Alive with the life-giving Spirit of God

There is a marvellous notice at Christ Church which is put in place at the main doors before services. It simply says, ‘Welcome to the service. Please switch off.’ Of course it refers to the ubiquitous mobile phones, which could easily derail a sensitive introit with a few intrusive bars of ‘Greensleeves’. However, there may well be congregations who would regard it as an invitation rather than an instruction. As we enter the creaking doors and hear the strains of the organ voluntary, the dim light inside filtered through stained glass and any conversation strictly sotto voce, switching off may seem both appropriate and appealing.

The month of May is a pentecostal month, a reminder that we are members of a body which is alive with the life-giving Spirit of God. We are not only an ‘Easter people’, living in the light of the empty tomb, but a pentecostal people, living with images of wind and fire. Week by week we are sent out ‘in the power of the Spirit’ to live to God’s praise and glory. Week by week our worship is called to be ‘in Spirit and in truth’. Day by day the Christian life is life ‘in the Spirit’. Without him, our buildings are empty shrines, our praises are simply religious concerts and our struggle to live as disciples of Christ is fatally flawed.

Jesus promised his first disciples that they would receive ‘power’ through the Holy Spirit - power in the sense of dynamic enabling. In that power they would be his witnesses in their own backyards and to the ends of the earth. Far from ‘switching off’, the truly Christian response to a call to prayer and worship is to switch on. Perhaps there should be a second sign in our porches: ‘Welcome to the service. Come, and be switched on’.

Canon David Winter is a former Diocesan Director of Evangelism, a broadcaster and author of many books including Message for the Millennium (BRF).