Productive thought is rooted in words. Coping success and the power to forgive someone for hurting you is rooted in the Holy Spirit, but it’s also true that the Holy Spirit gives me the power to persevere when fear, anxiety and depression paralyze me.

Never underestimate the power of saying Jesus’ name alone over and over again. It’s a great mystery how God is active in our human experience because we are accustomed to the seen reality we have with the people we interact with on a daily basis. If you’re single obviously you don’t wake up to companionship, but at some point you have interaction with others.

One of my favorite passages is in Romans 8. It talks about the Spirit interceding with groans that words cannot express. The context is the Spirit praying to the Father on our behalf. Celestial beings “gossip” about us. Satan is a celestial being, and the book of Job is clear that Satan and God discussed the life of Job. You know the story. In that sense the Spirit talking or groaning to God about Daniel Tomlinson is not a mystery. The Greek work for miracle can also be translated sign, and those things that amaze us like a miracle are merely signs of God’s activity. They aren’t amazing so much to beings who have observed them for thousands of years. That’s comforting to me.

Greatness as some call greatness is the end result of words being shared. Greatness cannot happen when words are not exchanged. God and the heavenly hosts not sharing words would be as ludicrous as the sun not rising in the east. Conversation, communication and faith are embedded in the life of Jesus’ followers, and when those things break down dark nights of the soul are inevitable. Even when we disagree with the fear and anxiety of another human being we are empowered to be with them without one word of judgement. We are empowered to be a vessel of God’s power to them even when we resent their lack of faith. I guess that statement is clearly judgmental, but I cannot escape the fact that life here and now is one huge paradox. I cannot judge another human being, even my offspring, but I do. When Jesus told the criminal on the cross that he would be with him in paradise he did not condone the crimes he had previously committed. God, Jesus and the Holy Spirit are masters at resolving these paradoxes, and even though evil is great among us, so is goodness.

Our pain is great. It always will be till Jesus reveals himself again, but it does not paralyze us continually because when we call upon the name of the LORD paralysis can be undone. We are not condemned to a life of sin no matter what someone says. We have been given incredible power through words to throw off the chains that drag us into pits of despair. They do not thrust themselves upon us the way a man might force himself into a woman because that is not God’s way with his children. Love does not insist on its own way. It takes into account whether a particular action in a given situation is appropriate, and if it is it acts accordingly. Oh what a message for our times. Oh what a message for any time.

What are you allowing into your mind and heart? If you force your agenda, thoughts, opinions and moral “superiority” on others you will isolate yourself to your own doom. I know people like that. I’ve been that person. I have to repent (change) daily from sin that so easily entangles me because I’m afraid I’m one whom Satan knows by name (see Joe Beam’s Seeing The Unseen book). I’m not afraid in the sense that the boogie man looks in his closet for Chuck Norris, but I am respectful of Satan’s power to undo me. He won’t because the blood of Christ covers me, and his resurrection was a contract signature that cannot erase my salvation. Wow!

Jesus’ words are my life. I don’t always follow them because the sinful nature is as real as my spiritual nature. They collide frequently on my journey.