How is it that molecules forming neurons in a brain's gray matter are able to create words? How is it that pictures are developed in this gray matter to partner with the sounds of letters? Words and pictures are able to stir emotions and move people to act out life-lived dramas in earthy neighborhoods.
One Sunday morning Nicole encountered contact information that suggested there was something more to life than what was meeting her eyes.
Nicole, an attractive young woman, launched herself into a successful modeling career. Her ambitions took her to Miami, where partying and other negative distractions motivated a move to New York.
Death had been the unintended consequence of her mother's alcohol use and Nicole wanted nothing to do with such career breakers. She wasn't convinced that drugs of any kind would enhance her expectations. However, she did enjoy going to clubs and dancing. And, because she was a known model joining the fun was not a problem for her. The social mixing might benefit her ultimate goal of being a Victoria's Secret model.
The excitement and self-esteem investments into her life experience didn't hide a deep sense that there was still a needed ingredient for the recipe to make her whole.There was this elusive something she just couldn't touch.
On one ordinary Sunday a model friend invited her to a few moments of good gospel music at the Brooklyn Tabernacle. Nicole had encountered this music in Germany and enjoyed its energy.
Yes! Of course she would go,clueless to where that choice would take her.
The main attraction was a video about this church's work in Haiti. The words and pictures resonated with something deep in her mind and begged for further investigation, which led her to return during succeeding Sundays. She was curiously following that remote connection that was asking her brain for a reply.
The next Sunday her brain did reply and the call rang out in some remote thought-space. She answered the call. The next few minutes found her stepping out and walking down to the front of the church. There she met a friend who'd been with her all the time but that she'd never acknowledged. It was Jesus! What were the words and pictures that made this experience so vivid? She had to find out.
She invested a good amount of her extra time attending prayer meetings and Bible studies at the church, looking for answers. She encountered unfamiliar words and pictures that were slowly giving her a recognition of a life experience that her career and clubbing could not provide. The value she'd found in personal self-esteem and having a good time were morphing into another, more substantial, recognition of reality.
The last party she attended revealed her growing suspicions that she wanted to choose another life trajectory. She felt a gnawing recognition that this party life was taking her down a dead end path, where drugs, recreational sex, and there perverse explorations into the darkest shadows of human experience contributed to her uneasiness. She had seen a vision of another neighborhood and she decided to get out of this earthy one into which she'd stumbled without the gift of a knowing light.
Gradually her likes for clothing style took her into a new concept where her body image was no longer what she wanted to put into her neighborhood's looking space. Rather, she wanted people to see a description of her character, her meaning beyond what her surface portrayed. There was now something more important then what initially meets one's eye in earthy neighborhoods. There was a person, Nicole, who was more valuable than body parts. Walking with Jesus in words and pictures was showing her the nature of eternal values.
The Spirit gives life; the flesh counts for nothing. The words I have spoken to you are spirit and they are life. (John 6:63,NIV)
Jesus answered, "Everyone (emphasis added)who drinks this water will be thirsty again (earthy water—my note). But the water I give him (everyone—my note) will become in him (everyone—my note) a spring of water welling up to eternal life. (John 4:13, NIV)
Nicole had found treasure and she made a choice to make its way her way, a journey into the never-ending way.
I found this story in the book written by Jim Cymbala, Spirit Rising: Tapping Into The Power Of The Holy Spirit, published by Zondervan and copyrighted in 2012. (I've told this story in my own words as it entered my mind) There is more to be found in this book than this one story reveals. It's Nicole's story that reaches deep into my mind and says YES!
Jesus answered,"I tell you the truth, no one can enter the kingdom of God unless he is born of water and Spirit. Flesh gives birth to flesh, but the Spirit gives birth to spirit. You should not be surprised at my saying, 'You must be born again. The wind blows wherever it pleases. You hear its sound, but you cannot tell where it comes from or where it is going.So it is with everyone born of the Spirit". (John3:5-8, NIV)
Spirit is the Father's life force that carries with it a new vision. You can't see it, but once revived in you its effects are noticeable. When we follow Jesus the spirit part of us is revived because Jesus puts us in a right relationship (spirit-Spirit) with the Father. (Romans 8:16-17) We become His children and inherit the Father's life with Christ.
But whenever anyone turns to the Lord, the veil is taken away. Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. And we, who with unveiled faces all reflect the Lord's glory, are being transformed into his likeness with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit. (2Corinthians 4:16-18,NIV)
...those who live in accordance with the Spirit have their minds set on what the Spirit desires. (Romans 8:5, NIV)
...by the Spirit you put to death the misdeeds of the body... (Romans8:13, NIV)
The Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are God's children.(Romans 8:16, NIV)
The Bible gives us the contact information. Together with the Holy Spirit we are enabled to go behind the veil that is our earthy neighborhood and vision another neighborhood where the Father's Way leads.
It required a few small steps for Nicole to venture forward one Sunday. But, it was a journey into Bible study and prayer that took her beyond the confines of an insignificant part of her earthy neighborhood. Nothing happens, the doors remain closed and the curtains tightly drawn until one pursues the questions to which only the Bible is able to apply light for a better view.
What are the chances that anyone, at any given time, will come to the conclusion that the Bible has anything to reveal beyond what meets the eye in earthy neighborhoods? Read on!
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Journey: Into The Never-ending Way
No FicciónWhy does one travel from a well known neighborhood to another where the outcome of the visit is not yet understood? I could name the streets and places in my neighborhood. There was a well defined map in my head that used comfortable explanations fo...
