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 Tuesday, June 09, 2009
Practicing Pentecost: The Curriculum for Summer

Hurry, then, to have a share in the Holy Spirit.
He is present when you call on him,
and if you call on him it is because he is present in you.
He is the rushing river that brings joy to the city of God.
He will show you what God the Father keeps hidden
from the learned and the wise of this world.
God is Spirit and those who adore him must adore in spirit and in truth,
so too it is fitting that those who long to understand him and to know him
must seek in the Holy Spirit alone
the insight of faith and the meaning of Truth pure and simple.
In the darkness and ignorance of this life, to the poor in spirit,
he is light that enlightens,
he is love that enraptures,
he is gentleness most moving,
he is our access to God,
he is the love of the one who loves,
he is dedication, he is devotion.

William of St. Thierry

In the days following Pentecost (i.e. summer) I try and give my attention to learn more about and contemplate the Gift of the Holy Spirit. I am finding that about 90 days a year (that's the idea anyway) of that kind of focused reflection and practice helpful and meaningful.  How have-do-are you learning about the Spirit (i.e. reading, practice, stretching.) 

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posted by John David Walt | at 6/09/2009 08:11:00 AM | 1 comments

 

Monday, May 12, 2008
Pentecost is upon us!

Pentecost is upon us again-- a season to pray and ponder and more deeply welcome the mysterious third person of the Trinity: The Holy Spirit. Below is the ancient hymn, Come Creator Spirit. Last year I read through Raniero Cantalamessa's book of meditations on the hymn by the same title. I'm thinking of doing that again. For now-- I encourage you to spend some time this week with the prayer.

Are any of you reading and praying in particular ways through the days after Pentecost? If so, I'd welcome hearing about what you are reading and learning.




Come, Creator Spirit,
visit the minds of those who are yours;
fill with heavenly grace
the hearts that you have made.

You who are named the Paraclete,
gift of God most high,
living fountain, fire, love
and anointing for the soul.

You are sevenfold in your gifts,
you are finger of God's right hand,
you, the Father's solemn promise
putting words upon our lips.

Kindle a light in our senses,
pour love into our hearts,
infirmities of this body of ours
overcoming with strength secure.

The enemy drive from us away,
peace then give without delay;
with you as guide to lead the way
we avoid all cause of harm.

Grant we may know the Father through you,
and come to know the Son as well,
and may we always cling in faith
to you, the Spirit of them both.

Amen.

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posted by John David Walt | at 5/12/2008 09:54:00 AM | 1 comments

 

Thursday, June 21, 2007
Cantalamessa on the Baptism of the Holy Spirit
(photo: that's FARMStrong and friends-- brothers from the Holy Mother-- Father Raniero Cantalamessa and Matt Maher.

Here's an inspiring comment from Fr. Cantalamessa on the Baptism of the Holy Spirit-- an oft misunderstood and misappropriated notion concerning the Holy Spirit. In my estimation, nothing is more needful of being normed in the life of a Christian than this reality. I will be interested in your thoughts out there, farmers.

Through what aptly has come to be called the baptism in the Spirit, we experience the Holy Spirit,
the Spirit's anointing in our prayer,
power in our apostolic service,
consolation in our trials,
light upon the choices we make.
More basic than any manifestation of the Spirit in the charisms, this is the first way we perceive the Holy spirit,
as transforming us from within,
giving us a desire to praise God
and a taste for praise,
leading us to discover a new joy in life,
opening our mind to understand the Scripture,
and above all teaching us to proclaim Jesus our "Lord."
Or perhaps giving us courage to take on new and difficult tasks in the service of God and neighbor.

What do we individually need to make it possible for each one of us to experience Pentecost in this way? First we need to ask the Father, consistently and persistently, to send us the Holy Spirit in the name of Jesus, and actually expect the Father to answer! We need expectant faith, a faith full of expectancy! Saint Bonaventure asks, to whom does the Holy Spirit come? And he answers, with his usual preciseness, "He comes to the ones who love him, who invite him, who eagerly await him."

