Collect:
Risen Christ,
by the lakeside you renewed your call to your disciples:
help your Church to obey your command
and draw the nations to the fire of your love,
to the glory of God the Father.

Comment
     Today is Rogation Sunday, when we ask God to bless the crops and livestock of the land. Our farmers have suffered a terrible year, and we need to pray for them and for a good harvest this year. Traditionally it is also a time to bless the poor, and to ask for God’s protection. In the days before maps, there would also be a procession around the boundary of the parish to remind everyone of its limits.
Rogation Sunday in this country comes at a hopeful time of year, when winter gives way to new life, light and warmth. In the Gospel reading Jesus looks beyond the cross to his resurrection and ascension, and his return to the Father who sent him – and that was a cause for joy, for in the presence of God the Father there is the greatest possible joy. Jesus would no longer be physically with his disciples. But in his place Jesus would leave something even better: the Holy Spirit, who would be the channel of God’s presence, his teaching, and his peace.
While Jesus was here on earth he was ‘God with us’ – but he could only be physically in one place at one time. By his death and resurrection he has opened the way for the Holy Spirit to come, and he is ‘God within us’. The Holy Spirit is able to be in every Christian at the same time.
When he is in us, God is in us – and that includes the Father and the Son, for the Holy Spirit’s presence somehow means that the Father and the Son are making their home in us. We cannot get any closer to God than that!
The Holy Spirit reminds us of Jesus’ teaching, and helps us to understand it and take it to heart. This is so important. Any relationship with God must be on his terms, and must be true to reality – the reality of who God is, the reality of who we are, and the reality of the world we live in. It is the Holy Spirit who helps us to face these realities by leading us into all truth – not all at once, but as we walk with him along life’s journey.
We have to respond – that is part of facing reality. And the proper response to Jesus’ teaching is obedience – letting that teaching shape our lives. A relationship with Jesus that does not involve complete obedience is not a loving relationship, for it is not a relationship with Jesus as he really is, the Son of God, King of kings and Lord of lords. If we love him, we will put his will above our own. If our new life is not seen in action, it is not alive!
The result of this relationship with the Father and the Son, through the Holy Spirit, is ‘peace’. ‘Peace’ in the Bible is not simply the absence of strife, but the presence of wholeness and harmony. There is a peace which the world can give us when all circumstances are good – when all is going well, and all our relationships are good. The peace that Jesus gives, however, is not dependent on circumstances. It is inner peace and harmony, based on being in the right place in God’s plan and having God in his rightful place in our lives. It is peace with God, above everything else, and that is possible even when everything seems to be going wrong. Jesus said all this just before his crucifixion – things could hardly have been worse, as far as his disciples were concerned.
When Jesus was betrayed and put to death they did not feel this peace!
Yet those events were the very things that gave us peace: by his stripes we are healed. We can live in peace, therefore, whatever our circumstances. God is working his good purpose out.
 
Questions
1) What difference does it make to have the Holy Spirit of God within us?
2) How do we see God’s new life in action today?
3) What is the connection between inner peace, love and obedience?




Collect:
Risen Christ,
you have raised our human nature to the throne of heaven:
help us to seek and serve you,
that we may join you at the Father's side,
where you reign with the Spirit in glory,
now and for ever.



Collect:
Risen, ascended Lord,
as we rejoice at your triumph,
fill your Church on earth with power and compassion,
that all who are estranged by sin
may find forgiveness and know your peace,
to the glory of God the Father.

