READING: John 15 v 26 – 27 and ch 16 v 4 -15

The Work of the Holy Spirit

“When the Advocate comes, whom I will send to you from the Father the Spirit of truth who goes out from the Father—he will testify about me. And you also must testify, for you have been with me from the beginning

I have told you this, so that when their time comes you will remember that I warned you about them. I did not tell you this from the beginning because I was with you, but now I am going to him who sent me. None of you asks me, ‘Where are you going?’ Rather, you are filled with grief because I have said these things. But very truly I tell you, it is for your good that I am going away. Unless I go away, the Advocate will not come to you; but if I go, I will send him to you. When he comes, he will prove the world to be in the wrong about sin and righteousness and judgment: about sin, because people do not believe in me; about righteousness, because I am going to the Father, where you can see me no longer; and about judgment, because the prince of this world now stands condemned.

“I have much more to say to you, more than you can now bear. But when he, the Spirit of truth, comes, he will guide you into all the truth. He will not speak on his own; he will speak only what he hears, and he will tell you what is yet to come. He will glorify me because it is from me that he will receive what he will make known to you. All that belongs to the Father is mine. That is why I said the Spirit will receive from me what he will make known to you.”

SERMON

Let us Pray – O God, light of the minds that know you, life of the souls that love you, and strength of the thoughts that seek you – bless these words and the meditations of our hearts. I ask this in Jesus’ name. Amen

A boy was wandering around church one Sunday morning. He stopped and examined a large plaque that was hung on the wall. “What are all those names up there?” he asked Brian the church warden. “Those are the names of people who died in the service.” Brian replied. Curiously, the boy asked Brian “which service the one with a long sermon?”

So to prevent that happening and risk names being added to the plaque I don’t want to be long today (thank goodness some of you may be thinking) but I do want to talk firstly about a birthday.

Whose birthday is it you may ask, well I tell you what, lets sing Happy Birthday.

Any idea yet whose birthday we are singing about? Well it’s the church’s birthday. I don’t mean St Wilfrid’s or St Thomas’s church but the birthday of the whole church – the birthday of the Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church, which we celebrate on this day each year.

Now I want you to do something very strange and it comes with a health warning, it may even be uncomfortable for you but I want you to think of someone who is close to you. Someone who is close to you and in your heart and or mind right now. Take your time for a moment and then ask yourself this question; do I know what gifts that person has? Do they even know what gifts that they have?

Then ask yourself another question… Has anyone ever asked them to use their gift for the work of the church? What’s more have they ever offered because they do not or are even aware themselves of what gift they have?

Everyone has a gift it just needs teasing out, opening up and for the rest of us to appreciate that gift and use it for the mission work of the church.

The church is not and never should be about one person or a small band of people. The church is a rich colourful tapestry and a kaleidoscope of talents and gifts waiting to be set free.

The sad thing is that we in the church do not probably look for the gifts of others and so we just let the same people carry on doing things.

Every year we celebrate Pentecost that great day when God poured out his Holy Spirit upon all flesh as he promised through the prophet Joel.

But it strikes me that for all our talk about the gift of the Spirit and how it creates, upholds, and sustains the church as a whole, we often miss the full significance of what God has given us.

We often miss the significance of Gods gifts because we fail in all our talk and in all our listening to ask ourselves:

“How has God gifted me? What gifts do I have to offer?”

Each and every one of us has been given by God our own special day of Pentecost. A day on which God imparted to us the indwelling of the Holy Spirit.

Indeed it is this indwelling, this personal day of Pentecost, which we pray for as a church over every believer when we lay hands upon them and with the sign of the cross and anoint their heads with oil on the day of their confirmation.

What God gives us when he gives us his Spirit is more than strength and support and teaching and comfort, those things we normally identify with God’s presence, he gives us more too than joy, and peace, patience, and kindness, those things which we call the fruit of the Holy Spirit, he also gives a set of gifts that are designed for the building up of the body of the church, and for the individual ministries to which we are called, and for our spiritual life.

