Is every gift that is given received? I remember reading a story somewhere about a son who wanted a car for his graduation. Instead, his father gave him a Bible. Disappointed and angry, the son threw the Bible down—unopened. He didn’t receive the gift he was given. His father never told him, nor did he discover on his own, that the keys to the car he wanted were between pages of the Bible. Since the son did not receive the gift he was given, he didn’t receive the gift he wanted.
I begin with that story because it has only been in the last few years that I have intentionally opened the gift of the Holy Spirit in my life. I was first given the gift of the Holy Spirit at Baptism. As a child of 12 in a Protestant Church, I knew I was baptized in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, that I received salvation and became a child of God, but I did not know that I now had God living in me. I did not know I had the gift of the Holy Spirit—with its accompaniment of many, many gifts to make living as a child of God fruitful, loving, and joyful.
Some years later, as I became Catholic and studied the Faith, I learned that through both Baptism and Confirmation I received the Holy Spirit with its gifts and fruits and that the Holy Spirit is strengthened in me any time I am disposed to receive a Sacrament and receive it. (Disposed to receive a Sacrament means, essentially, that I meet the requirements to receive that Sacrament and receive it with an understanding of the gift from God the Sacrament is.)
Pentecost
Pentecost is the third highest celebration in the church year. Christmas is the celebration of the Father’s gift of the Son. Easter is the celebration of the victory of the Son’s gift back to the Father and outward to us. Pentecost is the celebration of the Love of the Father and the Son to each other and to us, so that they (Father and Son) come to live in us through the Holy Spirit.
In a very real way, the end and purpose of Christmas and Easter is Pentecost. And the end and purpose of Pentecost is making God’s Presence real and practical in the world through us.
Some Interesting History of Pentecost
Our celebration of Pentecost this year comes right after the Jewish celebration of Shavuot—what the disciples were celebrating when the wind and tongues of fire came down on them—Pentecost within the Jewish faith. In Bible times, Shavuot was a feast of first fruits. When an Israelite first saw a sprig of barley, wheat, grapes, figs, pomegranates, olives, or dates emerge from the ground, they were to tie a string on it to mark it as “first fruits” to be given to God at Shavuot, 50 days after Passover. These first fruits were brought from across the country to Jerusalem. It was a remembering of their successful entering into the Promised Land at the end of the Exodus. In Bible times, this was a popular and joyful celebration. All the men were to come to Jerusalem for its celebration. They brought their first fruits in decorated baskets to celebrate the goodness of God’s harvest of plenty of food.
In later years, after the destruction of the Temple in 70 CE, the focus of Shavuot shifted to a celebration of appreciation for the Torah—which was given 50 days after the original Passover—very soon after the Hebrews left Egypt. That focus remains today.
This information I find fascinating—it seems to me to make our Christian celebration of Pentecost have a deeper meaning: the first Christian Pentecost was, in many ways, the first fruits of the new Passover of Christ’s Passion and entry into the expanded Promised Land of all the world open to the Good News of Salvation for all.
Wow! Gives me goosebumps. Sets me on fire with desire to hit the streets (or internet!) with God’s Gift of the Holy Spirit alive in me.
Acts 2:1-11
Today we hear the beginning of the Pentecost story. The disciples were together praying (as Jesus had told them to do as he ascended). There was a mighty wind and “tongues as of fire” came down on the disciples’ heads and propelled them OUT of their locked room.
They went out into the streets to preach. We’ve heard selections from Peter’s Pentecost homily several times through the Easter season. And what happened? FIRST FRUITS. “And 3000 were added to their number that day.”
As I read all the way through the account of the first Christian Pentecost, I see these first fruits converts to Christianity received a baptism of the Holy Spirit when they received baptism of repentance. Baptism of the Holy Spirit? Yes.
Baptism with the Holy Spirit
I Corinthians 12:3b-7, 12-13 and John 20:19-23
Baptism of the Holy Spirit means the Holy Spirit comes vibrant, alive, and sends a Christian forth. Even though we are given the Holy Spirit in Baptism and Confirmation, it is common to leave the full gift of unopened—as was true for me. It seems to have been true for the disciples on Easter Sunday night. The Gospel today says they received the Holy Spirit on Easter Sunday night. Jesus himself “breathed on them and said to them, ‘Receive the Holy Spirit.’” At that time, he also said to them, “Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, so I send you.”
Did they go? No. They stayed in the upper room behind locked doors. They went fishing back on the Sea of Galilee. They encountered Jesus multiple times. They worshiped him—“but they doubted,” as we heard last week.
It took the descent of the Holy Spirit in a powerful way on Pentecost for them to get up and go, to take to the streets, and from the streets of Jerusalem, to spread the Gospel across the world.
This stirring of the Holy Spirit is often a topic and goal of the Charismatic Movement in the Church today. I think it is often misunderstood. The reading from I Corinthians today helps clarify it. “To each individual the manifestation of the Spirit is given for some benefit.” We each have gifts of the Holy Spirit. They include Fear of the Lord, Piety, Courage, Understanding, Counsel, Knowledge, and Wisdom, These are gifts for us all, so that we may live active, vibrant lives of Faith, Hope, and Love in harmony together. As we use these gifts to live, we bear the Fruits of the Spirit: Love, Joy, Peace, Patience, Goodness, Kindness, Gentleness, Faithfulness, and Self-Control. AND we create Unity.
There are also particular Gifts given to EACH and EVERY Christian that fit their personality and place in home and community. These are called charisms. My charism is Knowledge. Knowledge plays out in me through writing, teaching, and empathic listening. Charisms are given to put us to work, to claim the world for God. Charisms tie into our everyday lives and our vocations to marriage, ordination, consecration, or single life.
Charisms can also mean special manifestations of the Spirit; praying in tongues, healing, and prophecy are common manifestations today. Those special manifestations come to those who are disposed to receive them by repentance, learning, and prayer—probably available to you through both local Charismatic groups and other renewal efforts, such as ACTS or Cursillo weekends or Life in the Spirit seminars.
Receive the Spirit
So, all of us who are baptized have been given the Holy Spirit! Have we opened the gift? Have we found the keys to a joyful, vibrant Christian life in the gift of Church, Sacrament, and Bible? Have we RECEIVED the gift?
A priest I know who has taught me much about the Holy Spirit uses an analogy of a glass of milk and chocolate syrup. If you put chocolate syrup in a glass of milk, it’s there, but you don’t see it or taste it—until you stir it up.
Application today: Stir up your glass of milk, the Gift of the Holy Spirit God gave you at Baptism, fortified in you at Confirmation, feeds in you with every Eucharist and Confession. Stir it up—then let it stir you.
Prayer:
Come Holy Spirit! Come and fill me! Come and use me! Come and lead me wherever you would have me go to do whatever you would have me do. Give the grace to do whatever I need to do to fully open the Spirit in me. Lead me, guide me, Lord.
