Icon of the Pentecost (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Devotional Thought of the Day:
⁵  “I am telling you the truth,” replied Jesus, “that no one can enter the Kingdom of God without being born of water and the Spirit. ⁶  A person is born physically of human parents, but is born spiritually of the Spirit. ⁷  Do not be surprised because I tell you that you must all be born again. ⁸  The wind blows wherever it wishes; you hear the sound it makes, but you do not know where it comes from or where it is going. It is like that with everyone who is born of the Spirit.” John 3:5-8 (TEV) 

²⁴  I will take you from every nation and country and bring you back to your own land. ²⁵  I will sprinkle clean water on you and make you clean from all your idols and everything else that has defiled you. ²⁶  I will give you a new heart and a new mind. I will take away your stubborn heart of stone and give you an obedient heart. ²⁷  I will put my spirit in you and will see to it that you follow my laws and keep all the commands I have given you. Ezekiel 36:24-27 (TEV) 

“Get to know the Holy Spirit, the Great Unknown, the one who has to sanctify you. Don’t forget that you are a temple of God. The Paraclete is in the center of your soul: listen to him, and follow his inspirations with docility.” (1)

Tomorrow is the anniversary of the beginning of Pentecost.  The beginning of the church, it’s birth in water and Spirit, that simply confounded Nicodemus, that incredible pouring out of God that started then, and continues during every worship service, with every baptism, with every remembrance of the work of the Spirit.

While many churches pull out all the stops for Pentecost Sunday, do we realize that Pentecost isn’t a day.  It is not even a season of the church year, but the era in which we, and so many have gone before us in, and who knows how many will follow in, in our stumbling steps.  It is Pentecost that we are in, as we take every breath, as we struggle with every sin, as we pray in desperation those prayers our hearts wonder will be heard, and be responded to by God with action.

If we really contemplate this, do we welcome it, or do we shy from it.

CS Lewis once described Jesus, using the picture of Aslan the lion, and stated that Aslan isn’t a tame lion, that Jesus isn’t a tame God.  I think that is the nature of the Holy Spirit as well, the wind isn’t tamed, it can’t be.  He is in control, and if we have any sense, that should begin to scare us, for we know the Spirit’s goal, it’s mission – to cleanse us as Ezekiel prophesied and rid us of our sin-hardened hearts.

But do we want that, more than one day a year?  Are we willing to hear God, do we want to know His presence continually?  Are we willing to listen to His voice, to those He calls around us? Are we willing to let Him cleanse us?   Are we ready for that?  Are we ready for the Holy Spirit to ready our  Heart, our spirit, our mind, and our strength to be separated from all that would hold us back from walking with God?

Or would we rather look at theology, or politics, or morality, or anything other that what God will do in our lives?  Will we welcome His fire purifying us?  Will we welcome Him removing the dross from our lives?

A hard question…

May we be willing to trust in His mercy, even as He does it!

(1)Escriva, Josemaria (2010-11-02). The Way (Kindle Locations 299-301). Scepter Publishers. Kindle Edition.