Comment
     The Gospel reading is part of Jesus’ prayer just before his arrest and trial. He has prayed for his eleven disciples; in this passage we have his prayer for us, and for all who believe in him.
Jesus prayed first of all that we would be one. The unity he asked for was not that of everyone being identical – he and the Father are not identical. It is the unity of involvement and inclusion. The Father was in the Son, involved and included in all he did, so that what the Son said, the Father was also saying. Jesus prayed that we might experience the same thing, and be involved and included in the life and work of the Father and the Son. That meant two things at least: involvement in God’s work of salvation, bringing to fulfilment the kingdom of God; and inclusion in the joys and privileges of God’s inner circle, where Jesus is in all his glory!
There is more. If we are involved and included in God’s life and work, he is in ours – Jesus prayed, ‘I in them and you in me’. Paul talked about ‘Christ in you, the hope of glory’; our bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit, and if he is in us Christ is in us also (Romans 8:9-11).
Christ is in us, involved with and included in all we are and do. But he is no mere passenger or spectator; he is the Lord!
When Christ is involved and included in us and we are in him and in the Father, that has to bring about complete unity between us as Christians.
We have the same power at work in us, working on the same agenda, heading towards the same goal and bringing us to the same glorious destiny. We are all different, with different parts to play; but we are working as one – or at least, that is Jesus prayer. And he has a specific reason for this prayer: that the world may know God sent him into it. If we are actively part of what he is doing in the world and his life and love flow through us and overflow us as we act in harmony together, there will only be one possible explanation: God came into the world in Jesus, and is now at work in his people. May it be so!
 
Questions
1) How can we be part of the answer to Jesus’ prayer for unity?
2) How can we know Christ is in us?




Collect:
Holy Spirit, sent by the Father,
ignite in us your holy fire;
strengthen your children with the gift of faith,
revive your Church with the breath of love,
and renew the face of the earth,
through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Comment
    The Holy Spirit is God the Importer. He imports Jesus into our lives, and he imports us into Jesus. Let me explain.
    On the day of Pentecost (a harvest festival) the Spirit came upon the church. First they heard a wind (same word as spirit – and the same word as breath), and then they saw flames of fire, and then each of them was filled with the Holy Spirit. It was as if God had breathed into them again, as he had breathed into Adam at creation. This was different, however. The spirit who had entered them was God the Holy Spirit, who was now alongside their own human spirits.
    The Holy Spirit is described as ‘the Spirit of Jesus’. That means he has the same character as Jesus, and if he is in us he imports Jesus’ character into our lives so that our characters can take on more and more of the characteristics of Jesus and we become more ‘Christ-like’. He also imports Jesus’ presence into our lives – if the Holy Spirit is in us, there is a sense in which Jesus is in us. And he imports Jesus’ resurrection power into our lives, to enable us to live for God as Jesus did. He will not force any of this onto us, for that is not his nature; if we want it, we have to co-operate with him – believing that Jesus now is at work in us, and working with him. The Holy Spirit does much more than this, of course, but we can’t say everything in one short comment!
    The Holy Spirit also imports us into Jesus. As with the wind, it is difficult to ‘see’ exactly what is happening – but we can understand the effects of it. If we are in Jesus, we have a new position in life. He is in the presence of God – and we too are accepted now as members of God’s family. His death has brought us forgiveness, his resurrection has brought us eternal life. We have the same spiritual standing as Jesus does, because we have been imported into him. His victory has become our victory!
    On the day of Pentecost the disciples didn’t really grasp all this. But they grasped enough to give them great joy! New life had come!
 
Questions
1. What does the Holy Spirit want to do in your life? How do you feel about that?
2. How do we ‘co-operate’ with him in practice?



Collect:
Holy God,
faithful and unchanging:
enlarge our minds with the knowledge of your truth,
and draw us more deeply into the mystery of your love,
that we may truly worship you,
Father, Son and Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.



Collect:
God of truth,
help us to keep your law of love
and to walk in ways of wisdom,
that we may find true life
in Jesus Christ your Son.



Collect:
Faithful Creator,
whose mercy never fails:
deepen our faithfulness to you
and to your living Word,
Jesus Christ our Lord.



Collect:
God our saviour,
look on this wounded world
in pity and in power;
hold us fast to your promises of peace
won for us by your Son,
our Saviour Jesus Christ.



Collect:
Gracious Father,
by the obedience of Jesus
you brought salvation to our wayward world:
draw us into harmony with your will,
that we may find all things restored in him,
our Saviour Jesus Christ.



Collect:
Almighty God,
send down upon your Church
the riches of your Spirit,
and kindle in all who minister the gospel
your countless gifts of grace;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.



Collect:
Creator God,
you made us all in your image:
may we discern you in all that we see,
and serve you in all that we do;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.