From: Joel 2:28-32 (RSVCE and New Vulgate)
Joel 3:1-5 (New American Bible)
The Spirit poured out
[30] and I will give portents in the heavens and on the earth, blood and fire and co-
lumns of smoke. [31] The sun shall be turned to darkness, and the moon to blood,
before the great and terrible day of the Lord comes. [32] And it shall come to pass
that all who call upon the name of the Lord shall be delivered; for in Mount Zion
and in Jerusalem there shall be those who escape, as the Lord has said, and
among the survivors shall be those whom the Lord calls.
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Commentary:
2:18-3:21. The second part of the book is all about salvation. The Lord’s compas-
sion (2:18) is shown by the message he sends via the prophet to the people in
response to their conversion: “The Lord answered and said to his people” (2:19).
On the Lord’s behalf the prophet encourages Judah and Jerusalem, telling them
that they have no reason to be afraid, for the Lord is going to deliver them from
their afflictions and provide them with every sort of earthly good (symbolized here
by the produce of the earth – grain, wine, oil: 2:19-27).
But the high point will be when God pours out his “spirit on all flesh …” (2:28).
The outpouring of the Spirit is the definitive sign that the “day of the Lord” has
come. That “day” is mentioned five times in the book (1:15; 2:1, 11, 31; 3:14),
each time with greater emphasis. The day of the Lord is an End time when a
number of things will happen: wickedness will be punished (1:15; 2:1-3); the po-
wer of the Lord will be manifested by portents in the heavens and on earth (2:30-
31); and, above all, it is the day when the Lord will judge all nations (3:1-8).
2:28-32. This is the great passage about the outpouring of the Holy Spirit. The
word “afterward” in v. 28 marks the transition from the material benefits de-
scribed in the previous verses to spiritual benefits. The outpouring of the Spirit
involves charismatic and prophetical gifts primarily (moral gifts derive from these).
This infusion of the Spirit is the fulfillment of an ancient promise, found in Num-
bers 11:16-30: “Gather for me seventy men of the elders of Israel, […] and I will
take some of the spirit which is upon you and put it upon them, […] Would that
all the Lord’s people were prophets, that the Lord would put his spirit upon them!”
This hope is accentuated in Joel, for now no limits are placed on who will benefit
from it – elders, young people, and even servants (vv. 28-29). And the Lord will
once more perform wondrous things through them (v. 30), like those done by
prophets in the strict sense (cf. Deut 13:2; etc.).
St Peter sees this promise being fulfilled when the Holy Spirit is poured out on
the day of Pentecost (Acts 2:1-21). “Peter turns to this passage from Joel to ex-
plain the significance of what has occurred, and the signs which those present
have seen: ‘the pouring out of the Holy Spirit’. It is a super-natural work of God,
carried out with the signs typical of the coming of the Lord, as they were foretold
by the prophets and realized in the New Testament with the coming of Christ”
(Bl. John Paul II, Address, 8 November 1989). Therefore, too, in the tradition of
the Church, this descent of the Holy Spirit is seen as an extension of his descent
on Jesus in the river Jordan: “God promised through the mouths of his prophets
that in the last days he would pour out his Spirit on all his servants, and that they
too would prophesy. Thus, the Spirit of God, who had become the Son of man,
so that by remaining within him, he would inhabit the heart of mankind and ani-
mate all the works carried out by the hands of God, fulfilling the will of the Father
through all men and making all men new – new creations in Christ. Luke tells us
that after the ascension of the Lord, the Spirit descended on the apostles at Pen-
tecost, to restore men to new life and to bring the new covenant to completion.
Therefore, the disciples praised God in all the tongues of men, laying all peoples
open to the action of the Spirit and all nations open to the power and authority of
God” (St Irenaeus, “Adversus haereses”, 3, 17, 1-2).
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Source: “The Navarre Bible: Text and Commentaries”. Biblical text from the
Revised Standard Version and New Vulgate. Commentaries by members of
the Faculty of Theology, University of Navarre, Spain.
Published by Four Courts Press, Kill Lane, Blackrock, Co. Dublin, Ireland, and
by Scepter Publishers in the United States.
From: Romans 8:22-27
Christians are Children of God (Continuation)
[26] Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness; for we do not know how to
pray as we ought, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with sighs too deep for
words. [27] And he who searches the hearts of men knows what is the mind of
the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of
God.
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Commentary:
19-21. To make his point more vividly St Paul, in a metaphor, depicts the whole
of creation, the material universe, as a living person, groaning in pain impatiently
waiting for a future event, raising its head, straining to see something appear on
the horizon.
The material world is indeed, through God’s design, linked to man and his des-
tiny. “Sacred Scripture teaches that man was created ‘in the image of God,’ as
able to know and love his Creator, and as set by him over all earthly creatures
that he might rule them, and make use of them, while glorifying God” (Vatican II,
“Gaudium Et Spes”, 12). The futility to which creation is subject is not so much
corruption and death as the disorder resulting from sin. According to God’s plan
material things should be resources which enable man to attain the ultimate
goal of his existence. By using them in a disordered way, disconnecting them
from God, man turns them into instruments of sin, which therefore are subject
to the consequences of sin.
“Are we of the twentieth century not convinced of the overpoweringly eloquent
words of the Apostle of the Gentiles concerning the ‘creation (that) has been
groaning in travail together until now’ and ‘waits with eager longing for the revea-
ling of the sons of God’, the creation that ‘was subjected to futility’? Does not the
previously unknown immense progress — which has taken place especially in the
course of this century — in the field of man’s dominion over the world itself reveal
— to a previously unknown degree — that manifold subjection ‘to futility’? [...] The
world of the previously unattained conquests of science and technology—is it not
also the world ‘groaning in travail’ that ‘waits with eager longing for the revealing
of the sons of God’?” (Bl. John Paul II, “Redemptor Hominis”, 8).
Reestablishment of the order willed by God, bringing the whole world to fulfill its
true purpose, is the particular mission of the Holy Spirit, the Giver of Life, the true
Lord of history: “’The arm of the Lord has not been shortened.’ God is no less po-
werful today than he was in other times; his love for man is no less true. Our faith
teaches us that all creation, the movement of the earth and the other heavenly
bodies, the good actions of creatures and all the good that has been achieved in
history, in short everything, comes from God and is directed toward him.
“The action of the Holy Spirit may pass unnoticed because God does not reveal
to us his plans, and because man’s sin obscures the divine gifts. But faith tells
us that God is always acting. He has created us and maintains us in existence,
and he is leading all creation by his grace towards the glorious freedom of the
children of God” (St. J. Escriva, “Christ Is Passing By”, 130).
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Source: “The Navarre Bible: Text and Commentaries”. Biblical text from the
Revised Standard Version and New Vulgate. Commentaries by members of
the Faculty of Theology, University of Navarre, Spain.
Published by Four Courts Press, Kill Lane, Blackrock, Co. Dublin, Ireland, and
by Scepter Publishers in the United States.