Glory to Jesus Christ! Glory forever!

In the Name of the Father, and of the + Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

It goes without saying, but the Holy Spirit, “the Lord, the Giver of Life,” as we confess (Nicene Creed), is front and center today as though He were making a first appearance on stage. And yet, we know that not to be the case for He has been and is “everywhere present and fillest all things” (O Heavenly King Troparion). He was present and actively engaged in the creation of the whole world there in Genesis (Gn. 1:1-2). And, He is ever-present at the end in the Revelation where “the Spirit and the Bride (Church) say, ‘Come!” to Jesus Christ, calling all who thirst to come and to take of the water of Life freely Christ alone can give (Jn. 7:37-52; 8:12; Rv. 22:17). From Genesis to Revelation, then, and everything in between, the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of God and of His Christ, the Spirit of Truth and holiness, the Spirit of adoption, has been watering and enlivening the whole of creation and all those who dwell therein with His grace – the grace of the Holy Spirit. Grace, beloved, is the Holy Spirit Himself at work in us. Grace is far more than “God’s free favor granted unto us,” though it is that, to be sure. God is, indeed, gracious, as Sacred Scripture attests. But, grace is divine energy – God’s energy – the energy of God in us. It is, if you will, the divine Life-giving sap flowing from the Vine to the branches, to use our Lord’s illustration, to give nourishment and growth to the spiritual fruit – the fruit of the Holy Spirit (Jn. 15:1-8; Ga. 5:22-23). In the words of St. Athanasius the Great, “God became Man so that man might receive the Holy Spirit.” What we lost in the Fall is now restored to us . . . . . . in an even greater way!

This Feast of Great and Holy Pentecost, therefore, completes the divine trajectory, initiated by the Incarnation of the Son of God in the flesh of man. It fulfills what was foretold and foreseen in the Old Testament and has been the aim ever since the Fall – that God might indwell His creature, created in His own image, having the capacity for divine communion. Not only will God pour out His Spirit upon all flesh in a way unlike before, as foretold by the Prophet Joel, but God will indeed put His Spirit in us, causing us to walk in the ways of God to keep His Word, and to do them (Jl. 2:23-32; Ek. 36:24-28). The Spirit of God will burn within us, causing our stubborn hearts to once again flourish with the fire of divine love – a love that is jealous for God to do God’s ways and God’s words. The light of Jesus Christ will dwell within us and we shall not walk in darkness, “’but have the light of Life’” (Jn. 7:37-52; 8:12).

This is the very promise of our Lord God and Saviour Jesus Christ today when He promises that out of the heart of faith will flow “’rivers of living water,’” which the Evangelist and Theologian tells us is the Holy Spirit (Jn. 7:37-52; 8:12). Elsewhere, our Lord also assured us that if we love Him and keep His Word, “’My Father will love him, and We will come to him and make Our home with him’” (Jn. 14:23). In fact, Jesus says, the Father will send to all believers the Holy Spirit in the Name of the Son of God, and that this Spirit will “’dwell with [us] [forever] and will be in [us]’” (Jn. 14:15-17). The key to the Spirit’s indwelling and renewing and regenerating Presence in us is our continued obedience, even as St. Peter admonished those religious leaders of Israel who persecuted the Apostles. God gives the Holy Spirit, the Apostle says, “’to those who obey Him’” (Ac. 5:32). It is an accepted Truth of the divine economy, then, wherever one Person of the Holy Trinity is, there the other two are also found. One will not be without the others.

Thus, men and women who love Jesus Christ and keep His word are made tabernacles, temples of the Holy Trinity, through the power of the Holy Spirit. And, what is a temple but the dwelling place of God, the House where God abides in holiness and is glorified rightly. “Do you not know,” St. Paul asks the Corinthians, “that you are the temple of God and that the Spirit of God dwells in you?” (1 Cr. 3:16-17). And, if this is the case (as it surely is), then we no longer belong to ourselves to run our own show and to do our own thing (2 Cr. 5:14-15). But rather, we are God’s now, bought at the inestimable price of God’s own blood (Ac. 20:28). Therefore, we are to glorify God – Father, Son, and Holy Spirit – in our body and in our spirit because they belong to God (1 Cr. 6:19-20).

This, beloved, is the grace of God at work in us. Ponder that Mystery, if you can. Contemplate its reality. Meditate upon such mercy bestowed upon sinners. We use such phrases as “Christ in us; God in us,” far too flippantly without nary a thought at how impossible that is! But, with God all things are possible. If the Disciples questioned how hard it was to enter the Kingdom of God, how much moreso for the Kingdom of God to enter into us (Mt. 19:16-30; Mk. 10:17-31; Lk. 18:18-30)?! And yet, Sacred Scripture teaches us that with God all things are possible, especially for those who believe in Him (Mk. 9:23; Jn. 11:40). This is what God has arranged by His grace through the grace of His Holy Spirit given to all who obey. In the words of our Lord Himself, “’[T]he Kingdom of God is within you’” (Lk. 17:20-21). It is St. Seraphim of Sarov who tells us, “For the heart of a man is capable of containing the Kingdom of God. The Holy Spirit and the Kingdom of God are one” (Orthodox Wisdom, p. 32). This is an audacious claim! How can He Who cannot be contained be contained within the human heart? And yet, has not God made this possible? Has He not made this His heart’s desire, just as much as He desired – and made possible! – dwelling in the mortal womb of the Blessed Theotokos made more spacious than the heavens?

O, beloved, the Kingdom of God within us is “righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit” (Rm. 14:17). That’s what St. Paul says. The Apostle implores us not to destroy the work of God in us by giving ourselves over to darkness and to those things that would extinguish God’s grace in us. For this, then, the priest prays three times at the Divine Liturgy on behalf of all who share in the Great and Royal High Priesthood of Jesus Christ by virtue of our Baptism into Him:

O Lord, Who didst send down Thy most Holy Spirit upon Thine Apostles at the third hour: Take Him not from us, O Good One, but renew Him in us who pray unto Thee (Pre-Epiclesis Troparion).

“[R]enew Him in us who pray unto Thee.” The Holy Spirit, the Spirit of Truth, the Spirit of divine adoption, the Spirit of holiness graciously bestowed at our Chrismation and Who tabernacles within us, must be renewed ever and again as we surrender ourselves to His holy indwelling, humbly beseeching His eternal goodness to renew us and to regenerate our sin-deadened souls. “[R]enew Him in us who pray unto Thee.” It is St. Augustine who observes this: “One possesses the Holy Spirit to the extent he loves the Church of Christ [which is His Body]” (The Way of the Fathers, #139, #141). If we say we love the Head of the Church, we will – we must – love His Body, and the extent to which we love the Church the Holy Spirit is given in like measure to us. We readily say we love Jesus Christ. But, I ask you, how much do you love His Body, the Church?

And so, today, on this culmination of the divine fulfillment, we pray once more in earnest:

O heavenly King, the Comforter, the Spirit of Truth, Who art everywhere present and fillest all things, Treasury of blessings, and Giver of Life: come and abide in us, and cleanse us from every impurity, and save our souls, O Good One.

Through the prayers of our holy Fathers, O Lord Jesus Christ our God, have mercy on us and save us. Amen.

Glory to Jesus Christ! Glory forever!

VIGIL PROPERS: PROPERS:

Nm. 11:16-17, 24-29 Ac. 2:1-11

Jl. 2:23-32 Jn. 7:37-52; 8:12

Ek. 36:24-28