God’s presence

Making Do

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Lighted vest - set aside "making do" for something better.
Sometimes we need to set aside our “making do” for something better.

I come from a long line of thrifty innovators. The kind that take great pride in sayings like:

Use it up,
wear it out,
make it do
or do without!

So it surprised no one when the need arose for me to put my thrifty innovation to good use. I had recently been coerced by a friend to join a running group – a harrowing tale in its own right for someone whose use of the term running had heretofore always preceded a direct object. (Think: “running the microwave” or, on particularly ambitious days, “running the vacuum”.)

I quickly learned that for a sport that seemingly requires no equipment but your own two feet, a remarkably large market of running essentials exists. I splurged on a new pair of running shoes and pulled a water bottle from my hiking gear, but I balked at the reflective vest. Options ranged from a simple and lightweight mesh vest to strings of LED cables that flashed in assorted colors. That is when my ingenuity kicked in.

The Art of Making Do

I wasn’t about ready to strap on a battery pack, but a reflective vest was certainly within my purview. I grabbed a roll of silver furnace tape, fashioned a few straps I could slip over my head, and had the equivalent of my reflective vest for about 39 cents.

My running group was simultaneously impressed by my creativity and embarrassed to run with me.

Maybe my running vest fell a little short compared to the truly reflective gear worn by the others, but I was making do with what I had. I was getting by on my own, and it worked just fine, thank you very much.

The Gift that Changed it All

Making do with tape

Fast forward a year into my running adventure. My running friend handed me a Christmas present with a smile. I opened it to unveil my first real running vest. It was fluorescent green with reflective trim and fit so light I barely knew I had it on. It was a beautiful Christmas present.

I retired my makeshift reflector with just a bit of nostalgia. There is a certain element of pride that comes from creating something on your own. I had been making do and getting by, but truthfully, the gift was even better.

Sometimes others know what we need even more than we do. We need people around us who can speak into our lives, share their own experiences, and open us to gifts we haven’t yet experienced. We need those who can come alongside and say, “I love that thrifty innovation you’re sporting. It’s now time for an upgrade.”

We need people who will help us set down our independence and accept a gift.

Heavenly Transaction

Even more than that, we need people around us who will point these earthly transactions toward a heavenly one. Even more than I needed a reflective vest, I needed the lesson it can teach me. The lesson of sometimes needing to set down my prideful independence. The lesson of opening myself up to another way that is not my own. And the lesson of accepting the greatest gift that has been given to me.

During the Christmas season we celebrate the birth of Jesus. He is the gift of God given to each of us. This gift is the opportunity to move beyond “making do” and embrace life to the full (John 10:10). But in order to receive this free gift, we have to set down what our hearts have already embraced. We have to retire the make-shift life we were etching out for ourselves in order to receive the fullest life that God has planned for us. We must loosen our grip on our little plans before we can accept the plans so big they stretch further than we can dare to ask or dream.

Jesus said that to follow him we must lay down our life and pick up our cross. He also promised that His burden is light, and He will never leave us.

Jesus, like life, was full of seeming contradictions.

The Path Forward

The path beyond making do

I am finding that the more I walk out my life in step with Jesus – and by that I mean consciously asking each day for God to show me his presence in my life and to give me wisdom in how I should live – the more I can sense his presence.

I don’t know where the path ahead will lead, but I am reminded this Christmas season that my job is first of all to release the stubborn “making do” life I have created. Second, my job is to receive the gifts of grace and guidance from the God who loves me. And third, my job is to pass along those gifts.

In short, my job is to reflect back the true light that has come into the world.

I’ve got a vest that will help me do exactly that.

This post was first written for inspireafire.com. Merry Christmas!

I Need You to be Okay Without Me

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This post is about my dog. And about so much more than my dog.

It’s also about me, and possibly you, too.

You see, when the pandemic hit, I was one of the lucky ones. Through a series of fortunate arrangements, I have been working remotely for the past two years. My dog loves this deal, and despite the constant teleporting between virtual meetings, I love it too. She lays by my feet all day. We enjoy lunch on the back porch. We go for walks in the evening. We are, as the saying goes, attached at the paw.

