Rest Most Sweet

 

"In our labor, rest most sweet; grateful coolness in the heat.
Console our restless lives, by your comfort, we seek."
This verse of my favorite hymn to the Holy Spirit comes to mind when I reflect on this scene. The hymn, written by Ricky Manalo, is called By the Waking of Our Hearts. It is based on the Pentecost Sequence. I don't often love a piece of music right off. I usually get to like it only after I hear it a few times. But I heard this hymn in a church in Oregon when I was visiting my sister one year after Easter and liked it immediately. I have been singing it a lot lately and trying to memorize it.
It captures beautifully the gentle, nourishing side of the Holy Spirit, in contrast to the wildfire brought on by the Sprit in Luke's description of the first Christian Pentecost. It does occur to me, however, that letting the Holy Spirit gently draw us deep down into the innermost part of ourselves where we meet the Divine must precede any authentic witnessing to the Good News of Jesus.
The refrain of the hymn prays,
"By the waking of our hearts, by the stirring of our souls.
may the Spirit of God abide and bring us together in Christ."