As Luke tells it (Acts 2:42-47), the Holy Spirit wants us to live together in peace, joy, and generosity. I love the picture Luke paints of the believers “breaking bread at home and eating their food with glad and generous hearts” (2:46). A footnote says that the word translated as generous here could also be translated as sincere, and that sounds like the Holy Spirit’s work, too.
Do you know someone with a generous heart, a sincere heart? How does it feel to be around someone like that? How do you think it feels to be someone like that? And how can we, both as individuals and collectively, become like that?
The Holy Spirit works with what’s already there. That morning in Jerusalem, the disciples, the crowds, and Peter with his ready tongue were already there, ready to be inspired (that’s what the word means, to be filled with the Spirit)—and the Holy Spirit went to work. What’s already there in your life? Where are you ready to be inspired? How can you act on that inspiration to joy and generosity?
This message is excerpted from “How can you act on inspiration with joy and generosity?” by Audrey Novak Riley from the May 31, 2021, blog of the Women of the ELCA. Today we commemorate The Martyrs of Uganda, 1886, and John XXIII, Bishop of Rome, 1963.
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