This day we remember the Body and Blood.

The Body was offered,

it was blessed and dedicated,

it was broken,

and it was give to us.

As a young person in the Episcopal church

I was taught a deceptively simple rhyme

crafted by Queen Elizabeth I:

Twas God the Word that spake it.

He took the Bread and brake it.

And what the word did make it,

That I believe, and take it.

God the Word made flesh

took bread,

gave thanks and declared over it a new reality,

and in the breaking of that bread,

the reality was released to us,

and we can receive it.

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The God of the Bible 

is the Most Relational Being in the Universe.

Bishop Robert Barron,

once talked about the uniqueness of the Christian God.

God is Love.

And then he paraphrased St. Augustine's Treatise on the Holy Trinity.

The Father is the Lover.

The Son is the Beloved.

And the Holy Spirit is the bond of Love between them.

The Father is the Lover.

The Son is the Beloved.

And the Holy Spirit is the bond of Love between them.

And Jesus says this in this Gospel.

Everything I have is from the Father.

The Father gives it to me.

And the Holy Spirit is going to give it to you.

And St. Athanasius said that out of this relationship

between the members of the Godhead,

there is creativity.

It is like a nuclear reaction.

The interaction

between the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit

is by nature

a creative force.

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Genesis 11:1-9

Exodus 19:3-8, 16-20

Joel 2: 28-32

Acts 2:1-11

John 20:19-23

If you aren't paying attention,

Pentecost

seems to be the most random event in history.

A group of people 

praying in a room in Jerusalem

suddenly 

see fire on their heads

and they begin to speak in various languages.

And many people and churches

do not understand why Pentecost is important

and they call it the birthday of the church.

And for people who believe that the Holy Spirit 

withdrew a generation later,

they try to downplay this event

and look at it as an anomaly.

This is why we read all these lessons each year

to show that Pentecost 

is part of a continuum in Scripture,

and also

a great restoration

of God's original plan.

Pentecost is the fulfillment of everything

the Messiah said he would do.

The Holy Spirit is the author of scripture,

and the central character throughout.

This is one of the interesting aspects of the Holy Spirit.

The Holy Spirit always directs the attention to someone else.

You can miss the Holy Spirit in the Bible

if you are not looking.

The Bible begins with the Holy Spirit 

hovering over the waters 

and out of this chaos comes order.

The Holy Spirit always brings order out of chaos.

Normal Christianity is Charismatic.

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Simon Sinek once said that great leaders

lead from their "why."

I once worked for an art company

that gave the staff random directions

but never told us what we were doing

or why we were doing it.

And I recall the directions were always in bits,

one task at a time.

It was very frustrating,

and the end goal always suffered

because the staff did not know why they were doing it.

Eventually I quit.

A lot of people think God is like this.

That everything is on a need to know basis,

and that we are given directions to obey.

And if you miss it,

well it sucks to be you.

Back to being an unhappy Christian trying to make 

the mean old man in the sky happy.

This is not Christianity.

God is in relationship with you,

and he wants you to know why.

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The Father Speaks.

The Son does,

the Holy Spirit manifests.

And so the Father 

calls a new creation.

He sends his Son.

And what does the Son do?

The son only does what He sees the Father doing.

The Father initiates,

and the Son administrates.

The Son carries out the word of the Father.

And so the Son

becomes sin for us.

The son empties himself and becomes a servant.

The Son becomes the word made flesh.

The son conquers death

and rises from the dead.

But these things are limited by the physical reality

that Jesus is one person.

The Father has spoken,

the Son has done his work,

but the Holy Spirit must bring it into manifestation.

You cannot know God,

or the Word

without the Holy Spirit.

You cannot love Jesus or keep his words without the Holy Spirit.

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This week we share a long form conversation with a member of the Belonging House Community, LaChé Heron.

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You are not a sinner.

Sin is not what defines you.

Sin is nothing more

than static on your new identity,

because Holies do not live in sin.

And as you hear the Shepherds voice,

and you present your body to the Shepherd,

you are more and more transformed

into the real you.

Jesus tells you who you are.

Jesus reminds you of his love.

Jesus encourages you to become more and more

your true identity in Christ.

And everything that sticks to you,

with the static cling of sin,

will fall away.

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Revelation 

This Kingdom

is not one of outward appearances,

but a kingdom of internal realities.

As Jesus said,

his body was the temple,

and it would be destroyed,

and on the third day

it would be raised up.

On the cross

the veil of his temple was torn,

his heart was pierced,

and out of that temple of his body

flowed blood and water.

That water,

was the Holy Spirit.

To be a Christian 

is to be a little Christ,

a temple of the Holy Spirit.

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Jesus Christ did not come to start a religion,

but rather,

he came to establish his Kingdom.

And on this eighth day of Easter,

we look at the second half of John 20,

and what Jesus did first after his victory over death.

He gave the ability to forgive sin

in the power of the Holy Spirit.

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Follow the Love in John's gospel.

For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten son,

so that whoever believes in him should not perish, but have eternal life.

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