Which will be a problem in a few months when I return to the office.

For two years we have rarely been apart. She co-pilots our route to the curbside groceries. She mooches treats from every drive-through establishment in town. She protects me from the brave and friendly delivery people.

And pretty soon she will have to be okay without me.

Except I know – and perhaps you do too – that sometimes there is nothing okay about being apart from those we want to be with.

It’s been three years now since my father passed away. I still catch myself expecting to see him, expecting to hear him, expecting to talk to him. I don’t think that will ever go away. The absence of his presence is nearly as tangible as his actual presence. It’s as though someone took that piece of my life and carved it into a metal ink press. The part that’s missing is the part that makes the picture when it’s stamped.

It’s not gone. It’s just completely inverted. And I don’t like it at all.

If our definition of okay is who we were “before,” then we may never be okay again. Instead, we become okay with not being okay. We become okay with being who we are “after.”

That’s what I’m working on with my dog now. The differently hard. And the differently joyful.

Dog chewing on toy.

We’ve started a robust separation desensitization routine. A dozen times a day I walk out the front door and right back in. Or gather my keys and then set them back down. Every day we practice quiet crate time in the other room.

Little by little the panic is a little less panicked. Little by little she is learning – I hope – that she can be okay without me.

She might even find that although this is new, and it’s not what she asked for, that there will be good things, too. There will be opportunities she wouldn’t have had otherwise – and no, I don’t mean sneaking into the garbage unobserved.

What can any of us say about the road ahead? We can say this: that our eyes have not seen, our ears have not heard, and our hearts have not begun to imagine what God has prepared for those who love him. We have the strength of the Father guiding us through both the lines and the spaces. We can embrace both the joy and the pain. And we can cling to the one presence that we never need to be okay without.

This post was originally written for inspireafire.com.

Making Sense of it All

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“It doesn’t have to make sense, it has to make faith.”

I was in a small group discussion where one of the ladies was relaying a conversation she had with a pastor. As someone who likes to make sense of everything, I was struck by this point. Sometimes things would be easier to endure if I could just understand it all!

But sometimes understanding is not the point. Sometimes understanding can even be detrimental to how God wants to use what we’re going through to do a good work – not just out there in the circumstances around us, but inside us.

Bible in Mirror

As we come into the Christmas season, it seems a perfect time to reflect on this idea. Christmas itself may be one of the ultimate occasions that was given to us not to make sense, but to make faith. John 3:16 tells us that God loved the world so much that He gave his only son for us, first in the form of a helpless baby, then as a minister to the people, and finally as a sacrifice on Calvary’s hill.

As far as religions go, it doesn’t make a lot of sense.

But the reason, John 3:16 continues, is so that anyone who believes in Jesus will have eternal life. Not understanding, but faith.

One of my favorite analogies for the logic behind the incarnation is in the story of the Christmas ducks that Paul Harvey relayed. (It’s worth hearing if you’ve never heard it.) It offers a sliver of “why” in a story that on its surface is incomprehensible. Despite these glimpses of understanding, the fullness of God will always escape our comprehension.

Ultimately, it doesn’t matter if we understand perfectly. God came in the flesh to make Himself known to us not so we would have a simple understanding, but so we would have a simple faith.

I think of Mary, of whom the Bible says several times after Jesus’ birth that she treasured all that was happening and pondered it in her heart (Luke 2). Even though there is bewilderment, I read a sense of serenity in these words, perhaps harkening back to her reply to the angel Gabriel – “I am the Lord’s servant, may it be to me as you have said.”

Geese and baby

I have heard these words read many times with the emphasis on Mary’s subservience and willingness to go forward with God’s plan. I also see something beyond simple submission. I see trust the God will take care of her whatever is to come. She is not just any servant. “I am the Lord’s servant,” she said.

No amount of pondering was going to make sense of all the Mary was about to witness. But as God’s plan unfolded just as was foretold, there was the opportunity for faith.

