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Hey, everybody, Keith Nestor here. I am really excited because I'm heading to the Defending the Faith at Franciscan University of Steubenville, and I'll be part of a special panel with my friends Anna Mundley, Brian Holdsworth, and Emily Deninney. This is one of my favorite Catholic conferences of the year. Incredible speakers, powerful worship, and tons of Catholics coming together to grow deeper in their faith. I'll even be leading the Rosary live with the Rosary Crew. So if you've never been before, this is the year to go. I'd love to see you there. Click the link in the description below to get signed up today. Welcome to Unpacking the Mass with Keith Nestor. On this podcast, we dig into the week's readings for the upcoming Sunday for the Catholic Church so that when you go to Mass, you are ready to hear what God has to say to you through the Scriptures. So grab your Bibles and let's get digging. Hey, friends, welcome to Unpacking the Mass. Today we're looking at the readings for Pentecost. This is a fantastic day, friends. The day when the Holy Spirit falls upon the apostles and they begin to preach the gospel in languages they don't understand to a group of people that have come for a different reason, and they leave with repentance and entrance into the church. It's a beautiful thing, the fulfillment. So many things that Jesus promised and the world has never been the same. And our lives continue to see this played out and the world continues to change because of this incredible mission. God always has a plan. We don't always understand the timing. These men didn't understand the timing either. And yet here it was. And boom. What an amazing day. Let's pray and then we'll jump into the readings. In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen. Let your Spirit fall upon us here as we look at these readings for Pentecost, Lord, and as the church continues to grow, may we be in the stream of your promise and your authority. In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen. All right, let's look at Acts, chapter two, my friends, verses one through eleven. When the day of Pentecost had come, they were all together in one place. And suddenly a sound came from heaven like the rush of a mighty wind. And it filled all the house where they were sitting. And there appeared to them, tongues as a fire distributed and resting upon each one of them. And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other Tongues as the Spirit gave them utterance. Now there were dwelling in Jerusalem Jews, devout men from every nation under heaven. And at this sound, the multitude came together. And they were bewildered because each one heard. Heard them speaking in his own language. And they were amazed and wondered, saying, are not all these who are speaking Galileans? And how is it that we hear each of us in his own native language? Parthians and Medes, Elamites and residents of Mesopotamia, Judea and Cappadocia, Pontius, Asia, Phrygia and Pamphylia, Egypt. And the parts of Libya belonging to Cyrene. And visitors from Rome, both Jews and Proselytes, Cretans and Arabians. We hear them telling in our own tongues the mighty works of God. Our second reading comes from St. Paul's first letter to the church at Corinth. And we'll be reading in chapter 12, verses 3 through 7 and 12 through 13. St. Paul writes these words. Therefore, I want you to understand that no one speaking by the Spirit of God ever says, jesus be cursed. And no one can say Jesus is Lord except by the Holy Spirit. Now, there are varieties of gifts, but the same Spirit. And there are varieties of service, but the same Lord. And there are varieties of working. But it is the same God who inspires them all in everyone. To each is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good. For just as the body is one and has many members, and all the members of the body, though many are one body, so it is with Christ. For by one spirit we were all baptized into one body. Jews or Greeks, slaves or free. And all were made to drink of the one spirit. And then one of my favorite passages from John's Gospel, chapter 20, verses 19 through 23. On the evening of that day, the first day of the week, the doors being shut where the disciples were for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood among them and said to them, peace be with you. When he had said this, he showed them his hands and his side. Then the disciples were glad when they saw the Lord Jesus said to them again, peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, even so I send you. And when he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven. If you retain the sins of any, they are retained. All right, my friends, powerful stuff. Let's talk about Pentecost. What's going on here? Now, Pentecost comes from the Greek word pentecoste, which means 50th, which means 50 days after Easter. But it gets its roots from the Jewish festival of Shavuot, which