You Will Also Testify

You Will Also Testify

May 6, 2013

Monday of the Sixth Week of Easter

We sat and spoke with the women who had gathered there.  One of them, a woman named Lydia, a dealer in purple cloth, from the city of Thyatira, a worshiper of God, listened, and the Lord opened her heart to pay attention to what Paul was saying.  After she and her household had been baptized, she offered us an invitation, “If you consider me a believer in the Lord, come and stay at my home,” and she prevailed on us.  Acts 16:13b-15

Jesus said to his disciples: “When the Advocate comes whom I will send you from the Father, the Spirit of truth who proceeds from the Father, he will testify to me.  And you also testify, because you have been with me from the beginning.”  John 15:26

Piety

Our piety comes forth from our friendship with Jesus and our study of the Sacred Scripture and sacred traditions in our faith.  Jesus knows this and points out to the disciples that – once they are empowered with the additional gifts provided by the Holy Spirit., they will testify on behalf of Jesus. 

Jesus knows that they will still have their human fears that make them run and hide from the authorities until after the Resurrection.  He knows what the near future holds.  But he also knows the good that they will do – and that we will do when our piety is forged with the gifts of the spirit.

Study

The reaction of Lydia to the preaching was to accept the invitation to baptism.  Once baptized, she then immediately started to act according to the expectations of Christian initiation.  The hospitality that she was moved to offer to the disciples was just the first step in her life after conversion. We see in her piety and action, the fruits that Jesus also predicted in the Gospel for his disciples.

In His time, people saw the signs Jesus performed, heard directly from Him and yet they persisted in hating and rejecting Jesus.  However, when knowledge and experience are forged with the gifts of the Spirit, Jesus knows that great things can and will be accomplished.

Action

What are you compelled to do based on your encounter with God?  This week, I encountered numerous stories about people who were moved to action.

Last night on “60 Minutes,” there was a segment about billionaire Paul Tudor Jones' charity - the Robin Hood Foundation – that fights poverty with the hard-nosed, business sense of Wall Street.

Yesterday, the Washington Post magazine had a cover story about Conception Picciotto.  She has kept a vigil about nuclear weapons across from the White House for 32 years. If you have been there, you have seen her yellow boards and rough “lean-to” shelter. 

And just a few days earlier, the daily Post included a long feature story about three protestors who face trial this week for their trespass and damage to the Y-2 Oak Ridge, TN nuclear facility.

Maybe none of us will be called to raise billions in funding and services for charities.  Maybe we will not camp outside for 32 years or try to take down the birthplace of the nuclear weapons industry.    However, we are chosen for some purpose in our faith.  What is your purpose?  In the spirit of Lydia, what holy hospitality are you being called to perform? You will also testify.