Pentecost Sunday, 2010

John 14:15-26

‘If you love me, you will keep my commandments. And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Advocate to be with you forever.

‘Those who love me will keep my word, and my Father will love them, and we will come to them and make our home with them. Whoever does not love me does not keep my words; and the word that you hear is not mine, but is from the Father who sent me.

‘I have said these things to you while I am still with you. But the Advocate, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you everything, and remind you of all that I have said to you.

Quick review: The new covenant between God and his people is a relationship of agreement. This means there is agreement on both sides. Just as in marriage there is an agreement of intent and responsibility between two people, in our relationship with the Father, there is not only commitment on our side but there is also commitment on his side. 

As God's people, we tend to forget that. We forget that this is a two-sided relationship and that the Father never meant it to be any other way. He always wanted relationship – a two-way commitment between himself and each of us.

God desiring a relationship with a human is somewhat like one of us deciding that we want a relationship with a dog. The dog could be quite willing to have a relationship in its own eager way but real communication and understanding is going to be a problem. Even if a puppy learns in a very limited way the things it should or should not do in order to please us, learns to obey our commands and even learns to read some of our facial expressions etc. the degree of relationship is going to be restricted by the dog’s natural incapacity to feel, think, envision, plan and respond the way we do. The relationship between a dog and its master or mistress is not a bad relationship but it’s not a full one.

What God wanted and wants with us is a full relationship. In order to make that possible he sent Jesus, who came to save us, give us free access to his Father and give us a true vision of who the Father really is. Through Jesus, we were given a picture of the Father. “The Father and I are one,” said Jesus. “If you’ve seen me, you have seen the Father.” But God knew that we would need more than that in order to enter into a full and developing relationship with him. He knew we would need continued supernatural help in order to be able to share in his heart and participate in his ways. So, he sent the Holy Spirit.

The point of this reflection is not that God sent the Holy Spirit to help us or that without the Holy Spirit we would be incapable of having a relationship with God; all that is true but the point of this reflection is that having sent the Holy Spirit, God's deep desire is to enter into a Covenant Relationship with each one of us, a relationship of two way commitment. He has pledged himself to each one of us and communicates this commitment through his Holy Spirit. This means he has, in truth, committed himself to certain actions and responsibilities within the covenant. He didn’t have to do that. He didn’t need to do that. He desired to do that. He desired relationship and if there is anyone who really understands how relationship must work, it’s God.

 He could have just demanded that we follow and obey like dogs. He would have been completely within his rights as our creator and Lord of the universe to just be a master dictator who gives orders and punishes the rebel and that’s that. But, no. He wants to have a love communion with us and he wants us to know, love and trust him in the same way his Son knew him, loved him and trusted him.The Holy Spirit is vital to the Covenant relationship between God and each one of his people.

‘Suscipe’ (pronounced sus chee pay) is a Latin word that means ‘receive’. It is also the name of a prayer attributed to St. Ignatius with which you may be familiar. It goes:

“Take, Lord, receive, all my liberty, my memory, my understanding and my entire will. All I have and possess, you have given to me; now, Lord, I return it. Everything is yours; dispose of it wholly according to your will. Give me only your love and your grace. That is enough for me.”

This prayer has also been called the Radical Prayer and, truly, it can be a little scary to pray that prayer and mean it. I first heard this prayer as a song and it immediately captivated me. That was the Holy Spirit in action. He comes and opens doors into the heart of God. Any desire I felt to be able to pray that prayer - and mean it - had its source in the desire God has to have a relationship with me. I was experiencing God’s desire and was being allowed to participate in it. Still, I hesitated. It was such a demanding prayer, such a prayer of total commitment and abandonment. This was a serious prayer! The Spirit put this question to me: "Can anyone be a committed Christian, and not pray this prayer??" 

 As I was reading over the prayer, longing to have that depth of courage and commitment to wholeheartedly pray it, the Holy Spirit moved again. The last two sentences jumped out as if they had suddenly been bolded. “Give me only your love and your grace. That is enough for me.”

I immediately understood that, yes, God was asking for my commitment to relationship but also that he had a huge part he was committed to in this relationship. He was committed to providing me with Love and Grace. The Holy Spirit communicated to me the reality and truth of what it means to be in a relationship with God. The Holy Spirit was the bridge between small insignificant me and God, the Incomprehensible, God, the Almighty. The Holy Spirit opened me up to the truth that God’s love and grace was indeed enough for me.

On my own, I could not have come to that revelation because in the natural none of us have anything on which to base our understanding of a relationship where we are given all that we need to exist as full human beings. In natural relationships, if we depend on another to give us everything we need we will always be totally disappointed, let down, betrayed and left with inadequate resources. And in the same way, if anyone depended on any one of us to be everything they needed we would totally disappoint, let down, betray and give inadequately to them. So, the impact of God committing his all in all to us is beyond our capacity to comprehend. We desperately need the Holy Spirit to bring us knowledge, insight and understanding of all that is unknowable, unseen and incomprehensible.

It is a wonderful thing when we commit ourselves to the Lord. We actually couldn’t do that without the power of the Spirit or without his opening our spirits to want to be connected with God. He is the one who stirs our hearts, blows gently on the dieing coals and creates new fires within. He is the cause and we are the effect. We can only reflect the desire God has for us. However, we can forget to ponder on the fact that as we are moved by the Holy Spirit to a relationship of commitment to the Lord, we can also depend on the fact that God has made a commitment to us. We can call on the Advocate to remind us of who God is and all that he committed to us: his Love, his Grace, his Son, his very Word.

We are human, limited and forgetful; we need to ask the Holy Spirit to open us up to and remind us of the loving power of a Father who is utterly committed to us so that we can pray wholeheartedly without doubt or fear, “Give me only your love and your grace, then I am rich enough and need ask for nothing more.”