The first readings over these past few weeks have been a passage from the book of Acts.  And they have pictured that kind of euphoria, that sense of having made it, having triumphed, that the early church must have felt.

But this Gospel passage today begins to temper that sense of completeness, of having arrived at the end of the journey of faith.  St John wrote his Gospel perhaps some sixty years after the time of Christ.  And over those years, he must have come to see that that sense of completeness, of triumph, had been just a little misplaced.  From all that had happened, it was clear that God had chosen us.  Now it must be made clear that we have chosen God.

So, the long, sometimes painful, but always valuable process of reforming oneself from within, of bringing one’s mind and heart into accord with the mind of God, is the process to which we are called by the saving power of Christ.  But once called we are certainly not abandoned in this process.  Rather Christ calls us to become personally involved in the process of our own salvation precisely because he himself is so intimately involved in the process of our salvation. 

If it is sometimes easy to say ‘No’ to the call of faith it is never necessary to do so, no matter how difficult the situation may seem to be.  Christ promises to send the Holy Spirit who will be for each of us the spirit of truth, who will urge us from within to follow the way of truth.  If we are open to the guidance of the Spirit, our choices will be Christ’s own. 

And there are two signs that can help us tell whether or not we are following the guidance of the Spirit.  The Spirit calls us to the Church.  We are invited as a people, and we respond as such.  If a choice we make, a way of life we build for ourselves, leads us far, far away from such communion, leads us to be influenced by, interact with fewer and fewer of God’s people in worship, in learning, in the sacraments, then it is a bad choice.  We are blocking out the movement of the Spirit.

And the Spirit urges us to a wholeness, an integrity, and the real satisfaction that such brings with it.  Put more negatively, if we make a mess of our lives, if we are deaf to the call of the Spirit, then something in us hurts.  If our lives are marked consistently by a dissatisfaction, a sense that something is wrong here, an emptiness, then that is a fairly good sign that we may be missing the direction in which the Spirit is trying to lead us.  It is true that the life of Grace may not always be easy or comfortable or pleasant.  But followed honestly and persistently, it will feel right.