Jesus promised his disciples that he would not leave them alone and that he would send the Spirit. Today we celebrate the feast of this gift of the Risen One.
While John places the outpouring of the Spirit on the day of Easter to show that the Spirit is the gift of the Risen One, Luke places the descent of the Spirit at Pentecost. Pentecost was a very ancient Jewish holiday, celebrated fifty days after the Feast of the Passover. It commemorated the arrival of the people of Israel at Mount Sinai. The Law was given there. Luke wants to teach that the Spirit has replaced the old law and became the new law for the Christian.
Here’s what the law of the Spirit is: it is the new heart; it is God’s life. When it enters in a person, it transforms him and from bramble, it becomes a fruitful tree, able to spontaneously produce the works of God.
When a person is filled with the Spirit, something unheard of happens in him. He loves with the love of God himself. From that moment “he does not need someone to teach him” (1 Jn 2:27); he won’t require another law. John comes to say that the man animated by the Spirit becomes even incapable of sinning: “Those born of God do not sin, for the seed of God remains in them; they cannot sin because they are born of God” (1 Jn 3:9).
And the thunder, the wind, the fire? In the book of Exodus these phenomena accompanied the gift of the old law. “All the people witnessed the thunder and lightning and heard the blast of the trumpet and saw the mountain smoking” (Ex 20:18). The rabbis said that at Sinai, on the day of Pentecost, when God gave the Law, his words took the form of seventy tongues of fire, indicating that the Torah was destined to all peoples (thought to be exactly seventy at that time). Luke uses the same imagery during the gift of the Spirit—the new law. If he wanted to be understood he had to use the same images.
And the many languages spoken by the apostles? Probably Luke refers to a very common phenomenon in the early church. After receiving the Spirit, the believers began to praise God in a state of exaltation. As if in ecstasy, they uttered strange words in other languages.
Luke has used this phenomenon in a symbolic sense to teach about the universality of the church. The Spirit is a gift meant for all persons and all peoples. Faced with this gift of God, all barriers of language, race and tribe collapse. On the day of Pentecost, the opposite of what happened at Babel occurred (Gn 11:1-9). People began to misunderstand and to distance from each other. Here the Spirit puts into action an opposite movement. He brings together those who are scattered.
Whoever lets himself be guided by the word of the gospel and by the Spirit speaks a language that everyone understands and everyone joins in: the language of love. It is the Spirit who transforms mankind into one family where all understand and love each other.
Matthew places the encounter with the Risen Lord not in Jerusalem but in Galilee. The evangelist wants to say that the mission of the Apostles begins where their Master had begun.
Galilee was a despised region. It was inhabited by diverse populations, derived from a mixture of races. It is exactly to these semi-pagans—Matthew wants to say—that now the gospel is destined. Jerusalem, the city that rejected the Messiah of God, lost her privilege to be the spiritual center of Israel.
Matthew places Jesus on a mount every time he teaches or performs some particularly important acts because the mountain reminds of God’s presence where He gives his commandments and mandate. Now, on the mountain the disciples who have experienced the Risen Lord and has assimilated his message are empowered to complete the Lord’s mission.
The remark that “although some apostles doubted” (v. 17) is confusing. How could they still have doubts if they had already met the Risen Lord in Jerusalem on Easter Sunday? From the point of view of catechesis, this detail is indicative. For Matthew, the Christian community is not made up of perfect people, but of people in whom good and evil, light and darkness continue to be present. We encounter this situation among the first disciples: they have faith but they still have doubts and uncertainties.
It is possible to believe in Christ and have doubts. Faith cannot exist together with evidence. One cannot “believe” that the sun exists; there is the certainty, one can see it. The effects of its light and its heat are scientifically verifiable. In the field of faith, this evidence is impossible. Like the apostles, we, too, have a deep conviction of the truth of the resurrection of Christ, but it cannot be proven.
The second part of the passage narrates the sending of the apostles to evangelize the whole world. During his public life, Jesus had sent them to announce the kingdom of heaven with these instructions: “Do not visit pagan territory, and do not enter a Samaritan town. Go instead to the lost sheep of the people of Israel” (Mt 10:5-6). After Easter, their mission expands; it becomes universal.
The light was enkindled in Galilee when Jesus, having left Nazareth, settled in Capernaum. “The people who lived in darkness have seen a great light; on those who live in the land of the shadow of death a light has shone” (Mt 4:16). Now its light must shine in the whole world. As the prophets have announced, Israel becomes “light of the nations” (Is 42:6).
The time is decisive and Jesus refers to his authority: he was sent by the Father to bring the message of salvation; now he entrusts this task to the community of the disciples, giving them his own powers.
The church is called to make Christ present in the world. Through baptism, she generates new children that are inserted in the communion of the Trinity, the Father, the Son and the Spirit. It is a sublime but difficult mission; it inspires awe and trepidation in those who are called to carry it out.
The disciples understood that Jesus was leaving them. They were sad and they asked themselves how could they continue to be united after he is gone.
Jesus promised not to leave them alone, without protection and guidance. He said that he would pray to the Father, and He would “send the other Paraclete” who will always be with them. Jesus clarifies that the Spirit could be received only by those who are in accord with him, with his plans and his works of love. The world cannot receive it.
What is this world to which the Spirit is not destined? Are they the pagans, those far away who do not belong to the group of the disciples or the members of other religions? The world as Jesus intends is not the persons, but those parts in the heart of the person—of each person—wherein darkness, sin, and death reign. That is where worldliness is present with its spirit, contrary to that of Christ’s. Paul reminds the Corinthians of it as they allowed themselves to be guided by human wisdom.
The Spirit is called the Comforter (one who is called to be beside.)
In ancient times, there was no establishment of lawyers; each defendant had to defend himself, bringing witnesses to exonerate himself. It happened sometimes, that some, though not guilty, was unable to prove one’s innocence or that, despite having committed the crime, deserved forgiveness. For her/him, there remained one last hope: that in the midst of the assembly there would be a person honored by all for her/his moral integrity. That blameless person, without uttering any word, would get up and go to place oneself at the side of the accused. This gesture is equivalent to an acquittal. No one would have dared to ask for more condemnation. This “defender” is called the “Paraclete” that is, “one who is called to the side of another who finds oneself in trouble.” The meaning of this title is, therefore, protector, helper, defender.
Jesus promises his disciples another Paraclete, since they already have one, he himself as John explains in his first letter: “My little children, I write you these things so that you may not sin; but if anyone does sin, we have a Paraclete by the Father’s side: the righteous Jesus Christ” (1 Jn 2:1).
And Jesus is the Paraclete inasmuch as our advocate with the Father not because he defends us from his wrath, provoked by our sins (the Father is always on our side, as Jesus). He protects us against our accuser, our opponent, sin. The enemy is sin and Jesus knows how to refute and reduce it to impotence. John reminds the Christians of his community this truth so that, in the midst of the difficulties of life, spiritual miseries, frailties, and many evil inclinations they won’t be discouraged, despaired, or lose the serenity of heart.
The duty of Christians is to remain open to the impulse of the Spirit who always reveals new things and increase the joy and peace, that help people to pray better and free the heart from useless fears.
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