Monday, Seventh Week of Easter

I am often struck by the response of disciples in Ephesus to Paul’s question, ‘Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you became believers?’ They answered, ‘No, we were never even told there was such a thing as a Holy Spirit?’ It was a very honest acknowledgement of ignorance. The first step to coming to know is often the acknowledgement that we don’t know. We are approaching the feast of Pentecost, the feast of the Holy Spirit. Perhaps there is a sense in which we all have a lot to learn about the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit was spoken of in the past as the forgotten person of the Blessed Trinity. We can picture God the Creator and Jesus his Son more easily than the Holy Spirit. We find images of the Holy Spirit in the Scriptures, such as the dove, fire, the wind, and, yet, we sense that they all fall very far short of the reality. The Holy Spirit is the life presence of God the Father and the risen Lord. It is through the Holy Spirit that the Father and the Son make their home within us and among us. When the Holy Spirit is alive in us, it shows itself in a way of life that reflects the life of God, the life of Jesus, a life of self-giving love. Saint Paul speaks about the fruit of the Spirit. Just as a healthy tree bears good fruit, so a spiritually healthy person, who is alive with the Holy Spirit, will bear the good fruit of the Spirit, what Paul calls ‘love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, generosity and self-control’. When Jesus says to his disciples in today’s gospel reading, ‘I have told you all this so that you may find peace in me’, he is referring to the fruit of the Spirit. He is promising to pour out the Holy Spirit into the lives of his disciples, all of us, the Spirit of God’s love, of his own love, and this experience of being unconditionally loved will bring peace, even when, as Jesus says in the gospel reading, the world will bring us trouble of various kinds. As we approach the feast of Pentecost, we pray for a fresh growth of the fruit of the Spirit in our lives so that we can experience the Lord’s own peace and be peacemakers in our conflicted world.

Tuesday, Seventh Week of Easter

We would all like to know what eternal life will be like. We can certainly never answer that question fully. As Saint Paul says, ‘eye has not seen, nor ear heard, nor the human heart conceived, what God has prepared for those who love him’. Yet, in today’s gospel reading, Jesus says, ‘And eternal life is this: to know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent’. The knowing Jesus speaks is a knowing of the heart, the knowing that springs from love. Jesus suggests that in eternal life we will be in a relationship of love with God the Father and himself, as a result of which we will truly know God and himself, know them as they are, as love. Again to quote Saint Paul, ‘now we see as in a mirror dimly, but then we will see face to face. Now I know only in part; then I will know fully, even as I have been fully known’. Paul is suggesting that the Lord knows us fully now, in this life, but it is only in eternal life that we will know the Lord fully. We are not without some knowledge of the Lord in this life. ‘We know in part’, as Paul says. Jesus has made himself and God known to us, to some extent. As he says in the gospel reading, addressing God in prayer, ‘I have made your name known to those you took from the world to give me’, namely, his disciples who represent us all. When it comes to Lord, we may see dimly, as Paul says, but we are not in darkness. The Lord has revealed and continues to reveal the light of his presence to us. We are grateful for that light. We are at our best, at our most content, when we allow the light of the Lord’s presence to shine upon us. In eternal life, the light of the Lord’s presence will be at its brightest and we will be at our most responsive to it. In that sense, eternal life is the bringing to completion of the good work that the Lord has been doing among us and within us in this earthly life.

Wednesday Seventh Week of Easter

There is a close link between today’s two readings. Both Paul and Jesus are very aware of how our faith can be undermined. Paul warns the leaders of the church in Ephesus that when he is gone ‘fierce wolves will invade you and have no mercy on the flock’. Paul is addressing the shepherds of the church, those with pastoral care for the flock, and warning them of the wolves who will attack the church. Paul was very aware of the forces that will be a threat to people’s faith in the Lord. Yet, he also reassures the shepherds of the church that God is with the members of the church to protect them. He says, ‘I commend you to God, and to the word of his grace that has power to build you up’. God, through his risen Son, is always at work to protect the church, empowering believers to remain faithful. In the gospel reading, Jesus, like Paul, warns his disciples that the world will often hate them and that the evil one will be a constant threat to their faith. Yet, like Paul, he also reassures them. Just as he watched over his disciples during his public ministry, Jesus tells them that as risen Lord he will continue to watch over them. He will be praying for them, asking God to keep them true to God’s name, to keep them faithful. We are being reminded in both readings that the Lord will always be at work in our lives, keeping our faith alive when our faith is put to the test in some way. Like the good shepherd he is, the Lord will always hold on to us, when other forces are trying to tear us away from him. The Lord’s power at work within us will help us to overcome any temptation to turn away from him, and if we do turn away he is always there to draw us back to himself.