Monday of the Seventh Week of Easter
The Holy Spirit is coming! Can you feel the anticipation in the readings as we lean forward looking toward Pentecost? That anticipation is what brought all three readings together for me. This is what the Lord put on my heart for today.
I was first drawn to today's Psalm. It is intense! But it is also immensely encouraging. I sometimes find the Psalms are my favorite for that reason. They can seem so foreign and familiar at the same time. We are intimately familiar with the images of God as described in the last two stanzas, but we get a little squirmy when we read the first stanza. In reading it though, I was reminded of a quote from Benedict XVI, “The Holy Spirit is fire; whoever does not want to be burned should not come near him.”
This is who is presented to us. The Spirit of God that is advocate, consoler, and liberator. But also the Spirit that is the flame that melts wax and dispels darkness. And this is why we can get scared.
I have been scared of the Holy Spirit before. I've seen the Holy Spirit do amazing things in people's lives, but that always involves change. The Spirit is fire and that fire will consume those things that are inhibit our faithful obedience to God and loving service to neighbor.
The thing is, we don't always want to watch that thing get burned up.
We don't want to reprioritize, reorganize, or reevaluate those parts of our life. We don't want to lose whatever it is the Spirit wants to consume--whatever waxy idol the Spirit wants to melt.
We want to cling to what we have. We want the safety of our own making. We want to trust that we have come far enough in the faith. But that is not enough.
In the first reading we are shown that there is more for us. The Ephesians that St. Paul encountered could have clung to their baptism from John and said, "We're changed men! We are good. I know that you are doing incredible things with the Spirit, but we are repentant, converted men. The Lord has brought us far enough along." And maybe they would have done ok. "Ok," however, is not what God wants for us. God wants us to thrive in abundance. God wanted them empowered by the Spirit. God wanted to upset what had become their new normal to bring them further along.
Now, the Spirit is our advocate and gives us what we need. Just as fire can melt our waxen idols and dispel our darkness, it can also sustain us, comfort us, and protect us.
This is the side of the Spirit that we need to embrace when speaking of Pentecost as well. At times, we can be so overwhelmed and weary that we can keep the Spirit at arms length because we are afraid we are going to be given that one more thing that will break us.
Maybe you can relate. Maybe you have felt too busy, too stretched, or too exhausted for the Spirit, and you really don’t want to get burned. If you can relate, here is the other part of what the Lord put on my heart.
The Lord promised us the Spirit as an agent of consolation, defense, comfort and peace. When you are tired, beaten, battered, and scared, the Spirit wraps us in a comforting embrace. He is the fire of a person camping in woods at night, providing comfort and warding off the darkness. He is the fireplace that a family gathers around on a cold winter night providing peace, calm, and communion that goes beyond words or activities.
The Liar whispers in our ears that the Spirit will only stretch us thinner than we can go, “Like butter over too much bread" as Bilbo Baggins says.
The Lord has promised that he has conquered the Liar, that darkness does not want the Spirit around because the light will drive it out. God has promised us that around this Fire, we can truly find rest.
The Spirit might turn our worlds upside down and lead us deep into discipleship. But, He will always rejuvenate us before He sends us back out.
Let's, come around the fire.
- Spencer Hargadon