Forty days after Jesus rose from the dead, He ascended into Heaven. However, before doing so He told the apostles: “I am sending the promise of my Father upon you; but stay in the city until you are clothed with power from on high” (Luke 24: 49). Jesus spoke of the same promise at the Last Supper when He said: “I will ask the Father, and He will give you another Advocate to be with you always, the Spirit of truth, which the world cannot accept, because it neither sees nor knows it. But you know it, because it remains with you, and will be in you” (John 14: 16-17).
What is this “it?” What is this “Advocate” that will clothe the apostles “with power from on high?” “It” is a Person, the Third Person of the Most Blessed Trinity, the Love between the Father and the Son, who dwells in all the baptized, uniting them to Christ and to one another. As the Holy Spirit came with heavenly power upon the apostles at Pentecost, so the Spirit came upon us when we received the Sacrament of Baptism. We are temples of the Holy Spirit!
The “Spirit of truth” helps us pray. While memorized and recited prayers are good and important, prayer is primarily an intimate relationship with God, and the Holy Spirit makes that possible.
St. Paul helps us understand this better. He wrote: “Among human beings, who knows what pertains to a person except the spirit of the person that is within? Similarly, no one knows what pertains to God except the Spirit of God” (1 Corinthians 2: 11). It is the Spirit who helps us know God and know how to pray: “the Spirit too comes to the aid of our weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we ought, but the Spirit itself intercedes with inexpressible groanings. And the one who searches hearts knows what is the intention of the Spirit, because it intercedes for the holy ones according to God’s will” (Romans 8: 26-27).
And so, if you ever feel dry and distracted in your prayer, you just need to remember that you have an “Advocate” who prays with you through your “groanings,” through your desires to know and love God. You can take a deep breath, imagining the Holy Spirit filling you up. Then, after holding the Breath of God within you, exhale and pray that the Spirit who fills you will go forth upon all the people and situations that have become a distracting concern for you.
“Lord, send forth Your Spirit and renew the face of the earth!”