Pentecost | The Holy Spirit Breathes Within Us - So Close! | Message from Fr Steve Fletcher MGL

A popular image of Pentecost is the Holy Spirit coming upon the disciples as tongues of fire or a dove. But that is only a visible representation of a much deeper interior reality. There is also the breathing of the Spirit by Jesus into the disciples in St John’s gospel. The Spirit is described as the irresistible closeness of God who prays within us when we cannot pray, transforming our heart’s sighs and groans into His prayer. 

While the world craves intimacy and connection, there is a deep fear and lack of trust that wants total control of relationships. This spills over into a fear of opening to God who is the source of all loving intimacy. Hence the insatiable desire for more pleasure, comfort, certainty, security, wealth, relationships and so on. There is an inability to restore broken relationships which is characterised by avoidance, distance, fear and rejection.

We often prefer a God who is far off and not intimately involved in our lives. The Holy Spirit is the one person who knows us more intimately than anyone else. The Spirit has been poured into our hearts in Baptism and remains with us. The Holy Spirit knows us better then we know ourselves. We are temples of the Holy Spirit. We are in an intimate relationship with the Spirit who animates and divinises all creation. The Spirit unites us to God as children of God. We have an eternal identity as a child of God. The Spirit expresses an intimacy with God that is so personal we can call God ‘Abba’ - there is a familiarity and warmth in this name which transcends all other relationships.

The love of God expressed by the Holy Spirit dispels all fear and opens us to an experience of freedom, joy, peace and connection with all creation beyond anything we have previously known.

Call on the Holy Spirit, speak to the Spirit, bow down to the Holy Spirit and you will encounter the risen Lord Jesus Christ everywhere and in all circumstances.

Your identity as a child of God is assured. Now live out of that identity.