The Wild Child
by Rev. Dr. Amy Chilton on 08/08/24
As I’ve been reflecting on the Spirit this week, I have been reminded again and again that the Spirit is no tame creature! We often picture her as a dove, which feels peaceful, but Scripture also pictures the Spirit as fire! Not only did the Spirit fall as flames of fire at Pentecost, but it also led the Israelites out of slavery as a pillar of fire in the nighttime darkness.
God’s Spirit appeared as fire as a sign that God was present with God’s people. Numbers 9:15-16 recounts the day the tabernacle was set up (the temporary version of the Temple that traveled the wilderness with the Israelites for 40 years), when God’s Spirit came and dwelt in it in the form of fire.
Fires might be peaceful to sit in front of while camping, but fires are also powerful - think of a forest or kitchen fire. When we picture the Spirit as flames of fire we are reminded that God’s Spirit moves with power as it will - often in new and surprising ways and always outside our control. The Holy Spirit is “like the wild child of the Trinity, anywhere and everywhere moving, calling forth, and stirring things up…She is untamable, full of possibilities and creative potential”![1]
What we can remember is that when we can’t see a way forward, when we wonder where God is at work or even if God is at work, the Spirit moves with freedom and power. While we might not think there is any way the Spirit can work, the same Spirit who came as a pillar of fire and led an enslaved people towards unbelievable freedom can also find a new way forward for us. The history of the peoples of God has shown over and over that our imaginations are always smaller than the power of God’s Spirit.
Where are you needing the Spirit to set up camp and remind you that you are loved by the creator of the universe? What mazes or traps are you caught in that you need the Spirit to light herself on fire and show you the way forward? What new movements do we need the Spirit to fall on as flames of fire - giving us courage to step forward into our futures knowing the Spirit lights the way?
Whatever our answers are, the Spirit’s power is deeper, and broader, and wider than our answers!
This week my prayer for you is that you see the Spirit’s light and feel the Spirit’s heat, even when she shows up in surprising and new ways.
Blessings,
Pastor Amy
PS - read these powerful words on the Spirit written by the 12th century German mystic, Hildegaard of Bingen:
“I, the highest and fiery power, have kindled every living spark and I have breathed out nothing that can die…I flame above the beauty of the fields; I shine in the waters; in the sun, the moon and the stars, I burn. And by means of the airy wind, I stir everything into quickness with a certain invisible life which sustains all…I, the fiery power, lie hidden in these things and they blaze from me.”[2]
[1] Loida I. Martell-Otero, Zaida Maldonado Pérez, and Elizabeth Conde-Frazier, Latina Evangélicas: A Theological Survey from the Margins (Eugene, OR: Cascade, 2013), 14.
[2] Hildegaard of Bingen, Hildegaard of Bingen: Mystical Writings, trans. Robert Carver, ed. Fiona Bowie and Oliver Davies (New York: Crossroad, 1990), 91-93.
