The Melody of the Holy Spirit

I smiled. “Absolutely. And do you love God, Danny?” [Should be Jeremy]

I inadvertently used the name of another inmate I’ve worked with along the same lines.

I sat at a table in the Wright County Jail three years ago, with Jeremy sitting on the other side. This was his third incarceration for 5th degree drug possession. He’d been an addict since he was seventeen.

“What is love, Jeremy?” I asked to start off this session with him.

He stumbled and bumbled through several definitions that had more to do with the effects of love and examples rather than what it actually is. Finally, he shrugged his shoulders and mumbled, “I guess I don’t know.”

“What if I told you that love is doing what’s best for the other person?”

He nodded his head. “That sounds like a good definition.”

“Do you love your girlfriend, Jeremy?”

“I do. I really do.”

“What’s the best thing you could do for her then?”

He thought for not too long. “Get off Drugs?”

I smiled. “Absolutely. And do you love God, Jeremy?”

“I do, ever since I was born-again two years ago.”

“What’s the best thing you could do for Him?” I asked.

This time there was no hesitation. “Same answer. Stop using and doing my own thing and start seriously following Him.”

I never saw Jeremy in jail again.

David Wilkerson, the author of The Switchblade and the Cross and the founder of Teen Challenge, was a modern-day prophet who died in a car accident on the plains of Texas nine years ago. I have a book of 365 selections from his writings, entitled GOD IS FAITHFUL that I use for one of my daily devotions. This entry is from the December 3 selection called “The Blink Generation.”

“Many Christians read the Bible regularly, believing it is God’s living, revealed Word for their lives. Over and over…they read that God spoke to His people again and again, with this phrase repeated time after time: ‘And God said…’

“Yet many of these same Christians live as though God does not speak to His people today. Indeed, an entire generation of believers has come to make decisions without praying or consulting God’s Word. Many simply decide what they want to do, then ask God to validate it.

“We are living in a time referred to as the ‘blink generation.’ People are making major decisions in the blink of an eye…

“Just a few years ago, the watchword among Christians was, ‘Did you pray about it? Have you sought godly counsel?’ How many important decisions have you made ‘in the blink of an eye’ recently? The reason God wants full control of our lives is to save us from disasters – which is exactly where most of our ‘blink decisions’ take us.”

Shawn murdered a young woman in cold blood and had been on death row for two years awaiting his execution.

He was as guilty as guilty could be and had great remorse for what he had done. His appeals to escape the death penalty would run out sometime in the next year and then would come the end for him, as surely as Wednesday follows Tuesday.

One day in a court hearing for Shawn’s seventh appeal, a custodian in shabby clothes showed up and said he’d confess to the murder. The judge said, “That’s foolishness. You were nowhere near the crime scene.” Shawn said, “No, I’m the guilty one, not you.”

Now there was a law in the land that if someone pleaded guilty to someone else’s crime, even though innocent, that person would take the place of the guilty criminal. The custodian quoted that law from memory and said, “Though I am not guilty in any way, yet I will stand in for Shawn.”

“This is very unusual,” said the judge. “I’m aware of that law, but no one has ever invoked it before. There is one additional stipulation, however: Shawn must agree to let you stand in for him.”

Shawn saw the custodian looking right through him with a love that brought tears to his eyes. What could he do? He melted and said, “Yes, I accept that arrangement. I don’t deserve it, but I agree to it.”

That very same day, Shawn walked out of prison a free man. The custodian was executed the next day.

The following story is not meant to be a simile, metaphor, analogy, parable, or revelation from on high. It’s simply an observation I made yesterday morning at 7 a.m., sitting on a couch about a pillow’s throw from our lower-level gas fireplace.

The pilot light is always on in the fireplace, a small blue flame that catches my attention in the dark but brings no light or warmth…until I punch a button on the fireplace remote. Then, in a flash, flames jump up to push away the darkness and bring warmth to a room that had been 63 degrees.

Isn’t it like that with the Lord Jesus Christ? Because I accepted Jesus as my Savior and Lord 39 years ago, He lives in me all the time, just like that pilot light. But I need to turn on the remote in my soul (that is, my will) every morning and let Him bring His true light into my life and the warmth of His joy when I love Him and seek Him with all his heart.

How, you might ask, does one keep that flame blazing all through the day? I’ll name three: prayer, Scripture reading, and service in Christ’s name. I’ll bet you could add at least three more in the blink of an eye.

“You shall have no other gods before me.” Exodus 20:3

We seem to do OK with the first commandment, but two verses down we encounter God’s statement that He’s a jealous God.

