“I will not leave you orphans.”
-John 14:18
Acts of the Apostles 2:1-11
When the time for Pentecost was fulfilled, they were all in one place together. And suddenly there came from the sky a noise like a strong driving wind, and it filled the entire house where they were. Then there appeared to them tongues as of fire, which parted and came to rest on each one of them. And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in different tongues, as the Spirit enabled them to proclaim.
Now there were devout Jews from every nation under heaven staying in Jerusalem. At this sound, they gathered in a large crowd, but they were confused because each one heard them speaking in his own language. They were astounded, and in amazement they asked, “Are not all these people who are speaking Galileans? Then how does each of us hear them in his native language? We are Parthians, Medes, and Elamites, inhabitants of Mesopotamia, Judea and Cappadocia, Pontus and Asia, Phrygia and Pamphylia, Egypt and the districts of Libya near Cyrene, as well as travelers from Rome, both Jews and converts to Judaism, Cretans and Arabs, yet we hear them speaking in our own tongues of the mighty acts of God.”
How to Listen to the Holy Spirit
The moment we receive Him and host him in our heart, the Holy Spirit begins immediately to make us sensitive to his voice and to direct our thoughts, our sentiments and our intentions according to God’s heart. At the same time, he leads us increasingly to turn our interior gaze on Jesus, as model of our way of acting and of relating to God the Father and to our brothers.
Counsel, therefore, is the gift with which the Holy Spirit renders our conscience capable of making a concrete choice in communion with God, according to the logic of Jesus and of his Gospel. In this way, the Spirit makes us grow interiorly, he makes us grow positively, he makes us grow in the community and helps us not to fall prey to egoism or our own way of seeing things.
It is the Spirit who counsels us, but we must make room for the Spirit, so that he can counsel us. And to make room is to pray, to pray so that He will come and help us always.
We always come back to the same subject: prayer! To pray with the prayers that we all know from childhood, but also to pray with our own words. To pray to the Lord: “Lord, help me, counsel me, what must I do now?” And with prayer we make room for the Spirit to come to help us at that moment.
Prayer, never forget prayer! Never! No one, no one is aware when we pray in the bus, in the street: we pray in silence with our heart.
In His Peace and Love,
~Eowyn
