The Book of Acts

“Because the Holy Spirit had not yet come on any of them; they had simply been baptized in the name of Jesus.” —Acts 8:16

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Like most babies I was baptized a couple months after I was born. Was this so I didn’t go to purgatory or hell if I were to die? Or was it just for tradition’s sake? I don’t know. I’ve always felt God was close to me since I was little—like a trusted friend I could tell my problems to. But it wasn’t until I worked the soup kitchen at a church in Detroit recently that I really felt baptized in the Spirit. God went from living outside of me to living IN me in one day. I’ve been back to the soup kitchen every month since. Christ lives with the suffering. If you want to see Him, feel His presence, experience the Holy Spirit, go be with and help the suffering. Any living sufferer will do—this could be nature, animals, water, humans—Whatever touches your heart and makes you weep, but try to see God’s face in your work. For me, I found that my soul is drawn to the homeless. Search your heart for your calling. God is calling for your REAL baptism this way. The lay theologian, William Stringfellow, once said, “care enough to weep.” I will take this a tad further and say IF you care enough to weep, maybe you’ve found God’s call for you. And that is the voice of the Holy Spirit which lives in all of us. Awaken it! .

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