The Day God Pours Out His Spirit on Everyone

(from Joel 2:28-32)

Do you know the feeling of being too small?

Too little to reach the high shelf. Too young to stay up late. Not big enough, not loud enough, not important enough to be picked. It aches to stand at the edge while the wonderful things happen to somebody else.

God's people knew that ache. They thought maybe God only spoke to the special ones: the prophets, the priests, the grown-ups with sure, strong voices. And the rest of them wondered, down in the hidden part of the heart: Does he even see me? Am I too young, too old, too plain to matter to God?

So God gave the prophet Joel a picture. A dream of a day that was coming.

And in the dream, God said:

I will pour out my Spirit.
Not a few drops for a few people.
I will pour it out like rain on thirsty ground.
On your sons. On your daughters.
The young ones will dream dreams.
The old ones will see visions.
Even the servants, the smallest, the last in line,
my Spirit will rest on them too.

Long before, when God came down on the smoking mountain, only Moses could climb up while everyone else waited far below. Now God was promising something new. His very breath, his nearness, poured down into ordinary people. Into children, into the forgotten, into anyone, anywhere, who called out his name.

The sun would go dark, Joel said. The moon would turn red as a coal. The whole wide world would feel that something enormous was here. And tucked inside all that wonder, the gentlest promise of all:

Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.

Everyone means the youngest and the oldest and the last in line. Everyone means you.

For a long, long time, Joel's dream stayed a dream. The people carried it like a folded letter they were not allowed to open yet. They waited. And waited. The day had not come.

Until one morning, long after Joel, a small room full of frightened friends heard a sound like rushing wind. And the Spirit of God came down, poured out exactly as he had promised, on every single one of them. Young and old, men and women, every last one.

It was the day Joel had seen, and it came because Jesus had opened the door. Jesus had gone all the way down into the dark and come back alive. And one of the very first things he did, risen and brimming with joy, was send his own Spirit to live inside ordinary people. To live inside you.

So if you have ever felt too young, too small, too plain to matter to God, remember the rain. He poured his Spirit out for exactly you. He is not waiting for you to become important first. He is already near, already gathering his whole family, and he will not leave one child standing at the edge.

The pouring began the morning that wind filled the little room, and it has not stopped. It is still falling today, and one day it will soak every corner of the world, until there is no dry ground left anywhere, and no one left standing at the edge.