Pastor’s Email College Devotion
The Week of Easter 2
April 3, 2016
The wind blows where it chooses, and you hear the sound of it, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit. (John 3:8)
Pneuma … wind … breath … … Spirit … soul … spiritus.
Holy Spirit?
As I lay in bed the other night and the winds were pummeling my home, I’m not sure that I thought of the wind in its more gentle form as “spirit” or even the “Holy Spirit.” As my house and windows rattled, I was a little anxious, to be honest. It is not the kind of experience I associate with the “pneuma” in my life, and especially with the Holy Spirit kind of pneuma.
BUT … But … but … if the Holy Spirit was present at creation, and is the very breath God exhaled into the human creature, why do I think it could ever be tame and calm? It is the potency of life blowing through us and among us. Would I even want it to be tame and calm? Not in my better moments. I pray the same for you.
As you lie down on your pillow tonight, take a deep breath … and feel the spirit of God within you. As always, make choices that you and your loved ones will be proud of.
Power of the eternal Father, help me. Wisdom of the Son, enlighten the eye of my understanding. Tender mercy of the Holy Spirit, unite my heart to yourself. Eternal God, restore health to the sick and life to the dead. Give us a voice, your own voice, to cry out to you for mercy for the world. You, light, give us light. You, wisdom, give us wisdom. You, supreme strength, strengthen us. Amen.
~~ A prayer of Catherine of Siena
