The Pentecost Principle



 

If there is anything that exemplifies my experience with God over the course of the past 4 years, it is the principle of Pentecost.

 

Radically life giving, life changing, and empowering work of the Spirit of God.

 

When I began this blog in 2010 I was involved in a relationship that I thought was "the relationship" for me.  The lifelong love I had always desired but had always eluded me. Turns out I was involved in a relationship that proved to be unhealthy and deeply dishonest.  It took me the better part of a year to get over it...and more time after that for my heart to be renewed and my joy to return in full force.  During those same weeks and months, my precious and godly Mom was dying.

 

I remember in the weeks after her death that I felt deep grief mixed with an indescribable sense of renewal. It was confusing.  What was it about her death that could possibly cause me to feel spiritually renewed?  The answer is...

 

I don't know. I really don't know.

 

But, I know who I have believed in, and that He is able to complete the work of spiritual growth and perfection that He began in me as a pre-adolescent girl in the 70's. 

 

Before my Mom's death, I thought I had found happiness.  Then I lost happiness.  After her death, when I allowed myself to grieve and question everything I had ever known and believed, I found joy.  Real joy.  Not the joy that comes and goes with the changing of our circumstances, but deep and abiding joy.  It does come from within...truly it does.  So if you are looking for joy anywhere from the outside, please hear this word...the search is never ending, and in our own human frailty, it is almost always heartbreaking.

 

When Jesus came on the scene, the members of His Jewish community who believed He was Messiah were happy - incredibly so! They knew that Messiah had been promised to come and save His people. To deliver them.  I believe Jesus did bring happiness to those first followers...He brought a fresh perspective on knowing God, He brought physical healing to many, and deliverance to many others.  But in the end, this happiness was temporary, because Jesus died.  Just like all the men and women who followed Him, believed in Him, placed all their hopes and dreams for salvation from the oppression of men...Jesus died.   He was beaten beyond recognition, forced to carry the tool that would kill Him through the city streets. He was humiliated in every way we can think to humiliate a person, hung up on a cross in front of everyone, and He died.

 

Where then was the happiness His followers had known? The hope for victory and freedom and power?  Dashed.  Devastated.

 

Somewhere in the death, if you will allow me to draw the comparison, as I found somewhere in the grieving of my own Mom's death...there was a seed of renewal.  A promise of joy and new power.

 

I read this morning in the book of Acts (one of the books of the New Testament). When Jesus was resurrected, He came to see His friends (of course!).  The Bible reports that Jesus appeared to more than 400 people on various occasions,  but when He was last seen by His closest followers, He said this:

 

"Do not leave Jerusalem, but wait for the gift my Father promised, which you have heard me speak about. For John (the Baptist) baptized with water, but in a few days you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit."

 

Jesus' friends and followers immediately starting asking Him questions about whether He was going to deliver everyone now...to restore the kingdom to the Jewish people.  You know, they were still focused on all the temporary and earthly aspects of what Jesus could do, and I think that's what we still tend to focus on today.

 

But Jesus didn't want to talk about restoring political power to the Jewish people. That wasn't His focus at all.  Here's what He said;

 

" It is not for you to know the times or dates the Father has set by His own authority."  Period. End of discussion on earthly deliverance and political restoration.  But I also noticed this today...Jesus, by His response, absolutely affirmed that God WILL restore the kingdom to Israel and to His chosen Jewish people. It's just not our business to know WHEN or HOW the Father will accomplish the fulfillment of that particular promise.

 

And Jesus' final words to His friends before He ascended to heaven and took His place at the right hand of God?

 

"But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth."

 

And what is the power that sustains us? Gives us power to confront and overcome pain, loss and grief?  What is the source of joy that is abiding, untouched by loss and disappointment?  The Holy Spirit.  The very presence of God, promised to all believers of Jesus and sent forth by the Father Himself...to somehow dwell within us.  How does that work?  I don't know.  I really don't know.

 

But it does. I know it does.  Even 40 years after I first understood the Gospel of Jesus and entrusted my life to Him, I am still learning, still being radically transformed by His presence in me.  And there is such joy. An embarrassment of riches that makes my vision of happiness in 2010 pale by comparison.  God has outdone Himself, from my perspective, over these past 48 months.  Directed my steps in ways far beyond my imagining.  Orchestrated the thousands of ups and downs, and the successes and failures that have brought me to the place I stand today.  And along the way, the seed of renewal has grown and bloomed into a veritable tree of joy.  As the fruit of joy spills itself into every area of my life, I pray I will never lose sight of the fact that this joy - God's joy - truly does come from within, welling up from my spirit like a spring of living water.