Receive the Holy Breath

I’ve read this New York Times bestseller by Dr. Joe Dispenza, “You Are the Placebo.” What’s interesting about this book is that it doesn’t just contain neuroscience discovery about how our brain can heal or hurt our body, but also how meditation can affect our brain by forming new thoughts and as a result renew our body.

It’s commonly accepted as a fact in the medical field that 30% of the medication you take is placebo effect. What it means is, 30% of the cure from the medicine come from your belief that this medicine will cure you. However, a recent research has discovered that placebo effect could be as high as 70%.

One of my relative is a doctor and her husband is also a doctor. They have their own clinic. When I was young, I used to visit them during summer. So, I often heard these doctors’ office jokes from them.

One of them is, when a patient came to the clinic, sometimes they ran out of the medicine needed for the patient. (It happens in Burma quite often than you think.) They didn’t want to disappoint the patient, so they just gave them a shot of distilled water and sent them home. (You can’t do it here in the U.S. but who knows.) The next day, the patient was totally recovered.

So they are joking about giving water shots and charging them a lot of money can make them get well.

Today, it’s no longer a joke because more researches have been done to prove the power of the placebo effect. Medicine has become a religion. We get well not become of medicine but because we believe in medicine. It sounds sad, but on the positive side, it proves the power of belief.

By saying “you are the placebo” Dr. Joe Dispenza means your health condition is pretty much the result of your belief system. He listed a great deal of scientific discoveries that led him to this conclusion. The book has over eight hundred five-star reviews, so it’s not some random stuff.

In today’s scripture reading, we read about the famous story of the Doubting Thomas. Just as your belief produces placebo effect, your doubt also produces the opposite result call the “nocebo effect.” Nocebo effect can cripple a person from accomplishing anything.

If you are the placebo, you can also be the nocebo. Just as your belief can make your dream come true, your doubt can also make your dream never come true.

So it’s important to examine what you believe and what you doubt.

Thomas was the only one among Jesus disciples who refused to believe that Jesus had risen from the dead. He wasn’t there the first time Jesus showed up after resurrection. When his friends told him about the return his boss, he didn’t believe. He said, “Unless I see the scars of the nails in his hands, and put my finger in the scars and my hand in his side, I will not believe.”

What’s interesting in this verse is that it says,

John 20:24 NRSV

But Thomas (who was called the Twin), one of the twelve, was not with them when Jesus came.

The Bible says he was called the Twin. What does it mean? I used to think he was one of the twin brothers. However, some scholars discovered that he was called the twin because he was like a twin brother of Jesus. He likes to record everything Jesus said. There’s a Gospel According to Thomas, which didn’t make it to the Bible. It’s very short and it was a fascinating read.

So, it makes the plot thicker. Why would someone who was so close to Jesus doubt Jesus’ resurrection? There were two disciples that were closest to Jesus, John and Thomas. John was like the baby brother of Jesus because he was the youngest of the twelve, and he called himself the “beloved disciple” of Jesus. However, John did not doubt. When he saw Jesus’ empty tomb, he believed right away that Jesus was risen because Jesus had told them many times that this would happen. However, Thomas didn’t even believe his fellow disciples, when the told him that they’ve seen Jesus.

There were two groups of Jewish beliefs. One didn’t believe in resurrection. It seems that Thomas belong to this group. It’s nocebo effect. If you doubt someone would happen, you would deny it even when the eyewitnesses have told you so.

A week later Jesus showed up again. Jesus obviously knew he was a doubter, so even before he asked, Jesus let him touch his scars.

John 20:28–29 NRSV

Thomas answered him, “My Lord and my God!” Jesus said to him, “Have you believed because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe.”

Why was Jesus saying that those who believe without seeing him are blessed? I am sure he is not advocating blind faith. The reason is, there are certain doubts that are healthy. A healthy doubt makes us investigate the truth.

However, in Thomas’ case, it was unhealthy because Jesus was about to commission them to go and change the world. They have been trained for three years, they have seen enough, and they have learned enough. It’s time for them the transform the world with the good news. However, his doubt will cripple him from accomplishing his God-given dream for his life.

How do you overcome doubt? I think the answer is also in this passage.

The Bible says, Jesus breathed on the disciples and said to them,

John 20:22 NRSV

When he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, “Receive the Holy Spirit.

Hebrew: Spirit is called “Ruach”, means Breath

Greek: Spirit is called “Pneuma”, means Breath

Chinese: Breath Exercise is called Qigong 气功.

Japanese: Breath Exercise is called Reiki 灵气.

Christianity: We have the Holy Spirit, literally means “Holy Breath”.

We have words like respiratory, or respiration has as root word spirit in there to mean breath. Whoever came up with the idea of translating the Hebrew and Greek word for “breath” into “spirit” has created a lot of confusion in Christianity. Why didn’t they just translate straight forward a the breath?

All over the world when people practice spirituality or meditation, it has something to do with breathing. I read that yoga is 70% breathing. The movements and poses are the minor part. If you are not breathing right, all poses and movements are basically useless.

I think that translation of breath into spirit has denied the modern Christians a very important spiritual exercise. In here, Jesus breathed on the disciples, and he says, “receive the Holy Breath.” How do they receive it? By breathing. There is another translation that says, Jesus breathed with them. Obviously, at the first gathering of Jesus with the disciples after resurrection, Jesus did a breathing exercise with the disciples.

Based on my research, there are three kinds of breath. Human breath, which keeps us alive. There’s the breath of the nature, which can be good or bad because in the nature there’s so called unclean spirit, or unclean breath. It might sound a little esoteric but the spiritual realm has its own pollution, so be careful with choosing what kind of spirituality you want to practice.

The Holy Breath is what Jesus was talking about, especially after the resurrection, he came back as divine body. His breath is divine breath, or holy breath. Holy means clean and pure. It’s the clean and divine breath. And he wants us to receive it. How do we receive it? Simple, breathe. The key difference is you breathe with belief, not doubt. Believe in what? Believe in his teachings.

John devoted the entire chapter to talk about the Holy Breath. He says, “If you love me, you will keep my commandments. 16 And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Advocate, to be with you forever. 17

John 14:17 NRSV

This is the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees him nor knows him. You know him, because he abides with you, and he will be in you.

So the condition here to receive the Holy Breath is that you love him, and keep his commandments. His commandments are simple: love God and love people, nothing more, nothing less. It also says that you know him because that Holy Breath is with you and in you. How do you know? The answer is heat. When you breathe in the Holy Breath, most of the time, you feel the heat and warm in your heart. That’s why John the Baptist says that Jesus will baptize you with the Holy Breath and fire.

Paul also taught in

Romans 12:11 NRSV

Do not lag in zeal, be ardent in spirit, serve the Lord.

The word “ardent” is translated from the Greek word that means boiling hot. When you heart is cold, you must breathe in the Holy Spirit to fire it up.

Another way to know that you have the Holy Breath is by observing its fruit: Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. This is what makes the Christian meditation different from other meditation. Most other meditation has to do with the breath of nature. Christian meditation is with the Holy Breath—God’s breath.

Jesus said

John 4:24 NRSV

God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.”

God is Breath. It means worship him in Breath and in Truth. Jesus was warning the first century religious people that they focused too much on Truth but lack the knowledge of the Spirit.

As Presbyterians, we know how to worship in Truth because we love to interpret the Bible truthfully. However, we left out the Breath part too often.

Let’s give this teaching of Jesus some serious thought so that we can worship in Spirit and Truth. Amen!