My beloved brothers and sisters in Christ Our Lord, God, and Savior,
CHRIST IS IN OUR MIDST! HE WAS, IS, AND EVER SHALL BE.
PENTECOST: THE DESCENT OF THE HOLY SPIRIT
Apolytikion (Dismissal) Hymn of the Feast.
BLESSED are Thou, O Christ Our God.
Thou sent down the Holy Spirit into the
fishermen, and Thou gave them knowledge
and wisdom in everything and through
them, as in a net Thou caught the whole
world. O Lord Who loves humanity,
Glory to Thee!
From the Pentecostarion.
ON THIS DAY, Monday after Pentecost, we
celebrate the All-Holy, Life-creating, and
Almighty Spirit, God, ONE OF THE HOLY
TRINITY, SAME IN HONOR, ESSENCE,
AND GLORY WITH THE FATHER AND THE
SON.
Ode v.
Experience the fire-breathing dew of the Spirit,
Forgiving and purging your sins and offenses,
All you children of the Church who are illumined.
The grace of the Holy Spirit, as tongues of fire,
Has gone forth today as a new law from Zion.
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Many names have been given to the Holy Spirit. One of them, which also shows the work which He does in the Church as well as in the lives of people is the Name "COMFORTER". Christ Himself used this word for the Holy Spirit when He said to His Disciples shortly before His Passion: "I will as the Father, and He will give you another Comforter to be with you forever — the Spirit of Truth" (John 14:16-17). And a little further on, the Holy Spirit is characterized by Christ as the "PARAKLETOS" ("Paraclete"), the Comforter Who will teach the Disciples and will remind them of everything He has said during His life. "But the Paraclete, the Holy Spirit, Whom the Father will send in My name, will teach you all things and will remind you of everything I have said to you" (John 14:25). Having the assurance that the Holy Spirit is the Comforter, we pray to Him: "HEAVENLY KING, COMFORTER, THE SPIRIT OF TRUTH."
God the Holy Spirit comforts the person who is struggling against sin, trying to keep Christ’s commandments in his life. This struggle is hard because THE FIGHT IS AGAINST THE EVIL SPIRITS. Therefore, the Holy Spirit is a comforter or One Who consoles men, as Saint John Chrysostom says. It is a mark of God that He consoles men, so God is characterized by the same term as the Holy Spirit.
The phrase "other Paraclete" means that Christ and the Holy Spirit are different Hypostases, but they have a COMMON NATURE, ESSENCE, AND ENERGY. Saint Gregory the Theologian, interpreting the phrase "other Paraclete", says that this constitutes and characterizes the ‘CO-LORDSHIP" and CONSUBSTANTIALITY OF THE TWO HYPOSTASES. The fact that Christ says that He will send ‘another Comforter’ means that He too is a Comforter.
THE HOLY SPIRIT IS CONSUBSTANTIAL WITH THE SON AND THE FATHER BECAUSE ALL THREE PERSONS OF THE HOLY TRINITY HAVE A COMMON ESSENCE OR NATURE, AND A COMMON ENERGY OR INTENTION GLORY. This is why wherever Christ is, THERE IS THE HOLY SPIRIT, and wherever the Holy Spirit is, THERE IS CHRIST…Saint Maximos the Confessor says that the Holy Spirt IS ACTIVE IN ALL PEOPLE, but in a different way in each one. He works in all people without exception, since they are CREATED BY GOD, Who is able to hold together, provide for, and set in motion the natural seeds. In those people who are in the period of the law, He points to transgressions of the Commandments and shows light on Christ’s promise. In those who are living by Christ the Holy Spirit works to make them sons, since they become sons by the energy of the Holy Spirit. And in the deified (theosis), those who have made themselves worthy of citizenship in God and the indwelling of Divine power, it works as creative wisdom. Thus the Holy Spirit is active in all, but differently in each, according to their spiritual condition.
Saint Basil the Great says that the Holy Spirit came to the NOUS of the Prophets and they prophesied the good things to come. A characteristic example is the case of Saint John the Forerunner, who was filled with the Holy Spirit that the imitation of the age to come is received in his mother’s womb while he was an embryo of six months, and as Saint Gregory Palamas says, it is by the Holy Spirit that initiation of the age to come is received in his mother’s womb and makes theology about Christ. And indeed as we saw in the feast of the Meeting, it was by the Holy Spirit that Symeon the Righteous recognized the Christ.
