To be people of the Spirit - humility, courage and relationship

WORD 2day: Tuesday, 2nd week in Easter time

April 29, 2025 - Acts 4: 32-37; John 3: 7-15

The call to get going, as we reflected yesterday, consists in becoming the people of the Spirit. Today the Word instructs us on what it means to become the people of the Spirit: it means becoming persons of humility, of courage and of relationships!

The Gospel presents to us the humble person of Nicodemus, who even though being a teacher himself, humbly dedicates himself to learning from Jesus, as Jesus reveals to him what it means to be born of the Spirit. Nicodemus proves to be a man of the Spirit, as he opens his heart to the revelation of God through Jesus, about the Spirit. 

The first reading presents to us the courage of the people of God in proclaiming their identity as belonging to the Risen Lord. When those who were released by the Sanhedrin come to the community and recount the threats and the ultimatum given by the chief priests and pharisees, the people, instead of being bogged down by the threat and the punishment, praise God and rededicate themselves to a more convinced proclamation: the courage that they received from the Spirit. 

The first reading continues to point to us another essential point about being people of the Spirit - the importance and centrality of relationships in Christian way of life. The Word will deepen the reflection on this tomorrow... but here we are already introduced into that theme, a central theme for our calling!

Being people of the Spirit requires that we are persons of humility ready to learn from the Spirit, persons of courage ready to risk anything to belong to the Lord and persons of relationship who are moved by nothing but the value of love - love of God and love of one's neighbours.