“For I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God.” Exodus 20:5

What are we to make of this? Jealousy is not an admirable trait in a person, much less in God. It shows a lack of trust and insecurity. But that’s not what God means here. God wants what’s best for us, the very definition of love. He does not want us chasing after riches, fame, a person of the opposite sex, or any of the other gods we put before Him because those all lead to unhappiness and grief in the long run.  

He is jealous when we don’t put Him first in our lives. He’s like a father who is jealous when his daughter doesn’t listen to him and  chases after boys who just want to use her. He’s like a mother who is jealous of her son’s becoming friends with the kid across the street who is constantly in trouble with the law. He is our Father who is jealous when we stray from him and go our own way – because He knows we’re walking down a smooth, wide path in the woods that is a thoroughfare for speeding cars and predatory animals. He is happiest when we walk behind Him and say, “You are my God, and I want to follow You to the ends of the earth.”

What if I were to walk behind Jesus on the King’s Highway the remainder of my days? What highway is that, you might ask? It’s the highway leading to heaven, with the world in the ditches as I walk by, and me an observer. Jesus is ever before me, beckoning me to follow Him wherever He goes and not to be concerned with what’s in the ditches or about where I might want to go. 

What would that look like? The highway winds in and out of a thick woods, up and down hills, and through swamps. There are familiar and muddy ditches on both sides. People there call out to me. Events happen in these ditches, like political infighting.  The ditches grow deeper and deeper the farther along I walk. I keep my eyes on Jesus, and the world grows dim.

As we’ll see in the following Joshua 5:13-14 passage, this is the wrong question.

Now when Joshua was near Jericho, he looked up and saw a man standing in front of him with a drawn sword in his hand. Joshua went up to him and asked, “Are you for us or for our enemies?”

 “Neither,” he replied, “but as commander of the army of the Lord I have now come.” Then Joshua fell facedown to the ground in reverence, and asked him, “What message does my Lord have for his servant?”

The commander of the army of the LORD is Jesus Christ Himself, and His answer to Joshua is direct and determined. It’s not whether He is for one or the other side but whether Joshua and the Israelite nation are for Him. It’s the same today with this election.

Whether you’re for Trump or Biden, focusing your attention on one of them to be president and asking God to favor your choice this day is flawed thinking. The real question is whether you’re for Jesus. In the whole scope of eternity, that’s the main question to ask. The rest of the events and circumstances of this world are secondary.

When I look outside-in, it’s all about me. How does the world affect me? How does what happens with this event, situation, or happening affect me? If this person acts in this or that way, is it good or bad for me?  Does anyone’s death diminish me?  

When I look inside-out, it’s all about God’s kingdom here on earth.  How do I affect the world? How does this event, situation, or happening fit into God’s will? What can I do to advance God’s kingdom with this person or that person? How can I bring glimmers of light into this dark world? Everyone’s death diminishes me.

Jesus is the model for inside-out thinking and action. The Apostle Paul, Oswald Chambers, Mother Theresa, and Billy Graham were not far behind.

No matter what else I can do for others, I can always pray for them. No matter what happens in this world, I can always pray that God’s will be done in all matters great and small. Sometimes that means asking God to raise up a godly man or woman to advance His cause, as He did with King David, Ruth, John the Baptist, and the Virgin Mary. We need a great revival in this land. I pray He sends one of His chosen to bring it about. 

If you’ll remember, three weeks ago Padraic was talking to Matthew about what Jesus said at the Last Supper: “Whoever has My commands and obeys them, he is the one who loves me. He who loves Me will be loved by My Father, and I too will love him and show myself to him (John 14:21).”

“Was Jesus talking about the ten commandments or something else?” Padraic had asked Matthew.

“You were there on the mountaintop near the shore of the Sea of Galilee when Jesus gave eight of His commands.” Padraic had a puzzled look on his face.

Matthew continued: “Jesus said, ‘Blessed are the poor in spirit for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.'”

“But that’s a statement, not a command,” Padraic said emphatically.

“What Jesus is really saying is, ‘Be poor in spirit,’ and that’s a command. Your spirit is your spiritual life in Christ. What He meant with this command is that you are to be poor in yourself and rich in God. Don’t you remember what John the Baptist said, ‘He must become greater; I must become less.'”

Padraic smiled the smile of someone who has just learned an important mystery of life. “I see it! He was always saying that in one way or another. ‘Think much of God; think little of yourself.’ That was one of His most important commands.”

To be continued….