Therefore the Holy Spirit is active in the Old Testament as well, differently from the way it acts in the New Testament, in the Church. For, as we said before, in the Old Testament the Holy Spirit pointed out to the Prophets the transgression of the Commandments and revealed the Coming of Christ, while in the New Testament, the Holy Spirit makes men sons of God and members of the Body of Christ and guides them to deification (theosis).
The dogma of the Three Persons indicates even more clearly for us the closeness of God to the world: God ABOVE US, God WITH US, God IN US, and in all creation.
ABOVE us is God the Father, the Ever-flowing Source, as it is expressed in the Church’s prayer, the Foundation of all being, the Father of mercies Who loves and cares for us, His creation–FOR WE ARE HIS CHILDREN BY GRACE.
WITH us is God the Son, Begotten by Him, Who for the sake of Divine Love has manifested Himself to men as Man so that we might know and see with our own eyes that God is with us most intimately, partakes of flesh and blood with us (Hebrews 2:14) in the most perfect way.
IN us and in all creation–by His Power and Grace–is the Holy Spirit, Who fills all things, is the Giver of Life, Life-Creator, Comforter, Treasury and Soucrce of good things. Having an eternal and Pre-eternal existence, the Three Divine Persons were MANIFESTED to the world with the Cominng and Incarnation of the Son of God, being "ONE POWER, ONE ESSENCE, ONE GODHEAD" (Stichera for Pentecost, Glory on "Lord, I have cried").
The Divinity Revealed Teaching
of the Holy Trinity in the New Testament
The Trinity of Persons in God was revealed in the New Testament in the Coming of the Son of God and in the sending down of the Holy Spirit. The sending to earth of God the Logos/Word and the Holy Spirit by the Father constitutes the content of all the New Testament writings. Of course, this manifestation to the world of the Triune God is given here not in a dogmatic formula, but in an account of the manifestation and deeds of the Persons of the Holy Trinity.
The manifestation of God in Trinity was accomplished at the Baptism of the Lord Jesus Christ, which is why this Baptism itself is called the "THEOPHANY" or "MANIFESTATION OF GOD." The Son of God, having become man, accepted baptism by water; the Father testified of Him; and the Holy Spirit confirmed the Truth spoken by the voice of God by His manifestation in the form of a dove, as is expressed in the Troparion of this feast: "When Thou, O Lord, wast baptized in the Jordan, the worship of the Trinity was made manifest. For the voice of the Father bore witness unto Thee, calling Thee the beloved Son; and the Spirit in the form of a dove confirmed His word as sure and steadfast. O Christ our God Who hast appeared and enlightened the world, glory to Thee."
The Truth of the Holy Trinity has been confessed by the Church of Christ in all of its fullness and completeness from the very beginning. For example, Saint Irenaeus of Lyons, a disciple of Saint Polycarp of Smyrna, who was himself instructed by the Apostle John the Theologian, speaks clearly of the universality of faith in the Holy Trinity…Defending the catholic truth of the Holy Trinity against heretics, the Holy Fathers not only cited as proof the witness of Holy Scripture, as well as rational philosophical grounds for the refutation of heretical opinions, but they also relied upon the testimony of the first Christians…There are likewise many testimonies from the ancient Holy Fathers and Teachers of the Church concerning the fact that the Church from the first days of her exisence has peformed baptism IN THE NAME OF THE FATHER AND THE SON AND OF THE HOLY SPIRIT, AS THREE Divine Persons, and has accused the heretics who tried to perform baptism either in the name of the Father alone, considering the Son and the Holy Spirit to be lower powers, or in the name of the Father and the Son, and even of the Son alone, thus belittling the Holy Spirit . The Church, however, has experienced great disturbances and undergone a great battle in the defense of the dogma of the Holy Trinity and has always triumphed. [Sources: The Feasts of the Lord, The Homilies, and Orthodox Dogmatic Theology)
"The Grace of Our Lord Jesus Christ,
and the Love of God and Father, and
the Communion of the Holy Spirit be
with all of you." (Divine Liturgy)
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"Glory Be To GOD
For
All Things!"
– Saint John Chrysostomos
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With sincere agape in His Divine Diakonia (Ministry),
The sinner and unworthy servant of God
The Eastern Orthodox Christian Ethos 