is the feast of weeks, or the first fruits. Now, this is a Jewish feast. It's a holiday that commemorates the giving of the Torah, the first five books of the Jewish Bible, to Moses on Mount Sinai. And this feast, of course, is one of three major festivals called pilgrim festivals, where the Jews were required to come back to Jerusalem and to come to the temple. So why is this significant, what we see happening here? Okay, if you think about the importance of the law given to the people of God in the Old Testament, you recognize that that was where really everything changed. Now they knew what God required of them, and they had this guiding force toward the way they should live and this covenant that God made with them. Well, Jesus comes and he makes a new covenant. He fulfills the old covenant, the old law, right. He says, I don't come to abolish it. I come to fulfill it. So he fulfills that. And then he says to the apostles, I am making a new covenant, a new command I give you. And it's a command based on love and based on his sacrifice. The old law had a lot to do with the sacrifices in the temple as an atonement for sin, but really that was a foreshadowing, the ultimate atonement for sin, which would come through Christ. And now the Holy Spirit comes upon these men to proclaim this new covenant, the gospel on the feast that celebrates the giving of the law. Think it was just a coincidence? Of course not, my friends. Now, what's significant about tongues being spoken here? People make a big deal out of this, but the tongues that were spoken were not the gibberish that you see people doing in weird Pentecostal services or whatever, that no one knows what they're talking about. Right? These were actual languages that were spoken and understood by the hearers. And I think it's so powerful that they were not known by the apostles that were speaking them. Why? Because this is to show this was about what God was doing, not about what these people could do. They couldn't, under their own power, speak the gospel in the native language of those coming from all over the region, all over the different nations that were coming, my friends, that wasn't within the power of the disciples in and of themselves. But as the Holy Spirit falls upon them now, all of a sudden, they have this incredible power because of the Holy Spirit working through them. And what was the result of this power, the gospel, the new covenant, being preached, not just to the Jews, but to everybody. Now, I know you might say, well, not everybody, because that was the beginning. But remember what Jesus said. You will be my witnesses from Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, to the ends of the earth. Now, we've seen that in the past, readings about, you know, the different places, Philip going to Samaria and all these others in the missionary journeys of Paul and eventually how the disciples would spread out because of persecution, that God would use that even to bring the Gospel to the ends of the earth. But this is all where it begins, my friends. And it shows us this powerful promise that Jesus gave to the apostles. Remember, just before he ascended, what did he say to them? Friends, think about this. He said, do not leave Jerusalem, but wait for the gift my father promised, which you have heard me speak about. For John, baptized with water, but in a few days, you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit. They had no idea what that meant. They had no idea. But notice this promise given to them is contingent on what they did. Otherwise, he just would have said, you guys do whatever you want. It doesn't matter. No, he said, stay in Jerusalem. Stay together. There's power in this community because that's the church that Christ started and gave his authority and promise to friends, the promises of God will be fulfilled. But the question is, will we be a part of that fulfillment? And that's up to us, really. By our participation in the church of Jesus Christ, the community that God gave those promises to, we can ensure that we receive the fulfillment as well. So in some sense, you would say that these promises were not given to individuals. They were given to a collective. And those individuals made up that collective because God wasn't interested in everybody going their own way and doing their own thing. No, he was forming a church. When Jesus told St. Peter, upon this rock, I will build my church. Speaking of him, I call you rock. And upon this rock, I will build my church. And the gates of hell will not prevail against it. He's making this promise to Peter. Yes, but it's about the church. And as we remain in that church, we remain in this problem. That's why it's so dangerous to leave the church. Because if you leave the church thinking, oh, I got the Holy Spirit, I got the Bible, I can just go do whatever I want to do. Well, you might have some truth with you, but you don't carry that promise with you, my friends, not this one. This promise