Easter6A20.    Acts of the Apostles   8:5-8, 14-17.

It appears that because of a persecution in Jerusalem led by Saul, Philip moves on and goes to evangelize Samaria.  The miracles that Philip performed helped the Samaritans to accept Jesus as the Messiah with great joy.  Before they had “been baptized only in the name of the Lord Jesus” but that was previous to Pentecost.  So they had not received the fullness of baptism, the Holy Spirit.  Peter and John were sent by the apostles in Jerusalem to bring the Holy Spirit to them.

John 14:15-21.  “Jesus said to his disciples: ‘If you love me, you will keep my commandments.”   The commandments he is speaking of are not the Ten Commandments given to Moses but rather ‘loving Jesus’ means that we love his will and will do whatever he wants of us.  After all, his will is an expression of his love for us. To love God means to love him as one who is infinitely supreme and superior to everything and anyone else.  To love God is to respect who he is and, in an incredibly stark contrast to him, who we are. We love him as our God over us and we love his love for us, who only amount to anything because of his love for us and our living in his love for us.  “And whoever loves me will be loved by my Father, and I will love him and reveal myself to him.”  1 Peter 1:8a,b: says: “Although you have not seen him you love him; even though you do not see him now yet believe in him.”  Learning to live with Jesus daily is a wonderful experience that is at the same time mystical, spiritual and real.  Believe; he makes it happen.

The Holy Spirit he gives us is always with us and in us.  Not only is the Spirit in us; but Jesus says of himself that he will be in us and we will be in him.  In the Trinity, the Father and the Son are in the Spirit; the Spirit and the Son in the Father, and the Son in the Father and the Spirit.  In our own lowly way the Three Persons who are One God is inviting us to be a loved member of the Divine Trinitarian Family, where God’s love is our life.

1 Peter 3:15-18.   “For it is better to suffer for doing good, if that be the will of God, than for doing evil.”  “Put to death in the flesh, he was brought to life in the spirit.”  Jesus, both human and divine, surrendered his human life in the flesh to death; but that humanness rose from death to a spiritual life that carried him eternally beyond anything that is human.  In our world a body in the casket is lifeless and hopefully remembered for a wonderful past.  However that life that was once in that body has now immeasurably more, higher and far greater life than it ever had before.