The Wind and the Spirit

The Wind and the Spirit

⁵ Jesus answered, “Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. ⁶ That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. ⁷ Do not marvel that I said to you, ‘You must be born again.’ ⁸ The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear the sound of it, but cannot tell where it comes from and where it goes. So is everyone who is born of the Spirit.”

John 3:5-8

Paul rightly said that the gospel we believe in would be seen as foolishness to the perishing. We live in a world today where anything spiritual is seen as wishful thinking, weakness of a small mind or fairy tales. With our scientific and technological advancements, humans have reached a level of arrogance that has never been seen before- not even at the Tower of Babel. The idea of an invisible, all powerful and all-knowing God is just too much for many people today.

Of course we all, religious and atheist, live daily with faith and blind belief. No one on earth holds their breath before the sun rises- not sure if this day perhaps it won’t. No one crosses their fingers when they flip the light switch, unsure is the lights will actually turn on or not (well perhaps in some places that is something people fret about). Most have no problem trusting the gears and cords that pull elevators up and down even though they are hidden away behind the walls and elevator ceiling. The truth is that there are a hundred things we simply trust will work throughout our day. Many of those things are invisible just like the wind.

I love the analogy that Jesus uses between the Spirit and the wind. Both can be so powerful and we can see the results of the wind all around us even though the wind itself is always invisible. The Spirit is the same way. We see miracles and answered prays and yet the power behind those things remains unseen.

We must reach a place where we trust just as much in the Spirit as we do that light switch in our home. We know the switch will turn on the lights. We must also know that the Spirit will do everything that we need in our lives. That faith must grow day by day.

It is that faith in the unseen and the living with the power of the unseen that is being ‘in the spirit’. When we can walk forward without seeing the next step- that is being in the spirit. It is faith without having to see. That should be the goal for all of us.

I pray that this week we can all work on this. Let us trust the unseen Spirit in our lives. Let us grow in that faith and we too can be spirit.

 

Blessings

Pr. Steven Couto