As many of you know, I went to high school at a boarding seminary in Hannibal, Missouri. In it’s heyday, Hannibal was quite the destination for water traffic using the Mighty Mississippi and it’s fortunes were made as a river town. That industry has mostly dried up but Hannibal still celebrates it’s remaining claim to fame, the writer Mark Twain who was born and raised there. Just outside of town is a network of caves that made an impression on Mark Twain when he explored them as a boy and they figure prominently in his famous stories involving Tom Sawyer and Hucklebery Finn. As part of our school orientation, we were given a tour of the caves and one of the things they did was turn off all the lighting for a moment. When this happened, it was completely and utterly dark; you could not see your hand in front of your face, no matter how good your eyesight was or how many carrots your mom made you eat! There simply was no light for the eye to see. St. Hilary, one of the early saints of our church, related this experience of total darkness to what it's like for our souls to try to know and love God without the Holy Spirit. He says that just as a fully functional eye cannot see unless there is light, the human soul needs the Holy Spirit to experience God. In other words, we can have fully functional souls because of our baptism, but the actual encounter with God begins with the Holy Spirit. We can be card-carrying Christians and “good catholics”, but if our faith is not formed and led by the Spirit and his gifts, we will be trying to see without light.
So what in the world is the Holy Spirit? The Holy Spirit is the Life of God and the Third Person of the Trinity. He also tends to be the most ignored and mysterious. This power, this life, this energy and love of God, was first experienced on Pentecost Sunday, 50 days after Jesus’s resurrection. Everything changed for the disciples when they experienced the Holy Spirit in the forms of tongues of fire and rushing wind. They finally began to understand the teachings, preachings, signs and wonders of the Lord. With the help of the Holy Spirit, the dots were connected regarding the passion, death and resurrection of Jesus. Their faith moved from their head to their heart and they left the Upper Room where they had been hiding and courageously proclaimed the Gospel with no concern for the consequences. The Scriptures go on to say that on Pentecost Sunday alone 3,000 people became followers of Christ. Within a few decades Christianity found its way to most of the major cities of the Roman Empire. Eventually it would spread to the entire world.
It is clear it was the work of the Spirit, the unstoppable love of God, that was responsible for the miracle of evangelization. The apostles would all die, most of them as martyrs, but nothing could stop the growth of the Church. The Church expanded due to the Presence of the Holy Spirit within the apostles and within those who came after them. When we live our faith without fear or compromise, the Spirit draws others to Christ.
Living our faith demands that we, like the first apostles, have the humility to let God to give us a knowledge beyond mere human facts and solutions. Living our faith means we are willing to leave our own safe, comfortable Upper Rooms. Living our faith means trusting in the power of the Holy Spirit to speak about things are difficult and unpopular.
Based on the readings this weekend, we might be tempted to think the early Church had more Holy Spirit than us. But that isn’t true. When St. Paul went to visit the Ephesians, he sensed they were missing something in their faith. So he asked point-blank, "Have you received the Holy Spirit?" They replied they hadn’t even heard of the Holy Spirit! When he heard this, St. Paul immediately confirmed them. They became supercharged Christians and their impact was felt immediately in the Church.
We are one step ahead of the Ephesians. We have listened to Christ's command, "Receive the Holy Spirit." Each of us received the Holy Spirit at Baptism and Confirmation. The Spirit's gifts are awesome. Listen to them: wisdom, understanding, counsel, fortitude, knowledge, piety, and fear of the Lord. They are already present in our souls but we must learn to activate and use them.
Why were the twelve apostles, most of them illiterate, able to win a world for Jesus? And why are a billion Christians unable to repeat the same feat now? The answer is the Apostles used the Holy Spirit's gifts to the fullest and we do not.
The Holy Spirit is just as available to you and me as he was to Peter and the other members of the early Church. But the Holy Spirit is God, he is not a pet. We cannot say, “Come Holy Spirit into my prayer, but stay out of my work” or “You are welcome in my house but stay out of my marriage or my finances or the way I parent or my choice of friends.” If we want his transforming power to take over our thoughts, words, and actions, we have to give him permission to enter every aspect of our lives, ESPECIALLY the ones that are ruled by fear and control. If we block off certain parts of our hearts to the Holy Spirit, his gifts cannot bring about the powerful results we hear about in today’s scriptures.
The amazing news of Pentecost is that God wants his Church to be just as lively and dynamic today as it was when the apostles were around. He is still pouring out gifts of healing, prophecy, comfort, preaching, and so many others to Catholics around the world and right here at Incarnate Word. We are not waiting for God to deliver the goods, He is waiting for us to say “yes”, to accept his invitation and let Him pour the waters of grace on the seeds of the Spirit that have just been waiting to explode into full bloom.
Ultimately, it is not that God and his Spirit are asking too much of us; it’s that we settle for too little and don’t ask for the light God wants to share with those who live in and by the Holy Spirit. Often we try to make our way through the darkness with our eyes alone. However, the gifts of the Holy Spirit are at our disposal. Let the Divine light show you the way. Ask for the Holy Spirit every day so you can be transformed and led out of the upper room which imprisons us with fear, doubt, and worldly comfort. The Spirit will speak through you and lead others to a better and holier life! The Church and the world needs you to be powered by these gifts! Say “yes” to God and do not hesitate to cry out, “Come, Holy Spirit come!”
