- Details
- Written by: Don Goulding
Be still, and know that I am God… (Psalms 46:10) (NIV)
In our first years of marriage, I was an awkward husband. I didn’t know when to offer advice, when to listen, or when to give her a hug. After forty years, the message is finally penetrating my male skull, that holding her in silence is an act of potent healing.
Being held during suffering is sometimes even better than the removal of the problem. When someone wraps their arms around me and holds on, it says, “You are loved and your pain is my pain.” That embrace holds tight until I’ve had enough, and it demands nothing in return.
When asked by CBS newsman, Dan Rather, what she said to God in her prayers, Mother Teresa responded, “I don’t say anything, I listen.”
So the reporter asked what God said to her.
“God doesn’t say anything, he listens.”
Every moment, God offers the opportunity to be still and listen to one another. I wish I would step into that holy hug more often. Rushing into praise and intercession is good, but I also need to commune in silence.
From where his Spirit fits against mine, Father may guide me into a specific prayer direction. At times, it will be zeal against the powers of darkness or heartbreak over the world’s dysfunction, but mainly we’ll rejoice and rest together in his goodness. He’ll get his arms around me and draw me into his peace, or his burden, but always into his larger reality—where superfluous words only spoil the moment.
Prayer: Blessed God, hold me still in the center of all you are.
- Details
- Written by: Don Goulding
When Jesus heard this he was amazed and said to those who followed him, “I tell you the truth, I have not found such faith in anyone in Israel! … Then Jesus said to the centurion, “Go; just as you believed, it will be done for you.” (Matthew 8:10-13)
Traveling through rural Pakistan, we passed bleak communities lacking any sign of women or children. It was considered indecent for women to be seen in public, so only men sat in clusters or roamed about. Oh, how darkness multiplies when humans try to fight evil with their own devices.
Then we arrived at an all-Christian village—an island of joy amid a sea of repression. I stood on the flat church rooftop and watched yellow, blue, and red kites dance above the mud-coated houses. The ladies inhaled the fresh air of outdoor life, girls ran and giggled, and the boys happily made kites. High over a people freed of their sins, flew colorful expressions of a blessed faith.
Faith is the wind that lifts us out of the mud. Without faith, my life is grounded on an expiring planet. I was not made to lie on my face but to soar into heavenly adventures, to dance above corruption and sin. Faith is the only force capable of lifting me into the life that God has planned for me.
Unanchored faith will not do. A kite, carried off by the wind, will flail and snag in the trees. A flyer with a string must guide it. Just so, even the strongest of faiths will crash me into hell if it is not attached to Jesus by the string of biblical truth. Faith blows as Jesus anchors me, and the result is the soaring life my Pakistani friends celebrated.
Prayer: Mighty Lord, by faith, fly me above the world’s demise.
- Details
- Written by: Don Goulding
Those who are in the flesh cannot please God. You, however, are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God lives in you. (Romans 8:8-9)
Every Tuesday was bulletin day for our pastor. He tapped out articles on a master stencil in his typewriter and then hand-cranked his worn mimeograph printer. I was aghast at his archaic method and volunteered to set up a computer for him.
It was an act of bravery for someone who grew up with horses and gaslights to take word processing lessons. My pastor took notes on each step, from switching on the computer to printing a document. His rote learning never allowed him to intuit the software logic. Years later, he still called me whenever he navigated into a corner and couldn’t figure out how to get back to his home screen.
In the same way, disciplining my corrupt mind with rote laws doesn’t keep me out of the corners of sin. The change won’t penetrate deep enough for me to understand God’s ways. I need his heart. Not just the rules. That’s why he made me the new temple of his Spirit. The forgiveness offered through Christ is huge, but it’s only the doorway that makes it possible for the Spirit of the Most High to move in as my guide.
True faith bubbles up from within. Jesus compared it to yeast, wind, and an artesian fountain, but it’s also like nuclear fission. Fission causes an unstoppable chain reaction of splitting atoms. We can no more stop a Spirit-filled believer from sacrificial obedience than we can contain an atom bomb after fission has begun. There will be a joyful, God-pleasing explosion of loving kindness.
Prayer: Please, Holy Spirit, burst out from within me.