[Pearls Ep. 122: Come, Holy Spirit]
Pentecost is upon us and that calls to mind the ancient prayer, “Come Holy Spirit.”
The question can be asked – Why? Why should we call the Holy Spirit? Doesn’t the Holy Spirit already know when to come? And, for that matter, isn’t He already here? Isn’t He everywhere, all the time?
Since you’ve asked, let’s look.
First, the Holy Spirit is with us, if we invite Him. Jesus tells us, “if you love me the we will come and dwell in you.” (John 14:23) and St. Paul reminds us that we are a temple of God and the Spirit of God dwells in us. This means if we’re in a state of grace – if we love God by living out the two great commandments as best we can, and humbly seeking forgiveness when we fall short. For Catholics this particularly means receiving the Eucharist and frequenting the Sacrament of Confession.
Ok, so if we’re in a state of grace, the Holy Spirit is dwelling in us.
And the Spirit knows what we need better than we do. St. Paul tells us that the Spirit prays on our behalf in inexpressible groanings because we know not how to pray.
So, why do we call on the Spirit?
You probably already know our favorite one-word answer (on a side note, our second favorite one word answer is “bacon” – which goes great with most everything). The universal one-word answer is Relationship. Everything God does and asks of us is in the service of Relationship with Him.
We have returned to producing our weekly videos – and in this week’s Pearls video we look at three ways calling “Come, Holy Spirit” builds our relationship with God.
And we’ll also look further at those in our follow-up posts.
Blessings on your journey with Christ –
Steve and Karen Smith
Interior Life