5. The Holy Spirit – a direct gift
I was reading to my kids about the Trinity (which I will admit, I get it but it still baffles me at the same time) but then I was reading about The Holy Spirit from the Conciliar Press booklet “What Orthodox Christians Believe”. Obviously we have the creed which talks about the Holy Spirit as “the Lord and Giver of life, who proceeds from the Father, who together with the Father and the Son is worshipped and glorified” but then I got to thinking and discussing with my family about what it all means. The Holy Spirit does many things and enables us to do many things. Whether we utilize that gift is another story.
A direct gift from God is pretty amazing when you stop and think about it. Do we utilize that gift to its full potential? Think about gifts we get from a relative for our birthday. Have you ever found yourself pulling out that sweater for a party because the gift giver will be there, but otherwise we don’t pay any attention. This is not that horrible seeing that you can’t wear the same sweater every day, however, we do not want this to be the case before God. The Holy Spirit is such a powerful and all-encompassing gift when you stop to think about it. It should not need to be dusted or pulled out to impress someone but rather utilized as much as possible if not continuously.
In Matthew 10:8 Jesus tells his disciples “Heal the sick, cleanse the lepers, raise the dead, cast out demons. Freely you have received, freely give”. That is awesome. We have been given the gift of the Holy Spirit, so we shouldn’t hold it in to ourselves but rather share what we can do. Now I admit I am not positive if Jesus is speaking of the Holy Spirit as that gift but that is ok. None the less, I have never raised the dead or cast out a demon but there are things that I can do, through the Holy Spirit, which is a gift, that I need to share with others. It is a gift that can be continuously utilized as well as continuously given away.
The Holy Spirit gives new life – Romans 8:10 “And if Christ is in you, the body is dead because of sin, but the Spirit is life because of righteousness” we see here that we must realize the body is dead because of sin (as talked about earlier in Romans, not because we are inherently sinful but rather sin immerses us. We indeed created in the image of God) but the Holy Spirit gives life. As the OTB states “now and in this world and in the promised final resurrection”. In the Orthodox Church we hold to the belief that the Holy Spirit is given to us in Chrismation after baptism. As we read in Acts 2:38 “Then Peter said to them, Repent, and let every one of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins; and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit”. It is a gift given to us as we receive new life in this earthly body. I am working to be mindful of allowing and looking to the Holy Spirit to help me grow as a father, husband and a Christian.
The Holy Spirit is powerful though I often forget to contemplate that. “But you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you;” (Acts 1:8) The Holy Spirit is powerful. We can first use this powerful direct gift from God to love other people. I know that I need to work on just turning to others and loving them first and foremost, even those that disagree with me, even hate me and persecute me. “Now hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out in our hearts by the Holy Spirit who was given to us” (Romans 5:5). This gift has been given to us from God and we have the power to imitate him by loving others. That is awesome. Just as God loves us, he gave us a powerful gift to be able to love others.
Verses 22 and 23 of Galatians 5 spell out a multitude of gifts proceeding from the Holy Spirit. “love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. Against such there is no law.” That is a pretty good list, at least to start with. I am going to take that is a list to expound upon, and look at those things in our daily lives.
Love – we can love people we don’t even know. Our Christian brethren and our brave soldiers can be loved. But sometimes I forget about those around us. Just as Jesus walked this earth in the flesh and put others before himself I need to work on that. Through the Holy Spirit we have the gift of love. I want to make a list, starting with just my family (wife and 3 kids) and write down what I know I can do to make them feel loved. I know one of my sons, if I just threw him around and wrestled him, then cuddled him he would feel loved. I know with my wife, grab some dishes and help out (even clean up after myself…yes I know I know) without be asked she would love it. And on it goes. The challenge is always putting others first and our desires second. To be honest the way we show love may not be noticed, at least at first, but it will make us who we want to be as people. It will grow in our hearts and make it the norm.
Joy – celebrate success, build people up and stop what we are doing to greet people. I want to work on being mindful of every moment I am in. If I am doing anything with my family, do it with Joy. I have them and the opportunity to love them. That is call for joy. Often times I forget what I can be joyful for, but really joy can be continuous. It all depends on the angle you look at things.
Peace – are there things I regret? Yeah. Are there things I wish I could change? Yeah. Can I change those things? Not really, other than being at peace and fix any mistakes I made. Do I think that I could (and SHOULD) be more knowledgeable in the bible? Yes. Can I change the past no, but can I change it going forward. YES! I need to be at peace with where I am. I am alive, I have opportunity to grow and I am making that commitment to do the best I can.
Longsuffering – here I think of the fact that there are things we don’t like. There always will be. Just as I think of how Jesus refers to the blind man in Acts and states that some unfortunate things do not happen as a result of sin, but rather as a means to glorify God! I need to look at my struggles as a way to be thankful for what I DO have and what I CAN do. Paul and Silas got thrown in jail, they sang and praised God and an earthquake set them free and many were converted through their faith. Our suffering can impact us in a positive way if we let it as well as impacting those around us. How we handle adversity and struggle says a lot about who we are and what we truly love.
Kindness, goodness and gentleness– I will put these together. I know that we all want to be good people. But do we use our abilities to our fullest extent? I know that I want to work on being kind and good in all things I do. With all of these, having small children can make things tough. When things get hectic I want to be able to always respond with kindness. At work I deal with kids all day as a music teacher. Kindness will make people want to be around you, and it will help people listen. (it doesn’t mean you have to be a push over but you can get things done while being kind, good and gentle). A kid that is in trouble (work or home) can be talked to kindly and gently and the message will resound with them. My wife always reminds me that how we talk to our kids will be the way that they will talk to their kids. Very well said. We also strive to be kind, good and gentle so that we can ask them “do I yell at you when I don’t like something?” when we want them to think about a behavior that we want them to change or an action we want them to apologize for.
Self-control – this one is really great. First of all we have confession and we confess things we “know we shouldn’t have done”. But I often think, if I were really honest, if I would have stopped and thought, then asked for strength could I have prevented most of the things I confessed? Then answer is usually yes. Granted there are spontaneous rash things that happen, but that is where training our hearts and minds comes in. But beyond that if a thought comes into our heads, we often have time to contemplate. That little thought is a gift from God. We might not always want to listen to it, but there is a reason it is there. Even that little bit of guilt or weird feeling after doing something wrong is a gift from God, the Holy Spirit. We can demonstrate self-control if we embrace the Holy Spirit.
On top of that it is ok to stand out and be different. The Holy Spirit gives us the strength to have self-control and do what is right. I can only imagine it is getting harder and harder for teens and young adults to have self-control in today’s culture. However, it is not impossible. It comes down to making the harnessing of the Holy Spirit a priority. We gave away our TV years ago and don’t miss it at all. I don’t even want to know what is in some of the shows that kids talk about at work. Yikes. Everything is a choice. I have time to read, blog, write music, sing, or prayer or anything. Do I still watch some movies with my wife? Of course I do. However, our kids used to watch videos and we axed that. They became obsessed. So now we must be the role models for them. Thank God for that. They will learn from us, good, bad or otherwise. But think about this gift of the Holy Spirit. It is a gift that has no monetary value but really could be better described as priceless. It gives us all of the tools to live our lives in a Godly way and be loving witnesses to those around us. Amazing.
Mark
Orthodox Dad in America
orthodoxdadinamerica 