Pentecost Sunday Leftovers

Sunday we celebrated the birthday of the Christian Church, a day we call Pentecost. Some two millennia ago and just seven weeks after Christ's resurrection, the New Covenant began with God ''pouring'' Himself out on a group of 120 Christ-followers. The book of Acts, which is a cursory overview of the church's first thirty years, begins with this story and continues the refrain of God powerfully moving in the lives of countless people from Jerusalem to Rome.

Before the monumental day of the Church's birth, the biblical story seems to indicate that God was not as universally accessible to the human family as He became post Pentecost. We could spend a lot of time and space speculating why this was the case, and, frankly, that's not an unprofitable conversation. For this e-reflection, though, I am satisfied to focus on the reality as we now enjoy it; the good news that every man, woman, boy and girl has the capacity to directly experience God.

By ''experience God'' I mean, we directly communicate with, are empowered by and sense the nearness of the Creator of all things. In other words, our relationship with the Divine is an intimate one, marked by mutual concern, listening and direction. This reality of God's nearness is what the New Testament text refers to variously as the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of God, the Spirit of Christ or simply the Spirit. All of these monikers employ the idea of spirit which in the ancient world simply meant the deepest essence of a person. To encounter the Holy Spirit is to encounter God unmitigated by any mediation.

Jesus did not say God has a spirit rather God is a Spirit (John 4:24). In other words there are no secondary or superficial parts of God. Later, the Apostle Paul said that the Spirit of God communicates directly with our spirit (Romans 8:16). All of this is simply another way of describing the Edenic relationship when God met with Adam and Eve in the cool of the day. That closeness has always been God's desire and is a reality we simply need to recognize and enjoy.

May you be filled with, baptized in, and fallen upon by the Holy Spirit even today. If that sounds too ethereal, then may you sense the nearness of God in your life right now and always.