Conscious – Wake up! God is hiding in plain sight.
I want to invite you to close your
eyes, so that you can see. I want to ask you an alarmingly simply question:
“Where is God? Where does God hang out?” Friends, if you need help, listen to
Jesus, you are swimming, dripping, 100-ft. down, in a vast ocean that is God.
You are breathing the unavoidable life that is God “with you” and “in you.” Pay
attention! Wake up! Be conscious! The word for “spirit” in both the Greek and
Hebrew at it’s most fundamental definition means, “breath.” This was what
Genesis meant when the “breath of God” hovered over creation (Genesis 1:2) and
God breathed into the nostrils of the ‘adam the breath of life (Gen. 2:7). This
is what Paul was talking about when he tells his Athenian audience that the God
of the Universe gives breath to everyone and that
in him we live, move, and have our being” (Acts 17:24-28). This
was the basic understanding of the first Christians who noted in the Nicene
Creed: “And we believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the giver of life.” Do you
have breath? Does your neighbor? Then you know where God is.
The Spirit’s presence in our life is the gracious gift of God that makes us human and not simply Christian. It’s what binds us all together into a common humanity. And yet, Jesus tells us, “The world cannot receive him [the Spirit], because it neither sees him nor knows him” (John 14:17). So this is a bit of incredibly important theology. Jesus is not setting up some dichotomy between the haves and have nots. He’s not suggesting that there are the pretty people, who get the Spirit, and the suckers, who don’t. Jesus is telling us that the Spirit hides in broad daylight. If you breathe, you are connected to God. But do you recognize it? Do you receive him? It’s about a posture not a privilege. Friends, for too long our world is suffering from “inattentional blindness” an inability to see what is right in front of us. Jesus laments that this system can “neither see nor know him.” We bow our heads to our cell phones to entertain us or distract us rather than to the reality that we are, all of us, connected to God who loves us and wants to help us. When we lived in Santa Barbara, if you paid attention, you could see movie stars all the time. They were everywhere. One of the funniest encounters was when I was at my local rock gym, chatting with someone behind the front desk, and a strange awareness came over me. I wasn’t sure why but all of sudden I felt like I knew the person standing right next to me. I casually looked up and there was Gwyneth Paltrow. Yep, I knew her. In Santa Barbara, the movie stars are all around you. You need only pay attention. So it is with the Spirit – except this Advocate, Truth-giver, helper, encourager, is even closer, as close as your own breath – you can’t escape and God doesn’t hide. Pay attention. Be conscious. Wake up.
Dependence – Surrender to the God who wants to help.
This affirmation is fundamentally about how one lives the Christian life. Old Covenanters would always ask one another, “How goes your walk?” and believed that one’s answer had everything to do with one’s relationship to the Spirit. One of the elements of our passage is that Jesus connects our love of him with our following him (4 times, vss. 15, 21, 23, 24). It makes sense and isn’t hard to understand. If I told my wife that I loved her but never did anything that she asked she would rightly question the sentiment, no matter how romantic I might be. It’s easy to say, “I love you. You’re beautiful. Let’s make a life together.” But if every other question is answered, “No. I don’t want to. I’m too busy. Do it yourself.” Then that’s a problem. But here’s the thing. Jesus doesn’t set up some litmus test for love that we are simply bound to fail. No. Jesus never commands us to do what he doesn’t help us to do. And that’s why the Spirit is so important and why our response must be one of dependence. Friends, we weren’t saved by grace only to be enslaved to our own hard work at being a disciple. Truth be told, the hardest work that you will ever do in the Christian life is to daily surrender to the Holy Spirit as the only source for your own wholeness and compassion. Often the hardest work we are asked to do is to recognize that Jesus does not give as the world gives. How does the world give? It says, “You never get something for nothing.” Jesus, however, says, “freely you have received” (Matthew 10:8). Do you want to live a full life which redemptively changes you and the world? Then spend time every day surrendering to the presence and action of God within your life. Take time every day in silence to recognize that your spirituality is God’s responsibility and that God will empower you by the Holy Spirit. The word Paraclete or Advocate can also be translated “helper.” What good is a helper if you never want to be helped?
Holy Spirit – God is your lawyer, mediator and encourager.
The final piece of this affirmation is a revelation about who God is. Our first two words are about our response (conscious and dependence) but the Holy Spirit part answers the question to whom. Who is this God we are being asked to be consciously attentive to and dependent on? Is this God trustworthy? Does this God want to do us harm or be his butlers and gophers? Well, Jesus says, “God is a Paraclete, an advocate.” The word literally means One who calls or talks alongside. In the ancient world it meant a lawyer in court but also 'one who consoles' (cf. Job 16:2). Jesus defines the job description of the Holy Sprit, sent by the Father in Jesus’ name, “to help you and be with you forever” (John 14:16). It’s interesting to note that Jesus refers to the Spirit as “another advocate” (vs. 16). The implication, of course, is that the Jesus himself is an advocate and the Spirit will be the same – just like Jesus and just like the Father who sent them both. So let’s do away with this long-standing, silly notion that the Spirit is our lawyer, our consoler, our encourager, who represents us to a God who wants none of it. No, the Father sends the Spirit in Jesus’ name (14:26), which means he sends her to do God’s bidding and act like Jesus. So friends, do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid. God is not out to get you. God is your advocate in all things. God gives you life and wants to make a home with you (vs. 23), to help you, forever.
I want to invite you to close your eyes and take some long deep breaths. So which word do you need this morning? Is it “conscious”? Have you been asleep for too long or falsely imagining a God who is distant? Breathe deeply and acknowledge that God doesn’t know how to be absent, that your life is swimming in God. Do you need the word “dependence”? Have you been trying to run your life on your own steam? Power is as close as your breath. Start spending time every day surrendering to the work of God in your life – 5 min. or 20 min. I want to invite you to join our centering prayer group every Wed., at 10 am. Do you need the words “Holy Spirit”? Have you forgotten that God is a community of love that invites and transforms us by belonging with us, for us, and in us? This is a God you can say “yes” to. It’s as easy and as hard as that. While we sing, which word do you need – conscious, dependence, Holy Spirit?
