This week’s reflections are written by Rev. Brian Johnson, one of our Associate Pastors here at St. Matthew’s

Rooted 2019 – Week Fourteen Day Three

Today’s reading is Acts 2: 1-13

Today we see the Holy Spirit enter the scene in a big way!  “And suddenly from heaven, there came a sound like the rush of a violent wind”, this wasn’t just a small summer breeze.  This was like a hurricane force wind! The Holy Spirit that Jesus talked about in Acts 1:8 is now presented in vivid detail.  The other item to note is the timing of this event. There were a lot of Jewish people from all over the world gathering in Jerusalem because of the festival of Pentecost.  This event is also known as the “Feast of Weeks” which took 50 days after Passover. The entire household of Israel would gather in Jerusalem to celebrate the goodness of God toward them.  So when the Holy Spirit came upon the believers there was a larger crowd to witness this event. The believers filled with the Holy Spirit started to speak in the native languages of all of the Jewish people that were gathered in Jerusalem.  God did this to show the wider Jewish community His faithfulness to all of Israel. Now all of Israel has the opportunity to hear about Jesus Christ in their own language. This moment at Pentecost marks the handoff from Jesus to the Holy Spirit.  It is the “Birthday” of the larger church that you and I are a part of. So what are we to learn from this passage today? First, that God fulfills his promises. We were promised the Holy Spirit and in this passage, we see another example of how the Holy Spirit is a very active part of the Trinity.  Second, the Holy Spirit is given to the community of believers all at once. It wasn’t just a private moment for each believer. This shows us how God finds community to be very important for his followers. Third and final thing to note is that even though we have this big event presented to all of the people in Jerusalem, there were still some folks who did not believe.  They thought these people from Galilee speaking in different languages were just drunk. We have to recognize that while God moves in big ways, the devil can still work to cause doubt in our minds. Which is why it is very important that we stay active in our spiritual disciplines. The Holy Spirit is a very important part of the Trinity and my prayer for all of us is that we see it working in our daily lives!

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