Remembering back to my first spiritual memory. It is vague, but goes something like this: I was preschool age going to my Baptist Church on a Wednesday Night. The kids wore their Halloween costumes that night because it was Halloween week. Some wore their bathrobes and were Biblical figures like Joseph, Mary, Moses, etc… One may have even had a John the Baptist outfit made of a burlap potato bag. Unfortunately, the outfit I wore that night was a Biblical figure too, but it was a Little Red Devil suit, complete with a plastic pitchfork. Mrs. Borge, the preschool teacher that night, was a little concerned about a kid who would wear a Devil’s suit to church. So, in a very simple way Mrs. Borge told us about how much Jesus loves us and how He wants us to belong to Him. I thought that sounded good, because, in spite of my attire, belonging to the Devil sounded pretty scary. Fast forward a few years to age 10, I decided that I wanted to let my church know that I belonged to Jesus. I was baptized and did my best to do what I thought Jesus would want me to do. Fast forward a few more years to a mission trip in my teen years and I felt like God was calling me to be a minister of His Good News. I initially accepted, but then slowly, eventually rejected that call. I plunged into rebellion against what I knew to be right and good for the next several years, though I still attended church infrequently. I loved myself much more than I loved God or anyone else. Finally, God got my attention one day while I was sitting alone reading the Bible, reflecting on the moral bankruptcy of my life and the ways I had mistreated so many other people, even some who loved me a lot. God spoke to me inaudibly. He said, “Bill, you are my child and I am your Father, you belong to Me, but you are acting like a child of the Devil.” I wept and began a journey of repentance. God began to disciple me, reminding me how those who really belong to Him act and don’t act, think and don’t think, speak and don’t speak. I eventually accepted His call on my life to serve Him, I went to Seminary and began to serve Him as a pastor. Sometimes I still need to be reminded how God’s children act.
Jesus once warned those who were against Him but claimed to belong to God, the Father saying, “If God were your Father, you would love me, for I have come here from God… You belong to your father, the devil, and you want to carry out your father’s desires… there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks his native language, for he is a liar and the father of lies…Whoever belongs to God hears what God says. The reason you do not hear is that you do not belong to God.”(John 8:42, 44, 47 NIV11) If for some reason we don’t hear God speaking to our heart, we may need to examine whether we are really one of His. Sometimes though, we just behave like we have forgotten that we belong to God and we behave like we did when we belonged to the Devil. Listen for God’s voice to remind you Who you really belong to and how His kids act.
Hang in there people! God is glad to be with us! I’m praying for us all!
