They Were All Filled With the Holy Spirit
“For the Souls in Purgatory – Eternal rest grant unto them O Lord”
Acts 2:1-4
When the time for Pentecost was fulfilled, they were all in one place together. And suddenly there came from the sky a noise like a strong driving wind, and it filled the entire house in which they were sitting. Then there appeared to them tongues as of fire, which parted and came to rest on each one of them. And they were all filled with the holy Spirit and began to speak in different tongues, as the Spirit enabled them to proclaim.
Grace Prayed For
Come, Holy Spirit, fill the hearts of your faithful and kindle in them the fire of your love. Send forth your Spirit and renew the face of the earth.
Reflection
Suddenly. That is how the Spirit comes.
After ten days of waiting, after fifty days of resurrection appearances and teaching and ascension and prayer, the event itself is sudden. A noise like wind. Fire that divides and rests. A house filled. And then voices — voices in languages the speakers had never learned, proclaiming the mighty works of God to people who had come from every nation under heaven.
This is the birth of the church. Not the institution, not the organization, not the hierarchy — the Body. The living organism of people in whom Christ’s risen life now dwells and through whom it now flows outward to the world.
Each one of them. The fire came to rest on each one — not only on Peter, not only on the Twelve, not only on the spiritually accomplished. Each one who had been gathered in that room of prayer and waiting received the same Spirit. The diversity of tongues was not a chaos to be corrected; it was the Spirit’s first statement about the universality of the Gospel. Every people, every language, every culture — in each one, the Spirit will find a way.
For our small group, gathered these fifty days since Easter, today is both an ending and a beginning. We have come to the source of everything the church is and does. We have been filled with the same Spirit that filled that upper room. The question that remains — the question the disciples answered by walking out the door into a crowd of thousands — is what we will do with what we have received.
Pentecost does not end in the upper room. It ends in the streets, with people from every nation hearing the good news in their own tongue.
Go. The Spirit has come. The world is waiting.
Come, Holy Spirit. Come.
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Sharing
Jesus last words on Earth were to his disciples, can be found in Matthew Chap 28 when Jesus told his disciples, “Then Jesus approached and said to them, “All power in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go, therefore, and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, until the end of the age.”
Jesus calls all of us to share in his redemptive mission here on Earth. I would ask you to share this Scripture reflection with your family, your friends and your acquaintances, and then share it with a couple of individuals that you may may not be comfortable sharing with, keeping in mind always the words of Jesus, And behold, I am with you always, until the end of the age
Author was assisted by AI in the drafting of this Post