We have the same opportunity to allow God’s Sprit to work within us. God can use whatever we are facing to grow our faith. And our faith, as Peter wrote, is of greater worth than gold.

Our God is not hidden. He made himself known on an unexpected Christmas morning, and He continues to make Himself known to us through the scriptures and through His Spirit. Regardless of whether this particular Christmas is a time of joy or a season of struggle, take a moment to look through your circumstances and see God’s presence in your life.

He has come, and he will continue to come, so that we may have faith to believe in Him.

This post was first shared at inspireafire.com. Merry Christmas!

Some Things are Worth Repeating

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Instant replays. Silly jokes. Favorite stories.

Oh sure, we may roll our eyes at the 200th telling… unless of course we’re the one doing the telling.

When you’re reminiscing with a friend, the stories just get better with age. The memory can take you back until you can see it, taste it, feel it. The retelling is not just a retelling, it’s a reliving. There is power in memory, and there is power in sharing that memory.

It’s easy to get swept up in our day to day and miss out on opportunities to recall important milestone. God knows this, which is why He set a precedent of commemoration. On the night of the Passover as the Israelites were being delivered out of Egypt, God told Moses and all the Israelites, “This is a day you are to commemorate; for the generations to come you are to celebrate it as a festival to the Lord… And when your children ask you, “What does this ceremony mean to you?” then tell them… (Exodus 12:14,26-27)

Many other times throughout the early history of Israel God established appointed feasts and annual celebrations. When Joshua led the people into the Promised Land, God instructed them to take 12 stones from the middle of the Jordan River and set them in their camp as a permanent memorial. God told them, “In the future, when your children ask you ‘What do these stones mean?’ tell them…” (Joshua 4:6)

Indeed, some stories are worth repeating.

Maybe we have never witnessed anything like the plagues of Egypt and the parting of the Red Sea. Maybe we have never moved from a physical desert into a land flowing with milk and honey. But we may have our own stories to tell. Times there was a near accident avoided, a relationship that was healed, a seeming impossible barrier that came tumbling down, a word, a friend, a provision when we needed it most.

Every one of us has a story we can tell. A memorial marker that we should erect so that we have occasion to repeatedly recall and share what God has done in our own history. These recollections draw us ever nearer to God, and grow our sense of wonder and gratitude.

Here in the United States we are entering into the season of Thanksgiving. It is a time to commemorate not just the history of gratefulness dating back to that first Thanksgiving, but a reminder to reflect on our own stories. Take this opportunity, like a festival to the Lord or a memorial marker you have erected, to recall what God has done and continues to do for you and those you care about. Share one of you own stories with someone else, and seek out stories from others.

Write a letter, make a phone call.

God knew what He was doing when He established the model to regularly remember and share. We need to keep alive those moments when God’s presence was most dear and most imminent for us. We shouldn’t limit these memories to only an annual Thanksgiving recollection, but Thanksgiving is an excellent time to stir up our gratitude as we recall what God has done.

However you choose to do it, put God’s stories – and your gratitude – on repeat.

This post was first written for and shared at inspireafire.com. I hope you enjoyed this encore!

Crazed. Or Not. Finding Balance in the Midst of Extremes.

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Digital display

There is a good kind of stress.

If you’ve always thought of stress as a four letter word in the plural, then this may come as a surprise. But it’s true. It’s even reasonable, once I stopped to consider it.

An environment with absolutely no stress is an environment void of stimulation or purpose. As human beings we need something to engage us. That something, to the scientists among us, is called “eustress” – a beneficial stress in just the right dosage to give a feeling of fulfillment.

Too little and we get bored. Too much and we get overwhelmed.

Balance is the key.

Unfortunately, life seems to try everything it can to send us in any direction except the one that leads to balance.

Take as an example of extremes these past 12-18 months. Not many people have been spared. You may be one who has had far too much to do: front line workers, parents juggling work and at-home schooling, caretakers trying to navigate a system that has been completely upended. Or you may be one who has not had enough to do: quarantined and alone with no visitors and limited chances to venture out. There has not been much middle ground.

