I have told you now before it happens, so that when it does happen you will believe. (Joh 14:29 NIV)

Let’s not forget all those sufferings our Lord had to pass through with his disciples before the Holy Spirit brought his special gifts that have been our topic this past week of Pentecost. That bitter warfare with the lord of this world was most terribly wrought even though our Lord and King spoke about it quite at peace with himself and full of confidence in his final victory and triumph. It was only in the Garden of Gethsemane where his disciples accompanied him to the edges of the battlefield that he gave more than just a hint of the seriousness of the coming crisis.

If that is now sounding very much like a Lenten devotion and not so full of joy of Pentecost, then that is because our Lord guides us in this manner through his holy word. The most beautiful promises of our Lord concerning the comforter go along with the serious prospect of the coming suffering of Jesus Christ right up to his death on the cross. The Hallelujahs of this victorious Pentecost celebration are grounded solidly in the salvific act on Golgotha. As the glorious ascension of our Lord is the prerequisite for the miraculous outpouring of the Holy Spirit on Pentecost so the ascension itself is caused by the Lenten suffering of our Lord and his glorification on the cross. On that cross all was earned and achieved  – and there will be no time – not even in eternity that this remembrance of the crucified Christ will be sidelined or even forgotten. His pierced hands, feet, side, body and head will always occupy centre stage in the life of the faithful. Therefore praise and worship to his glorious kingdom now in the Pentecostal time, but glory and honor too to his vicarious, all-availing and most precious sacrifice there on the wondrous cross and martyr pole.

We praise you o God and Father, you Lord of heaven and earth, that you have given your only begotten son Jesus Christ for us into death. You lead him into the deepest humiliation and shame before you rose him to the highest realms of victory and glory. We praise you o Lord Jesus Christ that you went all the way obediently to the will of your Father, faithfully fulfilling all that was demanded for us and our salvation from sin, death and the devil. Praise and worship also to you o most precious Holy Spirit, who teaches and reminds us, but also comforts, strengthens, sanctifies, completes and fulfills. You, o triune and eternal God, whom we worship, adore and call upon in all our holidays. Christmas, Easter and Pentecost are yours and we praise, thank, glorify and exult you as your called and saved congregation – now and forever.  Amen.

All praise and thanks to God the Father now be given; The Son and Him Who reigns with Them in highest Heaven; The one eternal God, whom earth and Heaven adore; For thus it was, is now, and shall be evermore. (Martin Rinkart 1586-1649 tr Catherine Winkworth 1856)

This is a rather free translation of Wilhelm Löhe’s devotion for Saturday after the high Christian holiday of Pentecost. It is found on Pg. 214 in Lob sei Dir ewig, o Jesu!   (Eternal Praise to you o Jesus!) edited by A. Schuster and published in the Freimund Verlag, Neuendettelsau 1949.