Holy Spirit
I usually worship in Holy Spirit church in Tallinn, Estonia. Behind the altar in Holy Spirit church, there is a carving by Bernt Notke. It depicts the descent of the Holy Spirit upon the apostles.
Somehow however, in the 542 years since its installation, a crucial part of the carving went missing. The original carving included the Spirit suspended from the top of the carving in the form of a dove. Nobody knows what happened to the Spirit. Was it spirited away to a private home? Did it get lost? Or did somebody point out that in Luke’s Pentecost story, the Spirit is represented, not by a dove, but by tongues of flame?
Whatever the explanation, the result is to my mind a blessing. Now the carving is no longer about the descent of the Spirit. Notke’s masterpiece now depicts the nine days between the ascension of Christ and the day of Pentecost. During these days the apostles were together in an upstairs room, praying.
Christian prayer is waiting emptied of desire. The praying is in the waiting. None of us can pray a prayer of petition on behalf of others or on our own behalf, without taking the risk that we may learn that we no longer want what we thought we wanted.
Jesus himself asked the Father to take away the cup of suffering that he anticipated in a night of prayer before he was crucified. The Father didn’t take that cup away from Jesus, but as dawn broke, Jesus was able freely to say ‘Your will be done.’
Fr Stiiv Knowers (retired Vicar living in Tallinn)
24 May 2026
