Pentecost Sunday: The Holy Spirit purifies, sanctifies, transforms, and empowers us
If you have siblings, you’ve probably experienced being called by the wrong name. Your parents know who you are, but the wires get crossed, and they say the wrong name. We laugh, and shake our heads, and think, “Don’t they know who I am?” This is usually funny, but we can get confused about who we are. Who defines our deepest identity? Where do we look for security, acceptance, love, strength?
Pentecost Sunday, when we remember the sending of the Holy Spirit, will be celebrated May 19 this year by many Christians. The Holy Spirit gives abundant gifts to the church: gifts of speaking, healing, compassion, knowledge, understanding, teaching, and administration, just to name a few. But the Holy Spirit is more than a dispenser of abilities. By grace through faith in our Lord and Messiah, Jesus, we are filled by the Spirit who unites us with the Son of God, and we become sons and daughters of our Heavenly Father. While miraculous spiritual gifts are important and beneficial, there is a deeper and longer-lasting work of the Spirit.
The Holy Spirit purifies, sanctifies, transforms, and empowers us, bearing witness to Jesus as Lord and empowering us to do the same. The Holy Spirit is the substance of God’s love poured into our hearts, that we might love the Lord with all that we are and fearlessly love our neighbors (and even our enemies) as ourselves. When we cry out to God, “Abba, Father,” that is the Holy Spirit bearing witness within us that we are beloved children of God, heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ, to share in Christ’s identity, suffering, and glorious ministry.
This Pentecost, let us give thanks for the Holy Spirit who gives us new birth into God’s family, and tells us who we are and whose we are in Christ: beloved children of God, accepted by grace, firmly rooted in love, and empowered to participate in the ongoing the ministry and message of Christ.
Jeff Bergeson is the pastor at Cambridge Presbyterian Church
This article originally appeared on The Daily Jeffersonian: The Holy Spirit is the substance of God’s love poured into our hearts