COME HOLY SPIRIT. still praying it????

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posted by John David Walt | at 6/21/2007 07:50:00 AM | 5 comments

 

Friday, June 15, 2007
Holy Spirit= THE Gift

Anybody out there studying the Holy Spirit with me in these days after Pentecost? I am learning that at the same time He is my subject, He is also my teacher.

I shared this brief story in my sermon the other day. "At my graduation from the seminary, I asked then President, Maxie Dunnam, to write a charge in my bible. At the top of the charge he wrote these words,

John David, I charge you, to keep the gift of the Holy Spirit stirred up within you."

In my reading today, Father Cantalamessa speaks of the Holy Spirit as the Most High Gift of God. He writes:

For the present, it is enough that we keep in mind that the Holy Spirit infuses in us not only "the gift of God," but also the ability and the need to give ourselves. From the Spirit we "catch," so to say, the very qualities of what he is in himself. The Spirit is "self-giving," and in whomever he touches, the Spirit creates a dynamism that leads that one, in turn, to be a self-giving gift to others....

The very same observation must be made concerning "gift": Coming to us, the Holy Spirit not only brings us the gift of God, but also God's self-giving. The Holy spirit is in very truth the fountain of living water that, once received, "wells up to eternal life" (John 4:14), which is to say that it squirts up and splashes onto anyone who happens to be near.

What are the implications of thinking of the Holy Spirit as THE gift. How might this enliven our awareness and embolden our faith. Remember, "faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see." (Hebrews 11:1).

What does it look like to "keep the gift of the Holy Spirit stirred up with in you?" What practices evoke this reality?

COME HOLY SPIRIT!


photo: Mary Kathryn and my birthday date.

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posted by John David Walt | at 6/15/2007 08:38:00 AM | 1 comments

 

Monday, June 11, 2007
Morning and What has Come Since

My friend, David Harrity, has just published a very nice collection of poems entitled, Morning and What has come since. I just got my copy in the mail from finishline press. This one below spoke to me of the Holy Spirit. It's about the interaction of the wind, trees and everything else. Enjoy-- and order a copy of the book. We must encourage the poets in our midst as they steward the mysteries.

Through the Window

The wind is
like a cradle
rocking the trees;
they swing
as if tired,
almost soft,
like staffs
parting the
sea of space;
they are
a transom
between what
is heaven
and what is
less than heaven,
catching rain,
keeping our heads
clean, writing on the
belly of the sky.

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posted by John David Walt | at 6/11/2007 10:22:00 AM | 2 comments

 

Saturday, June 09, 2007
Holy Spirit Reading


In this season of Pentecost, I am reading Father Raniero Cantalamessa's "Come Creator Spirit: Meditations on the Veni Creator." It is his commentary on the ancient hymn by the same title. This is a brilliant, masterful and very accessible work. What I love about Father C. is that he is simultaneously theological and poetic and thoroughly immersed in the Word of God. I'll try to flow out some quotes and thoughts in the coming weeks. For starters-- here' the hymn. It would be a good prayer to get lost in.

Come, Creator Spirit,
visit the minds of those who are yours;
fill with heavenly grace
the hearts that you have made.

You who are named the Paraclete,
gift of God most high,
living fountain, fire, love
and anointing for the soul.

You are sevenfold in your gifts,
you are finger of God's right hand,
you, the Father's solemn promise
putting words upon our lips.

Kindle a light in our senses,
pour love into our hearts,
infirmities of this body of ours
overcoming with strength secure.

The enemy drive from us away,
peace then give without delay;
with you as guide to lead the way
we avoid all cause of harm.

Grant we may know the Father through you,
and come to know the Son as well,
and may we always cling in faith
to you, the Spirit of them both.

Amen.

