Gospel: John 14:15-21
Jesus said to his disciples: "If you love me, you will keep my commandments. And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Advocate to be with you always, the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot accept, because it neither sees nor knows him. But you know him, because he remains with you, and will be in you.
I will not leave you orphans; I will come to you. In a little while the world will no longer see me, but you will see me, because I live and you will live. On that day you will realize that I am in my Father and you are in me and I in you. Whoever has my commandments and observes them is the one who loves me. And whoever loves me will be loved by my Father, and I will love him and reveal myself to him."
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Reflection:
The story is told about a wife who would always tell her husband that she loves him, her expression of love does not end by her vocal profession. She follows it up by actual acts of love, say for example by being a good mother and wife.
As the wife continues to do these noble acts their love and marriage would surely flourish. And it would perpetually be blessed by the guidance of the Holy Spirit.
In this Sunday’s gospel Jesus promised the disciples an advocate, who would always be there for them; that will be there to help and guide them. But for the advocate to be with them, the disciples must show their love for God by propagating the Lord’s teachings and by living HIS commandments. Therefore there is no fulfillment of the promise of the advocate without the disciples’ obedience and actual acts of love.
It’s very easy for us to profess that we love Jesus, but do we really love Jesus? For example, we say we love Jesus but we choose to turn a blind eye to someone in need of our help. Or we continue to engage with sin. Where is then the concrete action of our love for God?
For our love for Jesus to grow and bear fruit we have to nurture it with actual acts of love. We have to share Jesus and we have to become a living Jesus for others so that through us they will know Jesus.
As we do these noble acts we at the same time allow the Holy Spirit to come to us and we give it space to move freely within us. We therefore do good all the time and this we do not do by our singular actions. We do this because the Holy Spirit is prompting us to do it.
Do you want to feel the presence of the Holy Spirit within you? – Marino J. Dasmarinas
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