From Gethsemane to Pentecost: a journey of faith and empowerment. In the dark, trembling hours between Gethsemane and Pentecost, the disciples of Jesus Christ went through a profound transformation.
Having watched the arrest and the trial and the crucifixion of their beloved Friend, they were swallowed by fear and confusion and despair, since the One they believed to be the Messiah had been taken from them and their hopes appeared to die along with Him. They hid behind locked doors, paralysed by the threat of persecution and uncertain what any future could still hold.
And it was precisely in that fragile time of waiting that God was at work, because Jesus had promised them the Holy Spirit, the Comforter, who would guide and strengthen and encourage them. On the day of Pentecost, as Acts 2 records, the Spirit came down on them in wind and flame and turned these frightened, uncertain followers into bold proclaimers of the Gospel.
What the disciples lived through speaks directly to the situation of the Community of Hope in Ukraine, who face russian aggression every day. The daily horrors, the loss of the people we love and the uncertainty hanging over everything mirror the anguish those disciples felt, and we as Ukrainian Christians meet the same formidable challenge of staying steadfast in faith through trial and suffering. The fears are real and they are daunting. Yet as the disciples were not abandoned despite feeling utterly deserted, neither are we, since the same Holy Spirit who empowered the early Church is present and active now, offering strength and comfort and the boldness to keep seeking Him.
Pentecost was the turning point. Filled with the Spirit, the disciples changed from followers frightened by the shadow of death into courageous witnesses to life. They preached with power, performed miracles and carried the message of Jesus Christ across the known world, and it is worth remembering that most of them did not simply die but were killed. None of that came from their own strength, since all of it came from the Spirit.
The same Spirit is available to the Community of Hope in Ukraine today, because His power is never diminished by time or by circumstance. That power lets us stand firm in faith, love and serve refugees and displaced people and soldiers and paramedics and chaplains, care for those in need and for orphans and widows, and proclaim life and resurrection even inside the ruin this war has made.
The Mission of the Church therefore stays unchanged whatever the external circumstances, since Jesus commissioned His followers to make disciples of all nations, baptising them and teaching them to observe everything He had commanded (Matthew 28:19–20), and that Mission, the reason the Community of Hope exists at all, is as relevant now as it was two thousand years ago. In peacetime and in war, for you in peaceful countries and for us in a country being wrecked by russia, our Mission has not changed: to be the light of the world, to bring hope to the hopeless, and to proclaim the redeeming presence of Jesus Christ, through suffering and death toward the resurrection. The Holy Spirit is what makes that possible, giving the courage and wisdom and endurance to keep going, so that His Kingdom and His Mission are what grow great, again and again.
Thinking about that road from Gethsemane to Pentecost, I ask the Comforter to remind me daily that the Spirit who empowered those first disciples is available now. For us in the Community of Hope, meeting the hardships of this war every day, that power is our source of hope and strength. Our Mission has not changed, and our need for the Spirit is as urgent for us today as it was for them then. Daily.
May we, like those early disciples, be filled with the Holy Spirit, encouraged to live out our faith and committed to the Mission God has given us. Daily. In peace and in war, let us rely on the power of the Spirit to guide and strengthen us, knowing that we belong to God’s unchanging Mission and to His redemptive work of bringing His love and salvation into the world, in us and through us. Daily.
Taras M. Dyatlik, Ukraine
816th day of the ongoing full-scale russian war
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