I hope and pray along with everyone else that the slow return to a middle ground keeps progressing. And along the way, I am trying to learn what it means to find my own middle ground when the world around me is completely crazed, or completely not.

Either extreme can feel like a prison, and I’ve been in both. I’ve spent time strangling under the tangle of my to-do list and panicked over things left undone. I’ve also battled waves of crushing lethargy that come in the dark nights of an isolating depression. Once the scales start to tip one way or the other, it’s easy to keep spiraling in the same direction. Freedom comes only when I move back against the tide and seek balance. Recognizing where I am is the first step.

One of my favorite Bible verses is 2 Timothy 1:7: For God did not give us a spirit of fear, but of power, and of love, and of self-control. This tells me that when I start to feel trapped, powerless, and afraid, those feelings are not from God. God has given me the self-control and the strength to make any necessary changes. I can do it, even when it doesn’t feel as if I can.

The amplified translation drills down into the meaning of that last word “self-control” even further, to say it includes a calm, well-balanced mind. Do you see that word in there again? Balanced. No matter what is going on around me, the Spirit within me has the capability of maintaining a calm, well-balanced mind. My mind in turn can direct the self-control needed to keep from leaping to extremes. Exercising myself in this way is freedom – freedom to think, be and act how I choose regardless of what swirls around me.

This past year has been a severe example, but much of life will tip us one way or the other. If we aren’t careful, we can feel trapped under the confines of our own days. It’s up to us to discover the freedom God has waiting for us, back in the balance, even in the midst of extremes.

One Thing I Do: Forgiveness

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Forgiveness brings hope

In her book on forgiveness, Lysa TerKeurst writes an analogy comparing forgiveness to having your legs broken in a car accident. You can forgive the initial incident, but there is also a process of forgiving just as there is a process of healing broken legs.

Reflecting on this, I had a thought that was revelatory to me: forgiveness brings healing; it does not undo what happened.

I’ve often wondered why, even after I have forgiven someone, I don’t feel like I have forgiven them. I have to remind myself dozens of times, “I’ve forgiven them. I’ve forgiven them. I’ve…”

If I’ve forgiven them, why can’t I move on?

Rainbow

I expected forgiveness to erase the pain, but it doesn’t. Forgiveness can’t undo what has happened. It can only point us forward toward the slow process of healing.

Here is what I am learning. I may be a new creation in Christ, but I have to remind myself of that. Paul said, “One thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead…”

I never noticed until recently that little word “do.” After all, forgetting has always been a passive action for me. Forgetfulness is something that happens to me unexpectedly, not something I actively strive for. Who in their right mind tries to be forgetful? Yet Paul is saying this is something he does. He actively forgets what lies behind.

Sometimes I need to actively forget, too. When the emotions come, when the thoughts come, when the feelings come, I can actively remind myself: “This has been forgiven. I have given up my right to think about this anymore.”

I can choose to think about something else instead.

This is the healing process. It doesn’t undo what has been done. The ramifications of that will always be with me. No matter how much healing I go through, I will always walk with a figurative limp. I am a different person because of what has happened to me.

I bet you are too.

Forgiveness is like healing a broken leg

But different is not always a bad thing. I am also more compassionate, more understanding, and more insightful because of what has happened to me. I am stronger in ways I never expected. I am weaker in ways I never wanted.

I remind myself that Christ shines through our weaknesses.

There will come a time when Jesus will wipe away every tear. We will be a new creation in the fullest sense of the word – body, soul, and spirit. We aren’t there yet, but we have been given the Holy Spirit as a deposit guarantee of what is to come. It is with His help that we navigate this tumultuous in-between time. We wrestle with anger, hurt, frustration, and longing. We forgive, and then we remind ourselves that we have forgiven. We forget what needs to be forgotten because this is something we can do. It does not change the past, but it can change our future.

A bone that has been broken and healed is not the same thing as a bone that has never been broken. A heart that has been broken and healed is not the same thing as a heart that has never been broken. We cannot undo the breaking, but we can forgive and begin the healing.