doesn't follow individuals. It stays with the collective. And that's so important, my friends. And it was all just beginning. Pentecost is a Beginning. And it's a beginning for us to celebrate each and every year when we come to worship the Lord and celebrate this feast, we're reminded that God always fulfills his promises. But notice the fulfillment of God's promise is connected to his mission. So we have to likewise stay connected to his mission. He doesn't give these promises and say, you guys are going to have the best lives ever. You guys are going to prosper and have health and wealth, and whatever you do is going to be successful and all these wonderful things are going to happen to you. That was not the promise. The promise was that his mission would be fulfilled through them by the power of the Holy Spirit. Now, I would argue that's the best way to live, isn't it? That's better than living a cushy life with no meaning or purpose, in isolation from God. That might be what the world wants, but that's fleeting. Whereas when we join ourselves to the mission of God, yeah, we're going to experience some persecution. We. We're going to experience some difficulty. But we will also experience God's presence and God's promise and God's power. The three Ps, my friends. His presence, his promise, his power. Boom. Remember that? That's what Pentecost, the fourth P. Whoa, that just hit me is all about. Now let's look at our second reading. St. Paul's talking to the Church of Corinth about the Holy Spirit. And what does he say about the Holy Spirit? Right? He says that you can't be full of the Holy Spirit and say, ah, Jesus, be cursed. And that. And no one can say Jesus is Lord except by the Holy Spirit. This is where we can have unity as Christians of all different shapes and sizes and denominational backgrounds or whatever. So when we together, Christians, Catholic, Protestant, Orthodox alike, all declare Jesus Christ as Lord, we say yes and amen, recognizing that that is the Spirit's power within us. Now, you guys know how I feel about that. I think everybody should become Catholic, but I recognize that not everybody's Catholic. And I also recognize this, this is important, that the Spirit of God is at work in Christian communities that aren't necessarily Catholic. He's drawing people to Christ. And we can say yes and amen to that, my friends, because God's Spirit is always going to take us to Jesus. And people have different paths to get where they want to go. Now, don't hear what I'm not saying. I think everybody needs to be Catholic. But that happens oftentimes as a revelation to a person that's already got this understanding of who Jesus is. That's what happened to me. I was a Christian before I was Catholic. And God's Spirit had called me into a relationship with Jesus 100%. But as I dug deeper into that, I was led into his church. And maybe some of you are in that situation as well. I'm not here to say to you you don't have the Holy Spirit. Not at all. I think we're joined together by the power of the Holy Spirit, because no one can say Jesus is Lord except by the power of the Spirit. Now he was. Oh, what about, you know, the Mormons, they say Jesus is Lord. Do they have the Holy Spirit? Well, I think you can get into some, some issues with that because what they mean by Jesus is not what we mean. We believe Jesus is the second person of the Holy Trinity. We believe that, that he is eternal with the Father. They don't believe that about him. They don't believe the same things about God that we believe. So they can create a different version of a religion in their mind and say Jesus is Lord, but it's not the same Jesus because Jesus is not the brother of Satan. Jesus is not a created being. He is before all things, the Alpha and the Omega, the first and the last, the beginning and the end. Read John 1, right? Nothing was made that was not made by Him. He's the author of life, my friends, not a creation. He's the second person of the Trinity. So when we say Jesus is Lord and we have unity, it's around who Jesus really is. And then he goes into this discussion about the various roles that we have from the one same spirit. And I think this is important because even though we have the same spirit illuminating us, we're not all to operate in the exact same way. Now, this doesn't mean that we all have different missions. No, we have the same mission. It's God's mission. But there are different ways that we need to operate in order to fulfill that mission. The gifts of the Spirit, different gifts in order to accomplish different things. But check out what he says about the purpose of all this. This is important, my friends. To each is given the manifestation of the Spirit is verse seven for the common good. And then he uses this analogy of a body. The body has many members, and all members of the body, though many are one body. So it is with Christ. Why? Because of our baptism, my friends, and because of the Spirit which comes to us in