The prophet Joel, in his prophecy of the last days, mentions some of the gifts that have been granted by God through his Spirit: gifts of vision, gifts of dreams and gifts of prophecy.

Peter, in his sermon on the day of Pentecost speaks of the gift of tongues – of languages both angelic and human – to those assembled there so that they will not think that the disciples are drunk or mad.

And Paul who in the long run was the most experienced of all the apostles with the working of the Holy Spirit in our lives, lists some of the gifts that God gives and explores with the Corinthian congregation how those gifts can be used and abused.

Gifts of the Spirit of which some of them are the gifts of teaching, discernment, exhortation, hospitality, intercession, wisdom, prophecy, faith, administration, helping and the gift of mercy.

Each of these gifts are spiritual gifts. Gifts that are to be distinguished from the natural talents we are born with. They are gifts that can transform any person into someone who has a remarkable ability to minister and take God’s mission to others.

They are gifts which are given to each and everyone us, not just for a few to undertake, but for us all to use the gifts that have been given us.

So I ask again what gifts do you see in others and what gifts do YOU have?

What gift or set of gifts has God poured out upon you so that you might love and serve your God and your neighbour in the way God has intended especially for you?

If you take nothing else from this sermon I simply ask that you think about your gifts. To try to identify within yourself what God has given to you to use in his work.

It is a profitable exercise because it forces us to think about what God wants to do through us. It forces us to pray and to read the scriptures and to think about what God has done through us in the past and where we feel he is leading us now. And when we do that we can activate the Spirit within us because we bring its power to the forefront of our lives.

So I ask one more time what gifts has God given you?

For you all have individual gifts. And every one of us to use our gifts and play out the beautiful tune of our God and his son our saviour Jesus Christ.

For they are the gifts to be used in the work of God, a work to which we are all called, and which, when we all serve as we are intended – transforms us. Transforms our church, and our world into what God intends us to be.

May God Bless each and everyone of you as you recognise and have your gifts endorsed and therefore make clear the sweet music of our Lord. Amen

PRAYERS

We pray for God to fill us with his Spirit.

Generous God, we thank you for the power of your Holy Spirit.
We ask that we may be strengthened to serve you better.
Lord, come to bless us. And fill us with your Spirit.

We thank you for the wisdom of your Holy Spirit.
We ask you to make us wise to understand your will.
Lord, come to bless us. And fill us with your Spirit.

We thank you for the peace of your Holy Spirit.
We ask you to keep us confident of your love, wherever you call us.
Lord, come to bless us. And fill us with your Spirit.

We thank you for the healing of your Holy Spirit.
We ask you to bring reconciliation and wholeness where there is division, sickness and sorrow.
Lord, come to bless us. And fill us with your Spirit.

We thank you for the gifts of your Holy Spirit.
We ask you to equip us for the work which you have given us.
Lord, come to bless us. And fill us with your Spirit.

We thank you for the fruit of your Holy Spirit.
We ask you to reveal in our lives the love of Jesus.
Lord, come to bless us. And fill us with your Spirit.

We thank you for the breath of your Holy Spirit, given by the risen Lord.
We ask you to keep the whole Church, living and departed, in the joy of eternal life.
Lord, come to bless us. And fill us with your Spirit.

Generous God, you sent your Holy Spirit upon your Messiah at the River Jordan,
and upon the disciples in the upper room.
In your mercy fill us with your Spirit.

Hear our prayer, and make us one in heart and mind to serve you with joy for ever. Amen.

And so we seal our prayers together in the words of the Lord’s prayer and so we pray …

Our Father, who art in heaven,
Hallowed be thy name, Thy kingdom come,
Thy will be done; on earth as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread and forgive us our trespasses,
as we forgive those who trespass against us.
And lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil.
For thine is the kingdom, the power and the glory, For ever and ever.
Amen

Revd Kevin

Associate Priest at St.Wilfrids and St.Thomas