When the Spirit Comes

Seeing, Hearing, Feeling and Testifying in Truth

When the advocate comes

After Jesus comes back from the dead and appears to Mary, appears to his disciples, then appears to them again, now with Thomas in their midst, he says to them that iconic phrase: “Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe.” It is a boom! moment in the story. Remember? (John 20.) And Jesus has offered up his physical body and shown them and let them touch him.

In the resurrection, we are all focused on seeing and feeling and knowing that Jesus was dead and then wasn’t. That this isn’t a ghost in front of them. Physical, visible. We can see him.

And we bag on Thomas because he wanted the proof the others received: they got to see Jesus, they got to touch him and know that Jesus wasn’t dead anymore. He was alive!

So Thomas wants it and says

“Unless I see the mark of the nails in his hands, and put my finger in the mark of the nails and my hand in his side, I will not believe.”

So Jesus comes again, just as before. But Thomas doesn’t feel, like he says he needs, he simply sees and hears and knows that this is Jesus. He’s back. And Jesus wants them to know that people who are not there will be blessed too: people who don’t have the fortune of seeing and hearing and touching him.

So if we flip back to 16 where we are in the gospel today, we get something else: we get Jesus talking about the Advocate, the Paraclete, the Spirit, that is to come after he is gone. [After that experience with Thomas, after the other sightings] The one who can only come when Jesus has left for good. But notice that the Spirit comes in many forms: some visible and some invisible, some make sound and some are silent, some are felt and some are undeterminable. And yet she still comes.

“Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe.”

It isn’t the show, it is the presence. It isn’t the experiencing, it is the believing.

The Spirit of Truth

The Advocate comes, the Spirit in a great show, yes; the tongues of fire, the booming wind, and we know that this is GOD. This isn’t some magic show. That the only one able to do this is GOD. And here is that Advocate, to be seen and heard and felt.

But she doesn’t show up to be experienced only. She arrives to inspire the believing, so she creates this great language interpreter, this great filter, this profound anti-Babel moment in which there are all these tongues professing and all these languages said and yet the truth, the real truth is heard.

The miracle isn’t the speaking, it is the people hearing the truth.

It isn’t the multitude of languages, it is the universal comprehension.

And the danger of the moment, of this time, of this day is that we will confuse the sight, the sound, the feeling of this event and not comprehend it.

For the Advocate, the Paraclete, that Spirit of Truth, comes to us where we are sitting, not in these pews in a particular moment, during the hours of 8 and 9 or 10 and 11 every Sunday, but that she comes when we don’t know it, that she arrives unbidden and unwanted. That she comes and gives and hopes and dreams and we ignore her. Because we think we’re supposed to see her and hear her and touch her, that she is going to show herself and speak words to us and move our bodies for us. And she doesn’t.

Shane Claiborne laments that only Christians can worship a homeless man on Sunday and ignore him on Monday.

Spirit shows herself in the world and for some reason, we can’t see her; she speaks and for some reason we can’t hear her; she touches us and for some reason we can’t feel her. Not every time, not always, anyway.

But she isn’t here to be noticed. She’s here to help us believe.

She will testify

Jesus describes the work of the Advocate / Paraclete / the Spirit of Truth as coming to testify, to

“prove the world wrong about sin and righteousness and judgment”.

The world, as it was, as it is, under the sway of an evil ruler is wrong about sin, righteousness, and judgment.

And we can’t see it. We can’t hear how it’s wrong. We can’t feel what’s wrong about it. But she will reveal it to us. She will show us what we misunderstand, what we miscomprehend. We in our Babel towering, teeth clenched in anger, the pounding from our brains, pulses through our insides, and down to our fists, gripped. So ready to strike, to kill, to avenge; heads clouded, confused, furious, afraid. Our bodies scream to punish their difference.

Or is it their arrogance, their unrepentance, their retaliatory rage?

We need the Advocate / Paraclete / Spirit of Truth to come and rid us of the Babel curse and show us what sin and righteousness and judgment really are. Because we have trouble believing. Believing the way GOD wants us to.

But first we have to understand, as Jesus makes plain, that the Advocate / Paraclete / Spirit of Truth doesn’t come with Jesus here. Jesus must go and will be replaced, for the whole length of the life of the world, by the Spirit.

In Pentecost, we remember the arrival of the Spirit, but we celebrate the presence of the Spirit. Because she testifies to GOD. She reveals GOD to us. She makes GOD known to us. Not that she is conspicuous, but that she makes GOD conspicuous.

But further, that she keeps coming to us, she rushes in and pushes us, inspires us, gives us new comprehension. That in her, we might finally understand: finally seeing and hearing and feeling what GOD is doing in our world. And in that ecstatic, transcendent moment, that moment of great revelation, we see in her, she who was sent to reveal GOD to us, the single, unified call-to-action of GOD: to understand that we’re called to testify, too.

We will testify

Jesus says to his disciples (to us?):

You also are to testify because you have been with me from the beginning.

From the beginning, we were with him. From the baptism, to the teachings, to public tests, to Jerusalem and the cross. Or is it from our beginning? Or the beginning of everything? But that isn’t the what, that’s the why. Don’t be distracted. The what is to testify.

The power of Pentecost, in those tongues of fire, in that rushing wind, and in those many languages but one simultaneous ecstatic understanding is that the Jesus event is not a moment in time or a man who walked the earth or about an inherited religion or about social comfort or a final resting place. The Pentecost was the preview to the infinite moments, the ever increasing points of access in which humanity collides with the divine and she praises GOD.

Every moment in our lives, worthy of praise. Every day of true thankfulness. Every second of pure ecstasy. Every thing that has blessed us. Every almost. Every missed opportunity. Every utter disaster. Every tragedy. Every scar. Every battle. Every storm. Every strike. Every escape. Every hug, shoulder, warm blanket of protection. Every hot soup brought to us or hot meal delivered to our homes. Every stranger that helped us out of the ditch and every attendant that let our little girl get on the ride a second time in a row. And maybe a third. And fourth. Every single time a testimony.

Because, from the beginning, Jesus repented. Was baptized. Then he healed. Taught. Created. Told stories. Shared. Ate. Believed. Dreamed. Spoke. Proclaimed. Stood up. Witnessed. Testified. He proclaimed a GOD that stands with those who cannot stand and protects the vulnerable and loves even the unlovable.

That’s Jesus. That’s our testimony. In our baptizing and healing and teaching and creating and storytelling and sharing and eating and believing and dreaming and speaking and proclaiming and our standing up and witnessing, we testify not only to a GOD that is easy to love, that is an easy answer [like who ever says they’re against world peace?] but one who makes our lives challenging and frightening and hope-filled and sometimes, blessed easy.

And we know that to love peace is to make peace; to love the hungry is to feed the hungry; to love our neighbor is to protect our neighbor; to love GOD is to do like GOD and love like GOD and redeem like GOD.

So today, we go from here to testify, to reveal the GOD who walked among us and swoops among us now. That we might show that GOD is truly everywhere.

Drew Downs