Colour  Red

Sentence of the Day

‘A new heart I will give you, and a new spirit I will put within you,’ says the Lord God; ‘I will put my spirit within you and you shall live.’

Ezekiel 36.26; 37.14

Collect

Creator Spirit and Giver of Life,

make the dry bleached bones of our lives

live and breathe and grow again

as you did of old.

Pour out your Spirit upon the whole creation.

Come in rushing wind and flashing fire

to turn the sin and sorrow within us

into faith, power, and delight.

Amen.

First Lesson    Ezekiel 37:1-14

At the time when this passage was written, Judah had suf­fered the shame of conquest. Even the Temple lay in ruins; spirits were at an all-time low. Our reading is a fantastic vision, or dream – in an age when dreams were sometimes prophetic – followed by God’s interpretation. God will give the people his Spirit, and they will live.

1Some time later, I felt the Lord’s power take control of me, and his Spirit carried me to a valley full of bones. 2The Lord showed me all around, and everywhere I looked I saw bones that were dried out. 3He said, “Ezekiel, son of man, can these bones come back to life?”

I replied, “Lord God, only you can answer that.”

4He then told me to say:

Dry bones, listen to what the Lord is saying to you, 5“I, the Lord God, will put breath in you, and once again you will live. 6I will wrap you with muscles and skin and breathe life into you. Then you will know that I am the Lord.”

7I did what the Lord said, but before I finished speaking, I heard a rattling noise. The bones were coming together! 8I saw muscles and skin cover the bones, but they had no life in them.

9The Lord said: Ezekiel, now say to the wind, “The Lord God commands you to blow from every direction and to breathe life into these dead bodies, so they can live again.”

10As soon as I said this, the wind blew among the bodies, and they came back to life! They all stood up, and there were enough to make a large army.

11The Lord said: Ezekiel, the people of Israel are like dead bones. They complain that they are dried up and that they have no hope for the future. 12So tell them, “I, the Lord God, promise to open your graves and set you free. I will bring you back to Israel, 13and when that happens, you will realize that I am the Lord. 14My Spirit will give you breath, and you will live again. I will bring you home, and you will know that I have kept my promise. I, the Lord, have spoken.”

It is now fifty days since the Resurrection. Many pilgrims have come to Jerusalem for the Festival of Weeks. Luke, the author of Acts, tries to describe the coming of the Holy Spirit, but all he can say is what it is like. Divinity, to some extent, is beyond our experience and comprehension.

1On the day of Pentecost all the Lord’s followers were together in one place. 2Suddenly there was a noise from heaven like the sound of a mighty wind! It filled the house where they were meeting. 3Then they saw what looked like fiery tongues moving in all directions, and a tongue came and settled on each person there. 4The Holy Spirit took control of everyone, and they began speaking whatever languages the Spirit let them speak.

5Many religious Jews from every country in the world were living in Jerusalem. 6And when they heard this noise, a crowd gathered. But they were surprised, because they were hearing everything in their own languages. 7They were excited and amazed, and said:

Don’t all these who are speaking come from Galilee? 8Then why do we hear them speaking our very own languages? 9Some of us are from Parthia, Media, and Elam. Others are from Mesopotamia, Judea, Cappadocia, Pontus, Asia, 10Phrygia, Pamphylia, Egypt, parts of Libya near Cyrene, Rome, 11Crete, and Arabia. Some of us were born Jews, and others of us have chosen to be Jews. Yet we all hear them using our own languages to tell the wonderful things God has done.

12Everyone was excited and confused. Some of them even kept asking each other, “What does all this mean?”

13Others made fun of the Lord’s followers and said, “They are drunk.”

14Peter stood with the eleven apostles and spoke in a loud and clear voice to the crowd:

Friends and everyone else living in Jerusalem, listen carefully to what I have to say! 15You are wrong to think that these people are drunk. After all, it is only nine o’clock in the morning. 16But this is what God had the prophet Joel say,

17“When the last days come, I will give my Spirit to everyone.

Your sons and daughters will prophesy.

Your young men will see visions, and your old men will have dreams.

18In those days I will give my Spirit to my servants, both men and women, and they will prophesy.

19I will work miracles in the sky above and wonders on the earth below. There will be blood and fire and clouds of  smoke. 20The sun will turn dark, and the moon will be as red as blood before the great and wonderful day of the Lord appears.

21Then the Lord will save everyone who asks for his help.”

After the Last Supper, Jesus continues to tell the disciples about the mission they are to undertake. The “Advocate” is the Holy Spirit; he is the “spirit of truth”, and will be sent to the disciples, and to the Church, by Christ “from the Father”.

26I will send you the Spirit who comes from the Father and shows what is true. The Spirit will help you and will tell you about me. 27Then you will also tell others about me, because you have been with me from the beginning.

4I am saying this to you now, so that when the time comes, you will remember what I have said.

I was with you at the first, and so I didn’t tell you these things. 5But now I am going back to the Father who sent me, and none of you asks me where I am going. 6You are very sad from hearing all of this. 7But I tell you that I am going to do what is best for you. That is why I am going away. The Holy Spirit cannot come to help you until I leave. But after I am gone, I will send the Spirit to you.

8The Spirit will come and show the people of this world the truth about sin and God’s justice and the judgment. 9The Spirit will show them that they are wrong about sin, because they didn’t have faith in me. 10They are wrong about God’s justice, because I am going to the Father, and you won’t see me again. 11And they are wrong about the judgment, because God has already judged the ruler of this world.

12I have much more to say to you, but right now it would be more than you could understand. 13The Spirit shows what is true and will come and guide you into the full truth. The Spirit doesn’t speak on his own. He will tell you only what he has heard from me, and he will let you know what is going to happen. 14The Spirit will bring glory to me by taking my message and telling it to you. 15Everything that the Father has is mine. That is why I have said that the Spirit takes my message and tells it to you.