~ ~ ~

This post first appeared at www.inspireafire.com.

Who Invented Dental Floss

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I heard the comment once that conversations never end in ”I don’t know” anymore. Inevitably someone will whip out their cell phone and ask Siri, and the answer magically will appear.

This was certainly the case for me the other night when I was – you guessed it – flossing my teeth. Perhaps you’ve never wondered about the invention of dental floss before, but if you’re like me, you’re wondering now.

I grew up on the cusp of the internet era. I still remember card catalogs and microfiche machines and giant reference books in the stacks. A question like “Who invented dental floss?” was not something that just anyone could know. You would need to do research. Find an expert who specialized in the history of dentistry, read a dental history textbook, or visit a museum of dental history.

Today, any question I can dream up has an answer sitting in my hip pocket.

Well, almost any question. Ask Siri what the meaning of life is, and she’ll give you one of several snarky answers ranging from “42” to “I don’t know, but I think there’s an app for that.”

Depending on your question, an internet search may not be the best way to find your answer.

Perhaps as this new year has its beginning, you are also looking for a fresh start. An internet search can point you to a lot of excellent resources, ranging from organizing your closets to inspirational guidance, but if you’re looking for a deeper new beginning, you need to access a deeper source.

The Bible tells the story of Nicodemus, a scholarly man who, as a member of the Jewish ruling council, would have had every resource of that day at his fingertips. Yet despite all that access, the knowledge equivalent of today’s internet search engines, he apparently still had a question that remained unanswered. He came at night, perhaps afraid of public ridicule or worse. But he came. To ask the deeper Source a question.

Jesus talked to Nicodemus about new birth, a more radical new beginning than Nicodemus could even fathom. But it was a new birth that was available to Nicodemus, and it is available to each one of us still today. God promises that when we seek Him earnestly, He will be found by us. (See John 3:1-21 and Deuteronomy 4:29)

What are you searching for?

We cannot talk to Jesus face to face, but I have found that when I have an earnest question on my heart and ask Him to guide me, then He brings resources across my path that point me to the truth. It could be a piece of scripture that jumps out at me, a sermon crafted just for me, a song lyric, even an internet search result. Wherever they come from, those words resonate around the question in my heart in such a way that I know that regardless of the source, there is a deeper Source responding to me.

The answers we seek are not reserved for the experts, for the elite, or for those who have been granted access. Answers are available to me. And to you. And to everyone who asks.

Whatever new beginning you may be seeking, whatever question you may be asking, hold it in your heart and ask God to guide you to the answer. He has a way of curating what you need more powerfully than any search engine I’ve ever seen. Go ahead and ask.

And while you’re waiting for your answer, you can read about the history of dental floss here. Or here. Or…

There is so much information at your fingertips, my friends. Keep searching.

This post was original written for inspireafire.com. I hope you enjoyed!

Questions from God and the Devil, Part 1

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I am a big fan of questions.

Except for when I’m not.

What I mean is that most of the time, questions serve me well. They allow me to engage empathically with others, they help me understand different viewpoints, and they teach me diligence in my thoughts and actions.

But sometimes the questions get out of control. Sometimes they keep me awake at night replaying conversations or inciting possible scenarios. Sometimes their incessant whirling brings such doubt and confusion that I could easily be led away to despair.

Then, questions are no longer my friend. Perhaps this has also happened to you.

The question that arose about all these questions (ironic, I know), is this: How can I tell if a question is good for me to think about or if it is one I should avoid?

I have three answers.

The first answer comes in even recognizing that there are some questions that are not helpful, and that we can choose to dwell or not dwell on a particular thought. The Bible tells us that we should take every thought captive to Christ (2 Corinthians 10:5) That means we can think about what we are thinking about, and ask God for guidance in discerning what thought paths we should pursue. As simple as it sounds, pausing for a moment of metacognition – thinking about what we’re thinking about – can reframe our thought paths.

