The Glory of the Mundane

Intro

It is graduation season. Many of your kids, grandkids, nephews, nieces, etc., are receiving their diplomas or their degrees, imparting on them certain privileges due to them having completed some sort of study. The high school diploma gives colleges the certainty that the applicant has completed a basic course of study, meaning that they are more or less ready to embark on the difficult task that is earning a college education. A college degree gives employers the certainty that the applicant has completed a basic level of study within a specific field, making them more or less ready to begin working within that field. The same is true with more advanced degrees. The degree or the diploma, testifying to the completion of study and a certain degree of competency, even if merely theoretical, empowers the person to begin the next part of their journey.

Why it Matters

Today is a very important day within the Church. It is one of the major feasts that we celebrate, and the reason for this is simple: on this day, on 2000 years ago, the Spirit of God descended upon the group of people, giving them the power to enact the mighty works of the Lord. It is today, 2000 years ago, that the Church, after having received the necessary instruction, was commissioned to bring about the evidence of the renewed creation that Jesus came to burst open, testifying to his glorification, and empowering us to see the future with God’s eyes.

Dig Deeper

When we think of acts of the Holy Spirit, depending on our tradition, many images come to mind. For some, it is the picture of the more charismatic or Pentecostal Christian traditions, with strong expression of emotions. For other, it might mean the supernatural ability to influence the world: healings and exorcisms.

However, I think that the picture that Scripture paints for us of the acts of the Holy Spirit is actually much, much beautiful. If we go back to the beginning and begin to examine how a life with God was, we find that it is actually not all that different from what we already do. According to the Bible, the Holy Spirit is God’s personal presence in the world, and it’s beginning since the beginning of everything, and it sustains all of life.

The Holy Spirit empowers people to for the tasks that God appointed for them. It gives the inspiration for artists to create. It gives the inspiration for farmers to do their work. It gives the sustenance to parents to care for their kids and to work, and it gives kids the ability to love and respect their parents. And while God’s Spirit created a really good world, humans have given into evil and unleashed chaos into it through their injustice. So now the Spirit has come not only to fix everything, but actually to change our hearts so that we can truly love God. This is nothing less than an act of new creation, friends.

The Holy Spirit, therefore, gives us the strength to live our lives as humans. And while some people might be empowered with special task for the purpose of showing us what eternal life is like, for the vast majority of us, this task looks like every day life. It gives us the power to get through this dangerous life in the hope of what’s to come, knowing that the toils that we do are not in vain, but to the glory of God.

Big Picture

Jesus changed everything, friends. The world, the entire universe, will never be the same. Thanks to Jesus’s sacrifice on the cross, to his birth, death, resurrection, and ascension, the eternal rift that existed between God and humanity has been closed. There is no longer anything separating you from God - as St. Paul says, “For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord - for his own Spirit has been poured out to you, making you a walking Temple of the Holy Spirit. Like the glory of God which rested in the Tent of Meeting during the times of Moses, or, as we read last week, like in the finished Temple of Solomon, so does the Holy Spirit now rest in you.

Take-away

God restores all things. Whatever God touches is imparted with his holiness. God as touched each and every member of humanity by the Holy Spirit. Humanity is, therefore, made holy by the indwelling of the Holy Spirit.

Thus, it is today that the you receive your commission to do the things that God tasked you. Namely, to be the inspired witnesses to the goodness of God in a broken world, and through that, proclaiming the new creation that Jesus came to inaugurate, testifying to his glory, of which he is worthy to receive, together with the Father and the Holy Spirit, one God, forever and ever. Amen.