R. Alleluia, alleluia. Come, Holy Spirit, fill the hearts of the faithful
and kindle in them the fire of your love. R. Alleluia, alleluia.
Gospel John 7:37-39 On the last and greatest day of the feast, Jesus stood up and exclaimed, “Let anyone who thirsts come to me and drink. As Scripture says: Rivers of living water will flow from within him who believes in me.” He said this is reference to the Spirit that those who came to believe in him were to receive. There was, of course, no Spirit yet, because Jesus had not yet been glorified.+ “ The Gospel of the Lord. +since He was speaking earlier in public ministry.
As the coming of the original Pentecost shows us, with God’s Plan there can be a long stillness or wait before something major comes, and then when it does come it may come with lots of blessed activity. Contrast that with the plans of the fallen world, trying to act apart from God, they fill up all the still space with all sorts of self-centered activity, and then when God comes seeking to introduce His Kingdom and plan, it is crowded out by the people’s own frenzy. Thus, sacred aid gets self-blocked. Divine aid does arrive but it is missed, to the lack of due attention of godly matters. Sin is the pride of trying to block God out.
If we take it to far, then we are fallen to the one unpardonable sin, which is blasphemy of the Holy Spirit.
There is the stillness of attention given to God—which He is due. There there is all the worldly distraction going on—meant to have us avoid God and/or The Truth. The devil loves all this distraction that gets to you. It’s one of his main weapons. A weapon of destruction that’s a weapon of distraction.
Someone (at Riderwood) related to me (not in confession) of all their activity in something sinful as of in recent days. I presented a sad face back to them of their free comments, but they asked not why I gave that look—for they were in denial of the activity as “sin”—but I saw the quick astonished reaction by them, that had them quickly change the subject. If they had asked of me “why the sad face?” then I would have said: “This is the time of the Novena to the Holy Spirit, to prepare in waiting for renewal in the Holy Spirit, as coming in Pentecost time. I’m sad you passed it by with this other worldly thing.”
As it was, they just seemed to perceive my lack of approval as my being “old-fashioned and out-of-touch.” ‘My piety focus: “pie in the sky?!”
This is Pentecost Sunday now, when with St. Augustine we pray: “Holy Spirit, purify my heart. Come with Your Holy Fire and Truth. Sanctify me, to your servant who is quieted and humble for you.” We are likewise in June with the Sacred Heart of Jesus month, as so focused on it for about eight centuries, ever since Jesus revealed His Heart to the likes of Saints Margaret Mary, Francis de Sales, and John Eudes, and kept it strong onto American faith with varied Jesuits and Redemptorist religious promoting it here for two centuries, while much also from the immigrant saint Frances Xavier Cabrini. Of St. Gertrude the Great, the mystic, she relates in her writings that, at 25 years old, she experienced her first series of visions that would continue until the day she passed away. Her visions altered her life and she saw this first vision as her new birth. Her priorities turned away from secular teachings, even while well-educated, and Gertrude focused her mind and heart on studying Scripture and theology, and then writing her spiritual findings. She said that, in her time, people needed an awakening from secularism, and her own witness to a life being full in Christ was quite evident. The Sacred Heart of Jesus helped her expose how so many folks did opt for secular attentions that keep them quite immature and weak as Catholics, with much Purgatory coming for them before the Beatific Vision of Jesus, or worse, keep them from Christian at all. She wrote how 1st Command- ment breaking– of having other gods in place of the One True God—was most need of repentance in her lived time in Germany. People needed to get into honest prayer and find God in the quiet, in the silence, in the stillness of waiting upon The Lord. The nine days of waiting for Pentecost to happen made much sense to St. Gertrude—for how can we receive what we need of God without some silent preparation?
Gertrude would say: ‘You get back what you put in—when it comes to the spiritual life—as in responsibly doing your part with your focus of mind and heart. Distraction will be on the other side of this pursuit—to stop it or veer it off course. ‘
Gertrude also credits everything, of course, with the first movement of the Grace of God appearing for us, with God mercifully and generously even wanting to mix with us! When God makes a move to love, which He does often, are we there as “present” to His Spirit? Gertrude spoke of a nuptial life with God, as the Church as “Bride” in love with Her Lord, that would help overcome the distractions.
The Book of Revelation has a verse saying: “The Spirit and the bride say come.” A bride of Christ will want to ponder the Savior’s love and proposals, so it means to practice a stillness, the kind that the apostles and disciples practiced leading up to the original Pentecost.
What does “still” mean biblically?
“To be still” is “to keep silence” (Psalms 4:4) and so “to be quiet” (Psalm 107:29, etc.) or “inactive” in any way (Judges 18:9; 1 Kings 22:3; Zechariah 1:11, etc.). So “be still” in Psalm 46:10 means “desist from your war” while Psalm 23.2 says it’s the let the Shepherd take you to the quiet streams to drink in what you need.
When God tells you to be still, it’s a call to stop striving and to trust in His plan and power. It’s a moment to surrender your anxieties and expectations, and to allow God to work within you. It’s about quieting your own thoughts and allowing the voice of the Holy Spirit to guide you. Elijah the prophet had to learn this way of prayer, even though he had also experience powerful outer works of God, exercising his life as a prophet among the Baal worshippers of his day, deceived by Jezebel and the many demonic forces taken over the promised land of God.
To “be still” can mean to surrender one’s self to a position of vulnerability where you trust God to hold you up and give you rest, even when you don’t understand His plan. It’s about letting go of your own control and allowing Him to guide you. Some call this “the Release of the Holy Spirit.” The Hebrew word translated as “be still” (rapha) can mean “to be weak, to let go, to release one’s self to the power of God.”
To be still is to take time to quiet your own thoughts and quiet the world out for now. One person said that this practice allowed for him to recognize all the worldly anger in him and anxiety building up, in a distraction off-ramp he’d been on for years. When you’re “still,” you’re better able to discern God’s will, even if it doesn’t align with your own expectations. Yet he did enjoy the Letting Go of Anxiety: towards trusting again that God is in control and has a holy plan for us and for His Church.
To be still, at least in some built in practice of it—helps in our experiencing God’s Presence: Some choose to do this in the proximity of the Tabernacle in church or in a Holy Hour of Exposition. I see such witnesses every Friday at Resurrection, and I’m sure there are such at Riderwood.
In essence, being still with Jesus is about choosing to trust God’s timing, His power, and His love, even when things are uncertain or difficult. What is expressed in the silence? O God, I let You Be God, and Jesus to be Lord of my life. It’s all about You!
Psalm 46:10 says: “Be still, and know that I am God; I will be exalted among the nations, I will be exalted in the earth.”
Yes, Lord Let It Be So. Amen.
And you have a little Pentecost in that frame of life.