Acts 2:1-11; Ps. 104:1, 24, 29-30, 31, 34; 1 Cor. 12:3b-7,12-13; Jn. 20:19-23
“Jesus is Lord” is spoken by the believer as a confirmation of faith through the Holy Spirit with the grace to be proclaimed to the world. Those possessed by evil cannot make this claim for it is an anathema to Satan. “Jesus is Lord” is a proclamation of the Trinity as three persons in one God from the Father, through the Son, in the Holy Spirit. Just as we are to pray “In the name of Jesus” we are to proclaim “Jesus is Lord” as children of the highest God creator of all, there is no other.
Before Easter we enter into the time of Lent for forty days to fulfill the sacrifice that brings us Jesus our Lord through his passion, death, and resurrection. Now is the time to fulfill the coming of Pentecost through the nine days after Jesus ascension and fifty days after Easter. It is the coming of the Holy Spirit to give birth to the Church who is to forgive and retain sins. The Church through the Holy Spirit works to discern the moral, ethical, and spiritual practices of the people of God as both an institution and through the body of Jesus our Lord. Jesus is Lord of his bride the church and all who come to receive him in the Eucharist as one body in one Spirit though many parts. It is the same Spirit.
We see in the first reading the gift of the Holy Spirit as “tongues as of fire” coming to rest on now the apostles giving them the power to speak in different languages to all gathered in Jerusalem from the ends of the “world”. This Spirit comes to us with “different kinds of spiritual gifts but the same Spirit…for some benefit.” What is our gift and are we in service of our gift “for some benefit” of God’s greater good? It is a treasure to do the labor of love.
We are to reflect on the “benefit” coming from our gifts. Who benefits? Is our life lived for simply our benefit, our treasure, our glory or are we serving someone greater than ourselves? That is the question where the answer will bring us to salvation where the only true answer is “Jesus is Lord” of my life. If Jesus is Lord of my life then we offer up ourselves as a sacrifice for the benefit God wants to deliver through us in all our encounters this day. It is in the encounter where the Lord makes his presence known beginning with the encounter in Mass and as we go forth to encounter the world.
In a world of sin, we need the fire of the Holy Spirit to raise us up with the gifts of fortitude, justice, prudence, and temperance known as the Cardinal Virtues to go into battle as the militant church on earth. After Jesus “breathes” on the disciples and ascends into heaven, they pray their “novena” that is their nine days in wait for the coming of the Holy Spirit to bring them the confirmation of their call to go forth as Apostles and proclaim the good news.
In the Charismatic movement the gift of tongues is a spiritual gift of loving God with all our hearts, minds, and souls in worship often described as “slain in the spirit”. It is the joy and fire coming to the poor in spirit who die to self to be raised in Jesus our Lord. The poor in spirit are predisposed to receive the gift by virtue of their humility. Humility is the gateway to all the spiritual gifts. Just as Jesus is the cornerstone of salvation through the church the Holy Spirit is the cornerstone of the spiritual gifts through humility in dying to self that Jesus may rise in us.
In the gospel Jesus appears to the disciples after the resurrection and breathes on them giving them the authority to forgive or retain sins through the gift of the Holy Spirit. It is a ministerial gift set aside for the church priesthood. It is not the gift of tongues but the same Spirit belonging to the one body of Christ. In our confirmation within the Church the spirit comes to us giving us the gift that will serve God for some benefit. Do we recognize our gift given to us for the benefit of a greater good? Let the fruit of our gifts be multiplied by each act of service coming from the gifts.
We are to discern the gifts of the Holy Spirit that lights our fire our joy and brings us peace. It is our calling and we are not to set it aside or we will wander in the desert in search of the promise land already waiting for us. Let us stay in the Spirit with Jesus our Lord and neither wonder nor wander but move in the Spirit for the benefit of our salvation and of the whole world. “Peace be with you…and with your Spirit” who comes to us this day announcing “Jesus is Lord”. The time has come, now is the time to enter into the Spirit and take up our gift to Jesus our Lord.
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