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Years before I was ordained, I was serving for my mentor at St. Peter’s Cathedral in Helena, MT where I had the good fortune to meet a very strong young evangelist. You see, the vast majority of our junior high youth group members at St. Peter’s were there thanks to the efforts of one person named Ben. Ben would go out and convince his friends to join us each week. And at least two of those friends became longtime members of the group, beyond even my time with them there.
Ben was really fortunate to have a family steeped in Faith. All of them participated in the work of the church. His brothers were involved up to the Diocesan level with church projects. His parents were some of the most helpful and wise people I have meet. Faith was important to Ben’s family, meaning his life was steeped in God’s presence.
I believe too that Ben’s attempts, successful ones I should add, were to give his friends the very thing he had: God’s abiding presence in life. I think he wanted them to have this gift too, and in many ways I saw this become a reality, especially as some of his friends even got prepared for Baptism.
That gift of God’s constant presence is what this Day of Pentecost is really about. We receive that gift through the Holy Spirit.
In fact, Jesus tells the Disciples in our reading from John today that if He stays, then the Spirit of Truth won’t be able to come. That Spirit of Truth, as we learned at Maundy Thursday, is also called the Paraclete or “Advocate” as it is translated for us today. This word has also been translated as “Comforter”.
The power of the Spirit, as Jesus tells us, is that the Spirit leads us and guides us. Paul adds to this in Romans by saying the Spirit helps us in our weakness. Both Jesus and Paul remind us that the Spirit intercedes in our prayers for us too.
The Spirit does this because the Spirit isn’t just a thing we come to possess inside us. The Spirit isn’t just an amorphous “It” within ourselves. The Spirit is a Person of the Trinity, God in the fullness of God’s Self. When we listen to the Spirit, and when we speak to the Spirit too, we are talking directly with the Lord.
This is the gift Jesus wants to give us. In essence, Jesus, by Ascending into Heaven, is giving us the opportunity to be with Him always through the gift of the Spirit in our lives.
This gift is not limited to just a few. As we see in Acts, this is a gift that God intends to share with all of us. People from all over the world are witnessing the effect of the Spirit on the Apostles. In this same chapter, after our reading from Acts today, the people around Peter ask what they are to do. Peter tells them to repent and get baptized so that they too can receive the Holy Spirit. And it is so.
For this reason, the Day of Pentecost is one of the most appropriate days for a Baptism in the church year, and it is set aside specifically for that purpose. It is through Baptism that we receive the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of God to dwell in our hearts, souls, and minds.
It is all the more appropriate that we have our young candidate to be baptized today. We do so for this child at this young age so that this infant will never know a time when God hasn’t been present in life. Very shortly, all of us will take on the promise to help make it so, to help ensure that this child always knows and feels God’s presence.
For those of us like Ben in Montana and Peter all those years ago in Jerusalem, we know the power the gift of God’s presence has. We want to do everything in our power to make sure all others get to experience that presence too.
This is the work we as the church are called to do, not only on this Day of Pentecost, but throughout our lives in Faith. As you leave here today remember that. Help your fellow know God more deeply. Help all you can find to know the gift and power of God’s abiding presence in our lives through the Holy Spirit that dwells within us.