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posted by John David Walt | at 6/09/2007 12:54:00 PM | 3 comments

 

Wednesday, June 06, 2007
Come Holy Spirit (my sermon for today's Chapel)

COME HOLY SPIRIT. June 6, 2007. Summer Chapel Session I. Asbury Theological Seminary. Wilmore, Kentucky. John David Walt, Jr. copyright

In the Church calendar—which I prefer to call the Passion Year, we are living in the days following Pentecost. The great irony for me is the way the calendar speaks of these days. On the one hand, there is this extravagant celebration of the day of Pentecost—the mighty wind blows, the fire falls down, the Gospel is miraculously proclaimed in other languages followed by extraordinary signs and wonders all over the place. Now on the other hand—the calendar almost immediately seems to shut down the party and declare a season called. . . . . . anyone know???? Yes, ordinary time. If there is one thing the season after Pentecost is not, it is ordinary. And perhaps this is the great problem of the Church. We think of Pentecost primarily as a historical event rather than a present reality. When it comes to the Holy Spirit we have sound doctrine, but weak practice.

There are four primary realities in the Christian life—four fundamentals if you will. They are the Word, the Spirit, the person and the community. The place where we see these realities come into perfection of focus is in—you guessed it—the life of Jesus Christ of Nazareth.

God the Father sent the Spirit to the young virgin Mary who himself conceived in her the Son. The Holy Spirit was with Jesus profoundly throughout every day of his childhood and youth and yet one day he comes to the Jordan River and everything seems to change. He goes under the water and we see this apparition, this manifestation that looks like a dove, descending and landing on him. It’s the Holy Spirit. But wasn’t he already full of the Holy Spirit. How does that work? Was all that just for show? Or did the one who was full of the Holy Spirit just become even more full. Super-charged! Stoked! Enflamed! A more biblical option: anointed.

I love how his early witnesses spoke of him: This from Acts 10.

37You know what has happened throughout Judea, beginning in Galilee after the baptism that John preached— 38how God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and power, and how he went around doing good and healing all who were under the power of the devil, because God was with him.

I love how Luke, the writer of the Acts of the Holy Spirit, also known as the book of Acts, recounts the work of the Holy Spirit in his Gospel account. After his baptism, we read, “Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan and was led by the Spirit in the desert, where for forty days he was tempted by the devil. 40 days later, we read, “Jesus returned to Galilee in the power of the Spirit, and news about him spread through the whole countryside.” Next he goes to the hometown Synagogue in Nazareth and he reads this text: “The Spirit of the Lord is on me, because he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind, to release the oppressed, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”

So far so good. But now this: “Then he rolled up the scroll, gave it back to the [acolyte] and sat down.” Luke tells us “The eyes of everyone in the synagogue were fastened on him, and he began by saying to them, “Today this scripture is fulfilled in your hearing.”

The Word become flesh—in the Person of the Son by the power of the Spirit dwelling in the midst of the community.

You see, if we want to learn about the Holy Spirit, we must turn to Jesus. I love how Father Raniero Cantalamessa calls Jesus “the great Poet of the Spirit). And yet if we really want to learn and understand Jesus we must turn to the Holy Spirit.

After the Scripture reading, Jesus then proceeds to preach a six sentence sermon after which the the people promptly escort him to the cliff to throw him off. Watch what happens next. Isaiah 61 happens—He casts out a demon (in the synagogue), rebukes the fever in Peter’s Mother-in-Law, Healed everyone who was sick in the fishing village of Capernaum, begins to build his own community of disciples, cleanses a leper with a touch of his hand, forgives the sins of a paralytic and empowers him to walk, recruits a tax collector, rebukes the religious establishment, preaches the most famous sermon in the history of the world, heals a Roman Soldier’s servant from a distance of 10 miles, raises a widow’s son from the dead, eats with sinners, calms a raging thunderstorm with a three words, casts hundreds of demons out of one man into a large herd of pigs, heals a woman bleeding sick for twelve years through the touch of his clothing, raises a twelve year old girl from the dead, Feeds ten or twelve thousand people with five loaves and two fishes, and has a small group meeting with Moses and Elijah.

All this and we aren’t even half way through the Gospel. We come to Chapter 11— where finally his disciples begin to ask him how this works.