baptism. It's for the common good, not our own personal plaything. The Holy Spirit is not given to us to make us feel good. No, the gifts of the Spirit are given to us so that we can be used to build up other people so that we can proclaim the gospel. That's so important. But there's one other aspect of the Spirit's power that we're going to talk about as we look at the Gospel here. And this is a fantastic text because it's talking about the role of the Holy Spirit, not just within relation to the revelation of who Jesus is. We've already talked about that. But the relationship with Jesus, and that relationship has to involve reconciliation. Why? Because we're sinners. And I think it's so interesting that the resurrected Jesus, when he comes to the disciples and he gives them what? Talk about this. When he gives them his authority to forgive or retain sins, that is not separate from the power of the Holy Spirit. That's the power of the Holy Spirit that operates in that gift. It's not, all right, I've given you that gift. Go do it. No, it's in the Spirit. He breathes on them and says, receive the Holy Spirit. Whoever sins you forgive are forgiven, and whose ever sins you retain or retain. Now, of course, we know this is talking about confession to a priest, these men and their successors. And I know people freak out about this. I've had many conversations with people who are like, why do you believe you got to confess your sins to a priest? Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Where's that in the Bible? Here it is, here it is. And you show them this, they just go, oh, that's not what that means. And I always ask them, you tell me what it means. And some of the answers I get are just hilarious. I've had people say things like this. Well, when Jesus gave them the authority to forgive sins or retain sins, what that's really talking about. I love this one. That's just talking about preaching the gospel. They're just there to announce the forgiveness of sins. Well, wait a minute. Why does he need to give them the authority to announce the forgiveness of sins? Right? I'm not talking about, like this teaching authority of the correct doctrine. If all they're doing, I mean, we're all called to announce the gospel, right? But does that mean that we have the authority to say to someone, your sins are forgiven and your sins are not? You see, that's where it gets really dicey. Not in the whole idea of forgiving sins. Because the other thing that you hear people say is, well, we're all given that Authority to forgive sins. If somebody comes to you and says, hey, I want to confess my sins, you know, we don't need a priest. We just, you know, confess your sins to one another, right? As James says, you don't need a priest for that. Well, okay, does that mean I have the authority to say, no, you're not forgiven? That's usually where people get hung up. They want to say, oh, well, we all have the authority to say, hey, you know what, you're forgiven. There are some Protestant liturgies that actually say that. They say, in the name of Jesus, we announce that you are forgiven. When nobody's ever confessed anything, they just say that as part of their liturgy. But I've never heard anybody say, ah, guess what? No, your sins are retained. Because here's what would happen. You would go, let's say you go to your buddy and you tell him your sins, you confess your sins to him and he goes, you know what? No, you're not forgiven. Well, what makes him any better than anybody else? Just go down to the next buddy and say, hey, that guy said I'm not forgiven. What about you? Where's the actual authority? No one ever wants to put legs on that one, do they? No, my friends, this is so clear what's going on here. Jesus has given these men the authority by the power of the Holy Spirit to forgive the sins of people who come and confess it. You say, well, how do they do that? Well, obviously they're going to know because people confess their sins to them. This is a no brainer, okay? And it's powerful. But what I want to focus in on is that it's the power of the Holy Spirit that's given here. Because the Holy Spirit is about conviction. The Holy Spirit is about revelation, right? The Holy Spirit will show us our sins, we will recognize where we've sinned and the revelation of who Jesus is. We've seen that before, right? When Jesus said to the disciples, the Holy Spirit will remind you of everything that I've commanded you. He's going to remind you of what I've said. He's going to testify unto me. There's that revelation piece. And yet there's also, and this is beautiful, that restorative peace, the power of the Holy Spirit, my friends, that's so amazing. It's about conviction, restoration and forgiveness. Because the same spirit that motivates and activates the ability to preach the gospel is the same Spirit that brings forgiveness and healing. When we mess it up, that's important. That's important because we're going to. Jesus gave this gift to all of us because he