Has the Holy Spirit ever whispered in your ear? He has whispered in mine, reminding me of things, urging me to action, pulling me back. Sometimes when I am in the middle of an internal storm, tossed and tumbled and afraid, He has spoken a word that calmed the seas. If I weren’t a witness, I would find it hard to believe. But I have first-hand knowledge.

What I find amazing is that the Holy Spirit often uses words that were spoken long ago to other people in other circumstances. He takes these words and breathes new life and meaning into them. The Word of the Lord spoken to a paralytic, to Moses, to John or to Amos becomes the Word of the Lord spoken to Betsy, taking on a personal relevance often unconnected with its original intent.

Indeed, the word of God is living and active. Hebrews 4:12

When I was in my thirties, grief and shame overwhelmed me. How could I go to church, knowing the things I had done? Knowing how I had lived my life in my early twenties, wasn’t it hypocritical to go to a Bible study? Who was I kidding! God wouldn’t welcome someone like me. Certainly the other women in the group wouldn’t; perhaps they shouldn’t.

But then God spoke to me. “Arise, pick up your pallet and walk.” Jesus’ words to the paralytic in Mark 2. The Holy Spirit’s words to me. No longer paralyzed by my sin, I could and should and would move forward from that place; I would no longer make that spot of shame my resting spot; I would make my bed elsewhere. I could and did walk.

Over the years, the Holy Spirit has made many more verses come alive for me. A random word takes root and moves me. Last year during the Big Read (Read the Bible in 90 days), one verse jumped off the page as if God were speaking it just to me: .

You have circled around this mountain long enough, now turn. Deuteronomy 2:3

I find it interesting how much motion God’s call to us implies. This may be physical motion, but I think it is more likely that the physical motion represents spiritual and emotional movement. “Follow me,” “Go,” “I send you,” “I am the Way,” “Arise and walk.” Jesus even stops Peter from building a dwelling, a permanent stay-here structure, to honor Him (Matthew 17:2).

Emotionally, moving on, moving at all, can be difficult. We all have those moments which seem to define our lives, that we can’t get past, where we seem to reside. But God is about motion. “Go, leave this place” (Exodus 33:1), “Go into all the world” (Matthew 18:29), “Go and sin no more” (John 8:11). Jesus, God incarnate, was constantly on the move, with no home to call His own, no place to rest His head (Luke 9:58).

God does call me to stop moving sometimes, when my motion is futile or frantic. Several years back, overwhelmed by fear and grief after my husband’s cancer diagnosis and exhausted by the practical demands of surgeries and chemo and illness, I was near collapse. Then the Holy Spirit repeated to me what He once said to a long forgotten king:

This battle is not for you to fight; take your position, stand still, and see the victory of the Lord on your behalf. Do not fear or be dismayed. Tomorrow go out against them, and the Lord will be with you.  2 Chronicles 20:17

So when you are reading scripture and sense what those on the road to Emmaus sensed, that (their) hearts were burning inside (them) … while He was opening the scriptures to (them) (Luke 24:32), know that the Holy Spirit is whispering in your ear. He is the Spirit of God. Jesus is the Word, the living Word. His Word still speaks into our lives – transforming us, healing us, urging us forward, pulling us back, calming the storm.

If I weren’t a witness, I would find it hard to believe. But I have first-hand knowledge.

Betsy

Somewhere in my youth, I got the impression that starting something was almost the same as ending it.

Find Prince Charming and live happily ever after. Have a child and your life is complete. Accept Jesus as your Lord and all will be well. Plant a seed and you will have fruit. Build it and they will come.

Most of us have learned that it rarely works out that way. Starting something is just the first step. A very important first step, but just a step. If you’re ever grown anything, you know this firsthand. Jesus was talking to an agricultural society when He said,

Other seed fell on good soil and brought forth grain, some a hundredfold, some sixty, some thirty. Matthew 13:9

They would have understood that there was a length of time and a lot of activity between falling on good soil and bringing forth grain. Somehow, I expected it to be instantaneous; the beginning being almost the same as the end. I just assumed that accepting Jesus as my Lord would take away my love of sinning, fill me with love for humanity, and overwhelm me with joy and peace. You know what they say about that word “assume.”

Because sanctification is a process. The Church has developed big words to describe the process of Christian growth – justification, sanctification, glorification. Basically, the Church is recognizing that the beginning is not the same as the end, and that there is a growth process between the two. Jesus used much simpler words:

Jesus said to him, “I am the way.” John 14:6

The way implies a path, implies movement and activity, a change in scenery. A path may be curving or straight, rocky or smooth, uphill or level. A path implies a distance between the start and the end – and Jesus is the way to travel on that path. And Jesus is the beginning and end of that path as well, the Alpha and the Omega.

Everything in life, in nature, teaches us about the growth process. A child is not born mature. Seeds transform into plants; caterpillars transform into butterflies; tadpoles grow into frogs. Science teaches us that the earth is constantly changing and the universe is ever expanding. Why would I think the Christian life would be any different?

Nick and I took a class based on the book Sacred Marriage, which asks, “What if God designed marriage to make us holy rather than to make us happy?”  What if God designed life to make us holy rather than happy? America has constitutionally enshrined happiness as a goal, and pursuing it a right. I wonder how different our world would be if Thomas Jefferson had stuck with “property,” or, better yet, inserted the word “holiness?” Would we be pursuing holiness as arduously as we seem to pursue happiness?

What if I were to look at everything in my life as a step along the path to a closer relationship with God? Would I be able to accept pain and grief and frustration as part of the sanctification process?

So we do not lose heart. Even though our outer nature is wasting away, our inner nature is being renewed day by day. For this slight momentary affliction is preparing us for an eternal weight of glory beyond all measure, because we look not at what can be seen but at what cannot be seen; for what can be seen is temporary, but what cannot be seen is eternal. 2 Corinthians 4:16-18

Accepting Jesus as Lord, recognizing His gift of forgiveness and reconciliation, is just the first step. It’s the wedding, the birth, the re-birth, the seed. Justification is an incredible gift, but there is still quite a journey ahead. There will be difficult times; we may actually be unhappy sometimes. But Jesus goes ahead of us and beside us and shows us the way.

His divine power has given us everything needed for life and godliness, through the knowledge if Him who called us by His own glory and goodness. 2 Peter 1:3

Have a wonder – full journey my friends.

Betsy