  The voice of the Spirit prompts us to do things that we never thought we could do.  The Spirit prompts us to be creative whether that is creating another human life or creating a work of Art.  The Holy Spirit is all about embracing life not death.

            Another thing we can say is that the Holy Spirit gives us gifts for the benefit of the community.  The Apostles received the Holy Spirit as they gathered together as church.  The gifts that the early Christians received were not to be hoarded, but to be shared. The talents the Christians received from God were for use in ministry.   If we feel we are being led away from community by the Spirit, we are sadly mistaken.  The Spirit is meant to knit us together not to drive us apart.

            The sequence we read today reminds us that the gifts of the Spirit leads us out of woundedness. The sequence reminds us that the Holy Spirit is all about healing, comforting, refreshing, strengthening, nurturing, about joys that never end. 

            Let’s not be fooled today.  The spirit leads us to respect life, to embrace relationship, to experience ongoing healing.  If we experience a holy presence calling us to taste these gifts it is most certainly of the Holy Spirit.

Please note this is a rough draft....grammar may not be perfect.