knew we were going to need it. You know, John would write in one of his letters later, he would say, I write this to you that you may not sin. But if we do sin, we have an advocate with the Father, right? If we confess our sins, he's faithful and just and will forgive us. Nobody believes that the Catholic priest in his own identity has the authority to forgive sins. It's only when he's acting in that stream. Authority given to him by Jesus, by the power of the Holy Spirit. That's what we mean when we say he's acting in Persona Christi, in the person of Christ. So when you go to confession, you don't have to worry about what this dude thinks of you, because in some sense, you're not even talking to him. You're whispering into the ear of Jesus. And Jesus operates in that priest. He's Jesus with skin on, to bring to you that forgiveness. I've told this story a few times, but maybe you haven't heard it before. But one time, I gave a talk early after my conversion, and a guy came up to me. He said, oh, I used to be Catholic. I always loved those that, you know, you're gonna have a great conversation with. Someone leads with that. And I just got a question for you, Keith. Why would you want to confess your sins to a man when you can just go to God directly? And I just looked at him and I said, why wouldn't you want to? He says, what do you mean? And I'm like, I've been doing the whole go into my room and pray and ask for forgiveness thing my whole life, and that's fine. But I've never felt more of a sense of freedom, forgiveness, than when I've heard the words of absolution from someone who has traced his authority back to this moment in John 20. Because the apostles and their successors, who are the bishops of the Catholic Church today and their priests are their representatives. My friends have been given that authority. And I know that when I hear those words of absolution, that's an objective moment in time that I can point to and receive that gift. And there's nothing like it. If you're a Protestant, let me just tell you. You know, I'm not. You may not want to become Catholic, but at the very least, understand that when Catholics go to confession, they're not just, you know, telling their sins to a man, they're telling them to Jesus. And that it's one of the most beautiful Things ever. So if you want to stay Protestant, that's up to you. But just don't beat up on Catholics who want to go to confession, because I'm telling you, it's a beautiful, beautiful thing. And if you are Catholic and you haven't been in a while, maybe you're watching this and you're just like, man, I've been to confession in years, man, there would be nothing that would make me happier than to know that after watching this episode, you went to confession that day or the next day, if that's what you did. Please let me know in the comments. By the way, I'm telling you right now, I could just, like, shut this whole thing down. And if I saw that you did that, I would feel like everything was. Work was worth it. Be amazing, my friends, because it's so beautiful. That's the fulfillment right At Pentecost, this message goes out. God, through the power of the Holy Spirit, gave them that ability to preach that message and bring people in to the church. And through the power of reconciliation, he brings them back. It's beautiful. It's beautiful. My friends, I hope you have that awesome experience. And I hope you remember that even though you might feel insignificant, you are part of the body of Christ if you've been baptized into him through the power of the Holy Spirit, that one spirit has brought you in. So don't say, you know, oh, I have no part to play. No, you have a part to play. And we need you. God needs you for his purposes. That's why you were made just uniquely you. And may his Spirit work within you to transform you and equip you and empower you to perform his mission, my friends. But remember, you got to do what he says. What did he tell the disciples? Stay in Jerusalem. Stay together. Wait. Sometimes you got to wait too. And always you got to stay with the church. Don't go rogue. Stay with the church. Be ready, be patient, and see what God will do. Praise God. This is going to be an amazing year. Thank you so much for sticking with me here on Unpacking the Mask. You need to get caught up. There's a little card right here to get you caught up with the previous episodes. Do me a favor, please like and subscribe to this channel. If you're listening on a podcast, we appreciate the five star review. And hey, if you'd like to become a supporter of our ministry, there's links in the description where you can donate through our website or through support communities that we have like Patreon and locals. We appreciate that so much. My friends, we can't do this without you. But by the power of the Holy Spirit and with your support, God's going to continue to bring the truth to the world. And we thank you for being a part of it, my friends. Take care, and God bless you.