Optimist Roundtable

By Martha Sykes

This week at our churches was the celebration known as Pentecost which is designated as 50 days after Easter. In the book of Acts, chapter 2 you can read the account of the Holy Spirit, when it speaks of the tongues of fire that came down upon many believers, a symbol to all of God’s presence.

This was foretold by Joel, the profit, when he wrote, “and afterward, I will pour out my spirit on all people. Your sons and daughters will prophesy, your old men will dream dreams, your young men will see visions. Even on my servants, both men and women, I will pour out my spirit on those days”.

This Holy Spirit is like a force that is at the heart of the Christian faith. That spirit is the power, the essence of our wonderful Lord. That spirit is the power which upholds the universe itself, and that spirit is that which was poured out upon the first believers in Christ on the day of Pentecost, and which has ever since come to dwell within each one of us who believe.

If you read in the book of John, chapter 14, you will hear Jesus telling His disciples about how the Holy Spirit will come to them after He would leave them.

The spirit comforts, sustains, inspires, strengthens, and renews us. And it has the ability to draw us closer to each other, and to Jesus Christ and to God our father, who are all one. It is the spirit that can make our faith come alive. And it is the spirit that does the work of salvation in our daily lives. The Holy Spirit is all around us and within us. That is what the day of Pentecost means to us.

God made his presence known to this group of believers in a spectacular way; through a violent wind, and fire. Have you ever felt that spirit move you?

On that day, the Holy Spirit descended upon people from many nations, and He does the same for all of us all over the world today, if we only believe.