Pentecost Reflection

Come, Holy Spirit, Come
Veni, Sancte Spiritus
Based on the Readings for Pentecost Sunday
Acts 2:1-11; Galatians 5:16-25; Psalm 104, John20:19-23; 15:26-67;16:12-15

“Come, Holy Spirit, come! And from your celestial home shed a ray of light divine!” with these words the beautiful prayer to the Holy Spirit, VENI, SANCTE SPIRITUS, begins. The feast of Pentecost is also called the Birthday of the church because it celebrates the decent of the Holy Spirit upon the Apostles after which they were heard by people of every race and nationality to be proclaiming the truth of Jesus teachings in the language of the listener.
In Paul’s letter to the Corinthians, Paul tells us “No one can say, Jesus is Lord, except by the Holy Spirit” It is in this letter that one of the most redeeming passages of scripture can be found. Paul informs us “everyone has different gifts bestowed on them by God through the Holy Spirit.” He goes on to affirm that there “Different forms of service, but the same Lord; there are different workings but the same God who produces them all. To each individual the manifestation of the Spirit is given for some benefit” “For in one Spirit we were all Baptized into one body, whether Jews or Greek, slave of free person, we were all given to drink of the one Spirit”
The Gospel admonishes us to “Live by the Spirit”, he goes further to confirm that the desires of the flesh we can cause a breakdown of the graces provided to us. Some of the “Desires of the flesh” he mentions besides the obvious one of indiscriminate sexual pleasure are: immorality, lust, idolatry, hatred, rivalry, jealousy, anger or fury, selfishness, and drunkenness.
To elaborate on each of these today and how we might possibly cause ourselves to be separated from God and the Gifts He freely gives us through the Holy Spirit would take more time than we have. Each of these “Desires of the Flesh” affords us many ways of sinning. They are human faults that every individual has; our task is to try our best to resist their lure.
One thing that I personally can attest to is that, if we call upon God daily, or as many times as we need to in order to resist the temptations that plague us every day, to send us the Holy Spirit, God will oblige. One of my daily prayers begins with “Come, Holy Spirit, fill my heart and kindle in in me the fire of your love so that I might be renewed”
In John 16: we are promised, “The Spirit will guide you to all truth. The spirit will not speak on its own, but will speak what he hears from me and declare it to you”
The truth is that God is a loving, forgiving, compassionate God. God is always there awaiting your call to Him. He does not have an answering machine, voice mail, or a secretary. He always listens to what we are saying and will respond to us according to what He feels is best for us. God always answers our prayers, just not always in the way we want. Many times God actually comes to us and speaks to us in our dreams, or quiet times and even sometimes while driving a car, listening to the I pod, watching TV or playing ball. Unfortunately, we are too preoccupied to listen to what he is telling us through the Holy Spirit. I suggest that the time is NOW for us to begin to be more receptive to those calls from God. Don’t put Him on hold, but take a break from what ever we are engaged in and listen with an open and receptive heart.
We need to allow ourselves to “Receive The Holy Spirit” so that we can begin to develop a deeper and closer relationship with Almighty God and thereby begin the elimination fo the “Desires of the Flesh” that have prevented us from receiving all the gifts of The Spirit, Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness and self control.
AMEN
Rev. Robert Johnnene OFA
Mission Sts. Sergius and Bacchus
Email: Mission_St_Sergius@msn.com
Web Site: www.missionstsergius.org
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