Delivered on January 8, 2006, Melana

talks about "The Holy Spirit"  

We hope you enjoy reading her sermons and

wish you would join us each Sunday to

hear the new one in person.

 

The Holy Spirit                                                 Mark 1:4-11

 

        Most mainline denominations are much more comfortable talking about Jesus and God than about the Holy Spirit.  Presbyterians, the frozen chosen, might be especially bad about that because the Holy Spirit might make us emotional - and we wouldn't want that.

 

        When Erin was three years old, we started a contemporary service in the church I was serving.  She, of course, couldn't read, so she couldn't sing the words, but she could dance - and so she did - then her two best friends started dancing too.  One of her friends' mothers told me one day that Erin might turn it into a charismatic service.

 

        The Holy Spirit might make us dance to the music - and we shouldn't do that in church - should we?  We like things decent and in order - not emotional and free flowing.

 

        Just what is the purpose of the Holy Spirit anyway?  Wouldn't it be enough to talk about Jesus and God?  Do we really have to talk about the Holy Spirit descending on us?  Both passages we read this morning talk about the Holy Spirit descending at baptism - on Jesus and on those who believed.  That must mean that the Holy Spirit descends on us at our baptisms.  If that is true, why don't I feel different or better or something?  If the Holy Spirit has descended upon me, why do I still make so many mistakes and miss so many opportunities for service in God's name?

 

        The answer is that one that we want to hear, but don't want to hear, at the same time - God has given us free will.  Just because we have received the Holy Spirit does not mean that God has taken away our free will.  We still have the opportunity to turn away from God, choose another path, make mistakes, ignore God's call.  And we often do those things - it's what the Methodists call "back-sliding."

 

        This morning I want us to think together about what the Holy Spirit really does - and about what we mean when we say, Come, Holy Spirit.  The moment in which we first say:  I cannot save myself - Jesus Christ is my Lord and Savior, in that moment, we become Christians.  But we do not become disciples that quickly.  Becoming a disciple of Jesus Christ is a life-long process.  It is for this reason that I prefer to think that we are born again and again and again.  I cannot point to just one place in my life in which I can say - in that moment I was born again.  But I can pick out several crisis moments in my life in which I was transformed by the Spirit - and born again - several times.

 

        The process by which we become disciples is a never-ending journey of faith and doubt and growth.  It is not an easy thing to be a Christian - becoming a disciple is a process of development that is guided by the Holy Spirit.  The theological word for that development is sanctification - which means that we are continually born anew through the Holy Spirit.  Our lives are not static - our faith is not static.

 

        When we are children we have a very clear image of what God looks like and what God does.  When we are children, God looks very much like Santa Claus, but wearing a white robe instead of a red suit.  When we are children, God also acts very much like Santa - whatever we ask for, we will receive.  But as we grow up, there is some crisis along the way which shatters this image of God.  Perhaps it is the death of a grandparent, for whose health we had prayed nightly.  Perhaps it is the divorce of parents or a move at a crucial time in our lives.  At some point we must face the fact that all our prayers are not answered in the way we wanted.

 

        In wrestling with this new idea, we can be born again in our faith.  Born to a more mature understanding of who God is.  We could also in that moment of crisis, choose to cut God off.  Yet is we continue on our faith journey, we will find many ways that God does continue to bless us.  We discover that God can make good come out of bad situations.  We can discover that through all our lives, God is with us - that we are guided by the Holy Spirit.  We do not need to be afraid of being filled with the Holy Spirit, that is part of who we are as God's people.  The Spirit enables us to truly respond to God's call.  

 

        The Holy Spirit was promised to the disciples by Jesus to help them after he was gone from them.  Jesus knew that they would be grieving and confused and that they would need help to do the ministry they were called to do.  The Holy Spirit has been the ever-present helper throughout God's history with people - the Spirit has allowed people to do many things in God's name - and still does.  Many things that seem impossible become possible because of the Holy Spirit at work in our lives.

 

        We have seen this especially through Angel Food Ministries.  Several churches have asked us how we got started.  The truth is that if we had known how much it would grow, we would probably not have started - it would have been too overwhelming to think about, because we would have been thinking of doing it on our own.

 

        We have not done it on our own - the Holy Spirit has been at work all the way.  

When we needed refrigerators and freezers, we got them, with very little asking.

When we needed transportation to pick up the food in Republic, vans were donated for our use each month.  

When we needed tables, we didn't even ask at all - we were offered tables the very afternoon we mentioned needing them, by someone who did not know we had mentioned it.  

When we outgrew the fellowship hall, the tent was donated.

When we recognized that the tent would be difficult every month, the building was offered at no cost.

When we needed more volunteers, they showed up.

Whatever we have needed to make the program run has been provided - and the people to make it run have been available month after month.  In fact, the Holy Spirit works on people when they are doing Angel Food Ministries and almost everyone who ever helps comes back to help again.  This ministry has grown because we allowed the Holy Spirit to descend upon us - and we aren't dancing in worship!

 

        The Holy Spirit also works in our daily lives, if we will listen.  Have you ever suddenly thought that you should call someone on the phone and when you did, discovered that they really needed to talk to someone?  That is the Holy Spirit at work.

 

        I believe the Holy Spirit continues to work through us, through our intuition, our dreams, our conversations with other people.  Now, don't quote me on this, but the Holy Spirit is the most lively part of the Trinity, because the Holy Spirit is actively at work in our lives, if we allow it.  The Holy Spirit can pray for us when we cannot find the words, the Spirit gives us strength for tasks we thought we could not do, the Spirit helps us say "Yes" to God.  We will probably continue to talk more about God and Jesus, but we do not need to be afraid of talking about the power of the Holy Spirit at work in our lives.  The Holy Spirit will lead us into the future God has in store for us - and we still won't have to dance in worship.

 

© Melana Scruggs 2005

 

 

  

     

    

 

Questions? Comments? Email us!