Pentecost Revisited

 

Pentecost Sunday

Acts 2:1-11; Psalm 104; 1 Corinthians 12:3-7, 12-13; John 20:19-23

… The time for Pentecost was fulfilled…
Acts 2:1

We need another Pentecost!  I don’t mean a rigid re-enactment of the original.  That certainly won’t happen.  But what happened in time to inaugurate the Church must be repeated in the heart and soul of every believer in Jesus Christ.  We must be filled with the Spirit and it must thrust us forth to boldly bear witness to the death and resurrection of Christ.  We need another Pentecost, but I’m not sure we want one.

Pentecost revisited in our own souls and in our own times means the upsetting of everything that we would call “normal”.  The Spirit-filled soul has no taste or tolerance for the passing pleasures of this present world.  All such pastimes are replaced with an increasing, burning desire to be more with Him.  The Church cannot compete with the world when it comes to entertainment.  But the world can never satisfy the soul like the Spirit does.  The world needs amusement because it is sin sick and Spirit deprived.  Not so the soul who has discovered the power of a personal Pentecost! 

Pentecost revisited means purity.  God will not dwell in a messy house.  If we desire the manifest presence of God in our own souls then it’s time to clean house.  Sin must go.  And along with it, everything that leads us to sin.  Here we must be radical.  “If your eye offends you pluck it out.  If your hand offends you cut it off.”  These were no idle words of our Lord.  He certainly does not mean them literally, but their spiritual application must be equally as violent.  There can be no sparing here.  The moment you determine that all sin must go it will begin to appeal to your sentiment.  “Remember all the good times we had!”  Satan will not be easily plundered.  The process will likely be agonizing, but the reward is worth it. 

Pentecost revisited will turn the world around us upside-down.  It will likely mean the loss of friendships; perhaps even of family relations.  Like our Lord, we will find ourselves despised and rejected of men.  What a privilege!  Read the lives of the saints.  Such was routinely their experience.  But we read their biographies because they transformed their world rather than being conformed to it.

Pentecost revisited will mean persecutions.  “All who desire to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted,” [2 Tim. 3:12].  So said St. Paul.  Why do we think he was either in error or we will be the exception?  If the world does not oppose us it is a certain sign it is because it views us as a friend rather than an enemy or a threat.  Remember the words of the demons confronted by the seven sons of Sceva?  “Jesus I know, and Paul I know…,” [Acts 19:15].  The Spirit-filled soul poses such a threat to the kingdom of darkness that he is on the Devil’s most wanted list. 

Pentecost revisited means power.  While all these things are true and it may not sound like something desirable, we must see the end the Lord has in mind.  Peter, freshly fired by the Holy Spirit boldly preaches only days after he was cowering in fear.  Three thousand souls were baptized as a result.  They were struck to the heart and cried out, “What shall we do?”  Thus, the power of Pentecost.  Later Peter and John, going to the Temple to pray, cure a man lame from birth.  To read the rest of the Acts of the Apostles is to be treated to a smorgasbord of the power of God: the sick are healed, the dead are recalled to life, and the demoniacs are delivered.  Can you for a moment imagine that there would be any “business as usual” after such demonstrations?

Pentecost revisited means sanctity and divine intimacy.  This is the goal.  This is the purpose for which we were created; to have the deepest intimacy with God; to be immersed in the communion of love shared by the Blessed Trinity. 

So ask yourself this day, “What’s holding me back?”  What will keep you from this treasure which has been promised by the Father, purchased by the Son, and pledged by the Holy Spirit?  This is your birthright dear Christian.  Will you be robbed like Esau was robbed by scheming Jacob?

The key to experiencing our own personal Pentecost is twofold.  First, we must divorce ourselves from love of this world.  Then we must reach out to God with the deepest faith and love.  God, who is infinitely loving and merciful yearns for all His children to enter into this blessed experience.  Pentecost is not intended to be a historical memorial, but rather a perpetual reality.

We read today that the time for Pentecost was fulfilled.  There’s no more waiting.  God is most pleased to give us this same fullness of the Holy Spirit.  The way forward for us is the same as it was for them- through protracted prayer.  That is, to pray until we know that it has happened.  When we see that our life is being transformed and a “new normal” dawns, then we know we are indeed experiencing our own Pentecost.

Those first disciples waited ten days.  From the time of our Lord’s Ascension when they were instructed to wait in Jerusalem they waited.  They didn’t know for how long they would wait.  But they were faithful and stayed the course.  How long will it be until we enter upon our own Pentecost?  We don’t know.  But we can be sure the Lord will not be short on His promise.  If we wait upon Him in prayer we will certainly be endued with power. 

We need another Pentecost.  But do we want one?  The time is now.  The Church and the world are waiting.  Open your heart and let Pentecost be fulfilled in you today!