Come Holy Spirit! The Whole Church Needs a New Pentecost

Published on THE STREAM

On Pentecost the early followers of Jesus gathered. So their Lord had instructed them. Why? To expect the fulfillment of the promise he had made to send the Holy Spirit. We refer to Pentecost as the birthday of the missionary church for a good reason. Their encounter with the Holy Spirit in the Upper Room changed them.

They were filled with the same Holy Spirit which raised Jesus from the dead. The Apostle Paul would later explain the experience. He was not at that first Pentecost. But he certainly experienced the same encounter, and came to know of its powerful, transformative effects! (Romans 8:11)

The Holy Spirit capacitated the early followers of Jesus to go from being a frightened fraternity to a band of brothers and sisters. Of them it was said “they turned the world upside down” (Acts 17:6) They were empowered to carry forward in time the ongoing mission of Jesus Christ until he returns to complete the work of redemption.

We’re Offered the Same Gifts

Every year, this celebration of the outpouring of the Holy Spirit on Pentecost is an invitation to each one of us to have the very same encounter. It is the Holy Spirit which makes it possible for us to live lives of sacrificial love, holiness and service in a world that God still loves. It’s a world into which He still sends His Son, through the Body of Christ, the Church — of which we are all members. (John 3:16)

We are, in this millennium, commissioned to carry forward the very same mission of those first disciples who gathered with Mary the Mother of the Lord. Jesus promised his followers, “Amen, amen, I say to you, whoever believes in me will do the works that I do, and will do greater ones than these, because I am going to the Father.” (John 14:12)

That includes you and me!

A Transforming Fire

In these in words, recorded in that same chapter of John’s Gospel, Jesus made a promise.

I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Advocate to be with you always, the Spirit of truth, which the world cannot accept, because it neither sees nor knows it. But you know it, because it remains with you, and will be in you. I will not leave you orphans; I will come to you. In a little while the world will no longer see me, but you will see me, because I live and you will live. On that day you will realize that I am in my Father and you are in me and I in you.

Among the readings read at the Catholic Liturgy on Pentecost Sunday is the account of that first Christian Pentecost:

When the time for Pentecost was fulfilled, they were all in one place together. And suddenly there came from the sky a noise like a strong driving wind, and it filled the entire house in which they were. Then there appeared to them tongues as of fire, which parted and came to rest on each one of them. And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in different tongues, as the Spirit enabled them to proclaim. (Acts 2)

There is little doubt from their actions following that event. They were very different. They went forward and really did turn the entire world upside down. With their preaching and the witness of their changed lives. Will we do the same in this new missionary age? The choice is ours to make. . . . . .

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