By Anđela Čale
I began to take the Holy Spirit seriously four years ago when a book was ‘accidentally’ found on my desk, The Ways of the Holy Spirit. I read it in one breath and it was as if I realized then that the Holy Spirit was not some fictional cartoon character, but it was still just rational knowledge. After that I began to encounter him in the word of God and in other people, in nature I recognized his action. In the end, he showed me that in my life too, all the good I have done is his. My abilities are from him, my perserverance, courage, visions, ideas… it is all his. He also reminded me of the day of my confirmation and how truly gracious it way to encounter him, but later I was slowly „losing“ him.
I experienced him through his action, through the gifts that the charismatics told me about, through the fruits that I recognized, but something was still missing.
Three years ago I came to the Prayer and the Word community and at one seminar I heard a speech about him as a person, about one who needs to be met and experienced. It thrilled me and from that moment on I longed to meet him, to experience the Holy Spirit.
The story about Professor and his experience, and then the experience of others motivated me to constantly pray, to seek him.
Why should I not experience the Holy Spirit myself if others have received it too?
I realized that this search had at one point become an end in itself and that I had lost what I had before, and that is to work spontaneously with him. I am now in the third part of the formation (Flash) in the community and at one of the meetings I was very touched when I heard that we should stop trying because it is a grace. It was a bit abstract to me, because all my life I have learned to try and that I can only reach the goal with effort, but already tired of the effort I decided to stop. The weeks that came after were really hard – I went through the desert, various temptations, trials and at the moment I thought I would not be able to go any further, it happened!
At the beginning of that Flash meeting, I was most uncollected. There was no was I could gather myself in the introductory prayer, but I decided not to give up that despite not meeting Jesus, despite it being so hard, I would not give up. I will wait as much as I need to.
When the second part of the meeting started, I felt my heart absorb like never before – as if my soul clung to the words of our leader. She talked about the kingdom of God, the Trinity, the sacraments, and how, through the sacraments, the Trinity is a part of us and that is where the kingdom of God lies, and it all made sense to me.
At the end of the meeting, we were given the task of looking into ourselves and discovering the kingdom of God within ourselves. The leader pointed out: do not pray, think, ponder or meditate. By doing so, she refuted all my previous ways of discovering and encountering God, and I wondered „So what does she want from us now?“
The leader just said to monitor ourselves and observe how the kingdom of God is within us.
Honestly, I laughed at firs because somehow it all seemed too simple for me to be true. Despite this, I could hardly wait for the meeting to end to try what she said and I had already planned how and how many times I would repeat it until the next meeting.
To my great surprise, the encounter happened the moment I stood in front of the mirror. I just stopped and somehow confidently repeated the sentences I had heard at the meeting and were aware of those truths. As I spoke those words, my gaze changed.
I felt the Holy Trinity! I was so moved that my tears were dripping, and joy came out with every tear. Then I experienced the sentence by St. Augustine, „I seek you so hard, and you are in me.“
The peace and joy were indescribable so much that it was somehow terrifying how much bigger it was than me.
In that moment I saw all my escapes from myself, from God. Somehow I got a broader picture and answers to all the questions to world events to events in my life. It is hard to describe the breadth of that realization, it all became clear to me. It is difficult to describe this in words, but it went in stages and that joy, different joy, was the joy of existence itself.
The next morning I stood in front of the mirror again to see if it „was still lasting“; and if I still had that look.
It was interesting to me that I did not just have a different view of myself, but of everything.
Was that the experience that Professor had? I do not have an answer to that question, but somehow it does not even matter to me because I met the Trinity and for the first time I experienced what it means God is one in three Divine persons.
I go on now and believe that this outpouring of the Spirit will be recognized by the fruits – because Jesus said „whoever believes in me will do the works I have been doing, and they will do even greater things than these“ – and I believe that he is telling the truth.
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