When I started to do this, I was shocked at the thoughts that were playing through my mind. The chatter was so familiar and incessant that I didn’t realize some of the patterns I was getting stuck on. I couldn’t even begin to tell if a question was good for me to dwell on until I first became aware of my thoughts and what questions were already there. That’s step one.

The second way we discern questions worth thinking about is through the fruit of the question. In other words, does dwelling on a particular question bring clarity and peace or confusion and despair?

This isn’t always black and white. Our thoughts are complex and we can’t always consider a single question and leap immediately to either clarity or confusion. Sometimes we have to walk through uncertainty as we seek our answers. Sometimes questions raise emotional pain that we do need to walk through and not avoid. But there is a different feeling to wrestling with doubt, fear, or sadness while seeking clarity versus the feeling we have when we are churning on a question that repeatedly plunges us into darkness. When dwelling too long on a particular question produces only increased anxiety, set it aside. It may be that the time is not quite right to consider those thoughts. We can ask God to show us when the time is right. He will bring resources across our path to guide us.

The problem with using the fruit of the question as our identifier is by the time we realize a particular question is leading us in a bad direction, we are already well down the path. While it’s a little helpful to recognize after the fact – perhaps we can at least not go any further! – it would be even better if we could distinguish a priori whether a particular question is a friend or foe.

I think there are ways we can. Once we have identified a detrimental question by its fruit, we can be cautious of that question in the future. When we recognize it creeping back into our thoughts, we can displace it with something else.

Steps one and two can lead to this preemptive third step: recognize the detrimental questions at their onset.

Additionally, and importantly, we also identify detrimental questions at their onset by recognizing the spiritual component to our thoughts. There are questions God asks us that we should spend time thinking about. Conversely, there are questions from the devil, or our own wandering mind, that we should avoid. Knowing which type of question is knocking at the door of our thoughts can help us identify whether it is a friend or foe.

The outstanding question, of course, is this: What are the questions God asks us, and what are the questions that come from the devil or our own wandering mind?

This, my friends, is a question worth pursuing.

So I am embarking on a Bible study to see what I can learn. The good news is that since the spiritual patterns of thought that began at the beginning are the ones still with us today, we can learn a lot by studying the questions in scripture. There is nothing new under the sun, Ecclesiastes tells us.

In some upcoming posts, I’ll share what I am discovering. We’ll start with the very first question the devil asked… and the counter question from Jesus millennia later. Do you know what it is?

Coming After Me

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Sheep & baby

This post was first shared at inspireafire.com. Enjoy!

Anyone living in my region has probably noticed the freak snowstorms we’ve had three of the last four Wednesdays. I’m pretty sure it’s my fault.

Let me explain.

Winter

The other day I was listening to a video where Cory Asbury talks about his song Reckless Love. And no, watching the video wasn’t directly causal to why we’ve had a flurry of snow squalls, but stick with me. Cory talked about Luke 15, where Jesus tells the parable of the good shepherd going after the one lost sheep. “And when he finds it, he joyfully puts it on his shoulders and goes home” (Luke 15:5).

Can you picture that sheep? Scattered, lost, possibly bruised and banged up. Most definitely frightened. Being swooped up by strong arms, and carried, safely, atop the shepherd’s shoulders.

I’ve seen lambs carried this way. They may let out a “baaa” at the sudden perspective change, but most of them look downright happy on their new perch, surveying the world from a whole new vantage.

I can tell you that I do not feel like that found sheep.

I feel more like I am being dragged kicking and screaming through the valley of the shadow of death. There are burrs in my wool, thorns in my path, and rocks bruising my feet. My bleating is closer to a death wail than the triumphant “baaa” of return.

Perhaps this is a sign that I am still running.

God warned the Israelites when he brought them into the promised land that if they turned away from the one true God they would be handed over to their enemies. An iron yoke would be placed around their neck (Deuteronomy 28:48). Destruction, confusion, anxiety, and despair would ensue. And that, of course, is exactly what happened.

Contrast this with the yoke Jesus offers in Matthew 11: A yoke that is easy and provides rest for our souls. A leader who is gentle and humble in heart.