5Then he said to them, "Suppose one of you has a friend, and he goes to him at midnight and says, 'Friend, lend me three loaves of bread, 6because a friend of mine on a journey has come to me, and I have nothing to set before him.' 7"Then the one inside answers, 'Don't bother me. The door is already locked, and my children are with me in bed. I can't get up and give you anything.' 8I tell you, though he will not get up and give him the bread because he is his friend, yet because of the man's boldness[e] he will get up and give him as much as he needs.
9"So I say to you: Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. 10For everyone who asks receives; he who seeks finds; and to him who knocks, the door will be opened.
11"Which of you fathers, if your son asks for[f] a fish, will give him a snake instead? 12Or if he asks for an egg, will give him a scorpion? 13If you then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!"

I’m not a Holy Spirit scholar, but I am an avid student and while I have much yet to learn, I have learned a few things already. (As an aside, here’s some free advice and encouragement. Give yourself to serious, immersive study of the Holy Spirit while you are here. My own practice is to focus in an immersive way on the Holy Spirit in the summer months in what for me is a season of Pentecost. This time I’m reading Fr. Raniero Cantalamessa’s Come Creator Spirit, a fantastic commentary on the ancient hymn to the Holy Spirit.) There is a mysterious sense in which the Holy Spirit can be with you completely and yet there is still room for more. Let me test this learning on you: The Holy Spirit has limitless capacity and at the same time you have limitless capacity for the Holy Spirit. As I wrote that sentence, I wondered if I had just committed heresy. I called my mentor and resident theologian on the Holy Spirit, Maxie Dunnam. I read him the claim—“the Holy Spirit has limitless capacity and at the same time you have limitless capacity for the Holy Spirit.” There was a long pause. I cringed. Maxie spoke in his authoritative voice, “That’s absolutely true!”

The big mistake we make with respect to the Holy Spirit is in the way we think of him like an it and consequently speak in the terms of transaction and commodity. The Spirit is not a substance or a force-field. He is a person who moves like the power of the wind and with the intimacy of breath. And though he is with us, he can always be more with us. Though we are filled with him we can always be fuller.

“If you then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in Heaven give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!”
Let me close with the admonition that we must grow in our practice of Pentecost. It starts with a very simple prayer. It’s perhaps the most powerful prayer of the Church. You know it.

COME HOLY SPIRIT!

Write it on your doorpost, bind it to your wrist, write it on your forehead, doodle it in all your textbooks and notebooks, on bathroom walls, . . . . . . you get the point.

COME HOLY SPIRIT!

At my graduation from the seminary, I asked then President, Maxie Dunnam, to write a charge in my bible. At the top of the charge he wrote these words,

John David, I charge you, to keep the gift of the Holy Spirit stirred up within you.

I am learning to pray this prayer at all times in all places, COME HOLY SPIRIT! It’s like setting the sail on a ship. It’s like taking a deep breath. You will find yourself this summer in hospitals full of sick people desperate for healing, with grieving families desperate for comfort, among lost people desperate for salvation, with demonized people desperate for deliverance, with hungry people desperate for food, with religious people desperate for control, with rich people seemingly desparate for no apparent reason. Learn to whisper the prayer, sing the prayer, shout the prayer, to signal the ascended Lord in the heavens with the prayer—COME HOLY SPIRIT.

Nowhere is this prayer more necessary and needful than in the home with the family. As we crossed over the celebration of Pentecost this year, our family learned the fruit of the Spirit. At each meal we begin by chanting, “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness and self control.” And then with exuberance we pray, “COME HOLY SPIRIT!”

This is the prayer at the heart of the prayer at the heart of the Church—the Great Thanksgiving. We call it the Epiclesis: “Come Holy Spirit and be poured out on us gathered here and on these gifts of bread and wine and make them be for us the Body of Christ that we may be for the World the Body of Christ redeemed by his blood. Come Holy Spirit and make us one with Christ and one with each other in ministry to all the World until Christ comes in final victory and we feast at his heavenly banquet.

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posted by John David Walt | at 6/06/2007 01:12:00 PM | 2 comments

 

Today...