Friar’s Corner: Power of God, the Holy Spirit
Acts 2:1-11; Psalm 104:1, 24, 29-31, 34; 1 Corinthians 12:3b-13; John 20:19-23
Are you ready for a new Pentecostal Fire? Last week I shared with you the major work of God, the Holy Spirit, that Jesus told His closest followers about at the Last Supper. At the Ascension forty days after His Resurrection, Jesus commanded them to remain in the city until they would receive POWER from on high. Some of the Charismatic Catholics and other Pentecostals across the world have been praying these 9 days for a greater outpouring of that same Holy Spirit. God knows we need Him.
When we look at those definitions Jesus gave us about the Holy Spirit at the Last Supper, and we have been prayed with for a Baptism of the Holy Spirit, we get a sense of how HE is moving across the world. 1) He is the third person of the Holy Trinity, 2) He teaches us God’s Truth which is God’s plan for us and the world. 3) He Instructs and Reminds us of all that Jesus Christ told us. 4) He witnesses these things to the world. 5) He points out the evils of the world. 6) He Guides us and Announces the future.
The Church Liturgists, many who are not baptized in the Holy Spirit, still don’t understand a greater picture of who the Holy Spirit is and what He teaches us about some of God’s many gifts that empower us to bring God’s Good News to others. We receive many of those gifts at the Sacrament of Confirmation, which I shall spend the next several Sundays speaking about. Today, next to changing bread and wine into the Body of Christ, we have what I believe is the greatest prayer to the Holy Spirit. It expresses most of His other works. It was written some 800 years ago by a French seminarian, priest, professor, Bishop and then sent to England to be the Archbishop of Canterbury. This lovely sequence in good clear English is easy to memorize in its awesome poetry.
PENTECOST SUNDAY SEQUENCE
Come, Holy Spirit come!
And from your clear celestial home,
Shed a ray of light divine!
Come, Father of the poor!
Come, source of all our store!
Come, within our being shine!
You, of comforters the best;
You, our soul’s most welcome quest;
Sweet refreshment here below.
Shining Dove by Sergil Denysov (Dollarphotoclub.com}
In our labor, rest most sweet;
Grateful coolness in the heat;
Solace in the midst of woe.
O most blessed Light Divine,
Shine with these hearts of thine,
And our inmost being fill!
Where you are not, we have naught,
Nothing good in deed or thought,
Nothing free from taint of ill.
Heal our wounds our strength renew;
On our dryness pour your dew;
Wash the stains of guilt away.
Bend the stubborn heart and will;
Melt the frozen, warm the chill;
Guide the steps that go astray.
On the faithful, who adore
And confess you, evermore
In your many gifts descend.
Give us virtue’s sure reward;
Give us your salvation, Lord;
Give us joys that never end.
Amen. Alleluia.
By Stephen Langton, 1150-1228 A.D.,
Archbishop of Canterbury, England.
The Holy Spirit first came to live in us when we were baptized and brought us 10 gifts. He gives us many other gifts of divine power at Confirmation. The Sequence points out that the Holy Spirit “turns on the lights of understanding and knowledge” that we received at baptism. As He comes, four stanzas speak about the “divine light.” It makes us “glow” with the love of God as we go out into the world to be the hands of Jesus helping others. We are poor and He enriches our poverty. He is our best guest, comforter and sweet refreshment. He brings us rest, coolness and solace in the midst of our work. The fifth stanza asks Him to fill us up more so we “shine brighter.” We can’t do any productive work without the Holy Spirit.
The last four stanzas have the Holy Spirit healing our wounds and renewing our strength. He refreshes our dryness and takes away our guilt. He “bends the stubborn heart and will; melts the frozen and warms the chill; and guides the steps that go astray.” As we are faithful, adore and confess the Holy Spirit, He gives us more gifts to help others. As we cooperate in allowing these divine powers to work in and through us, we are promised a heavenly reward that will never end. Amen, Alleluia! Do you want more? Ask Him for more.
Something amazing
As we really pray this Sequence, not just read it, something amazing begins to increase in us. Jesus’ Light grows in intensity in us. We enter more deeply into the fountain of “living water,” Jesus promised to the women at the well in St. John 4:10: Jesus replied to the women and to us: “If you recognized God’s gift, and who it is that is asking you for a drink, you would have asked Him instead, and He would have given you Living Water….the water I give shall become a fountain within the person leaping up to provide eternal life,” John 4:14. See also Ezekiel 47, Isaiah 55:1ff and Psalm 1. Aren’t these wonderful promises and blessings? Let us praise and thank God for all He has already given us. Scripture says, “Ask and you will receive; seek and you shall find.”
Have a blessed and powerful Pentecost. Let us want more of God’s Pentecostal fire. As Catholics, we were the first Pentecostals. We go back to the Upper Room and we have not split off from His church. Father, let the Fire fall; let the fire fall. I am proud to be a Pentecostal priest. Now go spread His fire! Alleluia!
(© 2020 Father Bob Hilz, TOR)