All we need to do is come to Him.

I don’t know why I seemingly choose the iron yoke time after time. Why don’t I let my Shepherd pick me up and place me on His shoulders? Why do I run bleating through the wilderness away from the One who can calm my fears and set me on the right path?

I don’t know why; but I know I do. And I am coming to know, deeper and deeper, just what it means for the Good Shepherd to keep pursuing me no matter how far or how hard I keep running.

God knew, for example, that there was a certain Bible Study I needed to attend. I wanted to attend, but another class conflict was going to allow me to attend just the first couple weeks.

Until it snowed. And my class got cancelled and Bible study did not.

And then it snowed again. And my class got cancelled and Bible study did not.

And then it snowed again. And my class got cancelled and Bible study did not.

And that was the week I needed to be there. That was the week I had people speak words into my life that I needed to hear. That was the week I had people pray with me specific prayers I needed to pray. That was the week I took one more step toward not running.

And one more step, I am coming to realize, is a big deal. Because Jesus may be gentle, but He is also relentless. He will orchestrate weather – as many times as needed – to allow for that one more step. He will inconvenience others – as many times as needed – to allow for that one more step.

He will come after me. He will come after you. And I may never look at an inconvenience the same way again.

I may be disappointed by a cancellation or a freak storm, but here is a new window into that same story: it could be that because of that very moment, someone’s soul is being saved. Jesus is lifting a lamb to His shoulders. Or at the very least, the lamb has paused, looked back, and is considering this gentle, relentless shepherd that is coming after.

Pentecostal Listening

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Fifty days after Passover, Jews from all nations gather in Jerusalem to celebrate Shavuot, the Feast of Weeks, also known as Pentecost. On one very special Pentecost a little over 2000 years ago, the gathering Jews witnessed a never-before-seen event. With a sound like rushing wind and a visual of leaping flames, the Holy Spirit descended upon the apostles. They began proclaiming the wonders of God in different languages. Some of the gathering Jews were amazed – “How is it that each of us hears them speaking in his own native language?” – while others laughed at them, thinking they were drunk.

Fire

How is it that such an outpouring of power could be witnessed by some as a great miracle and by others as drunken nonsense? The answer, I think, is that they heard different things.

God’s spirit has been poured out on all people, but not all people recognize the voice. Jesus gave the analogy of sheep that follow their shepherd when they know his voice. To the unbelieving Jews He said, “You do not believe, because you are not my sheep. My sheep listen to my voice; I know them, and they follow me” (John 10:26-27).

Likewise, on the day of Pentecost, God sent His Holy Spirit to speak through the apostles. From the gathering crowd there were those who recognized the voice. They heard, each in his own language, the wonders of God being proclaimed. Astonished, they looked around, and in the neighboring faces they saw similar amazement. This divine encounter was not happening to them alone, but to everyone who connected with the words being spoken.

But there were others in the gathering crowd who did not share this amazement. Perhaps they did not press in close enough to truly hear. Perhaps they had hardened their hearts to not recognize God in their midst. Whatever the reason, it is not hard to imagine what they heard: the sound of eleven men shouting in multiple languages could easily be confused with drunken gibberish. They turned away from the presence of God and scoffed at the apostles, saying, “They are filled with new wine.”

The outpouring of God’s spirit at Pentecost was an inaugural event, but the outpouring of God’s spirit has never ceased. When the crowd asked Peter what they should do, he replied, “Repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins. And you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. The promise is for you and your children and for all who are far off – for all whom the Lord our God will call.”

Bible1Did you catch that? The gift of the Holy Spirit was for them, and their children, and for all who are far off, including everyone whom the Lord our God will call. In other words, this promise is for us, too.

Whether the entire Christian faith is foreign to you, or you are a believer who struggles with confusing elements, don’t be too hasty to mock. If it sounds like gibberish to you, press in closer. Listen more intently. Read God’s written word, and listen to biblical teachings. You may be surprised to discover that through the tumult around you, God is speaking directly to you.

He is waiting to pour His Holy Spirit into every area of your life.