It is Pentecost Sunday! Today is the day when we look back with the church universal to the incredible gift of the Holy Spirit that was given to us and to the start of what came to be known as the church; the family in which we all find belonging, in all its great diversity and expressions. This is a family which we receive when we are born again and get to join in on the heavenly celebration, the same celebration that started with 120 people in an upper room, grew to 3000 people joining and now billions of people later we are still celebrating.  

Pentecost nowadays can be so misunderstood. For some, it reminds them of certain denominations, church expressions, loud music and ecstatic glossolalia. These can have a connotation to Pentecostal churches but it is not what Pentecost is about. Pentecost is a pivotal moment in mankind’s history with its creator. It is the moment which we received the creator Spirit in whom alone we can say Jesus is Lord (1 Corinthians 12:3). There has not been a more important moment in the history of our faith since then. It is that which enables us to be Christian, who makes us into His new creation and share this life with the world. 

The Holy Spirit in both Hebrew and Greek is translated as the Holy- Wind/ breath/ Spirit and in looking at these definitions we can perhaps better understand the Spirit's work in our lives.

The Spirit as wind shows us how He works. It can be gentle and it can be fierce. It brings us into His intimacy and allows us to communicate that love to the world. There is a 2nd-century Christian text from the Odes of Solomon that says that the human soul is like a harp that sounds as the wind passes through it:

“as the wind passes through the lyre

and the strings speak

in the same way through my inward being

sounds the spirit of the lord, and I speak in his love”

As the Spirit is at work deep in our souls it is that work which enables us to communicate this Love of God to the world and where the church has miscommunicated this love is where it has not allowed this Spirit to deeply work in it.

Wind cannot be bottled and distributed as needed. Wind bottled is no longer wind. Wind is unpredictable, it does what it wants and moves where it wills and because of that, we cannot trammel the holy spirit with rationalism or with our ecclesiology and institutions. 

The Spirit as breath reminds us of the life that God gives us through the spirit. If you look at the global church it is clear that some parts of the church are suffocating. The only way to stop suffocating is to breathe. The Spirit is the breath given to the church and the church needs to start breathing.

Ezekiel chapter 37 brings together the 3 images of breath, wind and spirit and I believe carries an important passage for the church.

In it, Ezekiel is taken to a valley filled with dry bones. The Lord tells him to prophesy over the bones and as he does the bones come together and forms a body but the body has "no breath in them". Then he is told to prophesy to the wind and says “Come from the four winds, O breath, and breathe on these slain, that they may live” and “breath came into them, and they lived” and they stand up as an “exceedingly great army” 

Verse 11 says “Our bones are dried up, and our hope is lost”. We are these dry bones as the church and we need the Spirit to come revitalise the church to live and be an “exceedingly great army” for the glory of God, shouting His love to the world. In verse 14 the Lord speaks this to us: “ I will put my Spirit within you, and you shall live”

Ezekiel prays “come, Breath” or “Come, Holy Spirit.” This is the first and only prayer to the holy spirit recorded in scripture. This is the “Maranatha” of the Holy Spirit. 

Maranatha like this prayer is found only once in the Bible (1 Corinthians 16:22) and can be translated as “Our Lord, come” but also as “Our Lord has come” in this we find that same tension of knowing the “Holy Spirit has come” and still praying “come, Holy Spirit” so that the Spirit may come and fill us anew and breathe life into our churches and various institutions, so that we might live and better communicate the love of the father to the world.

So let's pray in this season alongside the church universal one of the oldest prayers in the church, the original epiclesis.

Veni Sancte Spiritus!

Come Holy Spirit!

Israel Fouché

A son, friend and lover of grace, Israel is a graduate from Bethel church in Redding, California and former member of the Community of St Anselm under the Archbishop of Canterbury. He is passionate about teaching people about the healing power of God and demonstrating the love of the father through it. He has taken a message of Good hope to various nations and now pastors Father’s House Cape Town.