I am kind of bummed because I am going to miss church on Pentecost Sunday. Our family will be on vacation. Don’t get me wrong I love vacation and trust me this exhausted family needs time away, but Pentecost Sunday is something that is out this world amazing at our church. There is music celebrating the diversity of the church, scripture read in tongues from many nations and a joy that is overflowing from all in attendance.

All of this because help has come to God’s people.

Scripture talks about something miraculous that occurred during Pentecost. Jesus’s followers were in the upper room praying. They had just seen their friend, companion and leader leave this earth and return to his Father in heaven. It’s here that everything changes for them. According Luke, the author of Acts, a great wind and fire blew threw the room and the Spirit of the Lord had come upon them. This was the beginning of the Spirit’s work in the church. The Spirit had come to empower  believers and through that empowerment, expand the gospel of Jesus Christ.

“But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.” Acts‬ ‭1:8‬ ‭NIV

I love what NT Wright says in his book Simply Christian, “The Spirit is given to begin the work of making God’s future real in the present.” God’s ultimate plan is to make all things right. To make all things new.

So what we do right now matters.

God’s spirit is beginning that renewing work here and now. He’s doing it in the lives of the girls at My Refuge House, bringing about restoration, filling their hearts with joy, and giving them a new hope for the future. But he’s also at work in the lives of our staff team empowering us to be agents of justice, restoration, and hope.

God’s Spirit wants to empower you also, to be renewed, and to be agents of His renewal in the world. As NT Wright goes on to say, “The Spirit is given so that we ordinary mortals can become, in a measure, what Jesus himself was: part of God’s  future arriving in the present; a place where heaven and earth meet; the means of God’s kingdom going ahead.”