But life is not totally pointless and senseless. History is never all over and done with. Every act, no matter how small, has its consequences. Some acts change the world dramatically, as Christopher Columbus did when he sailed westwards in search of India. Others are less dramatic, but just as decisive.
God is at work in history, working in us, through us and for us. Other writers of the Old Testament saw history as the story of God's relationship with a chosen people. And the Church sees this relationship as concentrated in the earthly life of Jesus, his death and his resurrection, the turning point of all history.
History can often seem distant and irrelevant. We may marvel at the Great Wall of China, but do we care who built it? Often it is just a series of stories in books - with a few interesting bits, like Nero fiddling while Rome burned, or Harold with an arrow in his eye, or Henry VIII and his six wives. And many people fit Jesus into this category - a set of stories in a book. Four books in particular, Matthew, Mark, Luke and John.
God is far more than a story in a book. Jesus lives on in us, in his Church, in his sacraments. Not for nothing did John the Baptist proclaim that when Jesus came, he would baptize "with the Holy Spirit and with fire" (Mt 3:11).
Fire warms, and fire destroys. Fire tests and purifies (2 Cor 3:13-15). When Jesus said "I have come to cast fire upon the earth" (Luke 12:49), some people would have felt very uncomfortable, for fire burns up the worthless.
But we are not all chaff. What is good in us welcomes the cleansing fire of God's love, laying bare our sin. Moses saw God in a burning bush. The apostles saw God in tongues of fire. The fire was the Holy Spirit, not only purifying, but also igniting them.
Faced with the volcanic power of God's Spirit, we are just miserable ants. But Jesus sent the same Spirit to comfort us and to strengthen us, to be our advocate, to stand beside us. The Spirit makes God's love real for us today.
"By this we know that we abide in him and he in us, because he has given us of his own Spirit." (1 John 4:13). This is the meaning of Pentecost. And from this close presence flow all the gifts, of love and joy and peace that God wants us to have. Come, Holy Spirit, come.
HD