Part II - You Feel the Wind

In recent weeks here in Massachusetts we've had some incredible windstorms. Golf ball sized hail fell in the suburbs around Boston, trees snapped like twigs in microbursts, and power lines came down right across the Mass Pike. In the middle of the hot summery stretch of August, we were suddenly hearing storm reports of damages and power outages numbering in the hundreds of thousands.

I sat in my back yard watching the tall pines that line the property. Usually, the trees nudge my thoughts to the natural grace and survivor skills the Lord vested in nature. They somehow stand through decades of icy winters and long hot droughts in summer. Without complaining, they endure, whispering peace and serenity as they wave their aromatic scent in the breeze. 

I love these trees! Don't you? The freshly oxygenated air they supply enriches me. I meditate on God’s provisions of sun and rain to nourish the green earth. We always water the garden and make sure the flowers have access to sun. But wind? I never think about it. 

In the wake of the storms, it suddenly occurred to me that wind is another essential element. Of course the Father knew exactly what he was doing when he set these currents to work and ordered them to cover the earth.

The air is constantly in motion. Nor’easters, and westerlies, southern currents and cold fronts--everything in constant flux. It really is a weatherman’s delight of swirling patterns and movement. Nothing stands still. 

Have you ever wondered why? We don’t just have air to breathe. It is sent on a mission.

Temperatures rise and fall and huge masses of air sweep across the nations. They disperse rainclouds across the land, deliver seeds, and blow the chaff and dying leaves away. The air blows over the seas and cools the land. As I reflected on what the wind does for a tree, I realized there’s even more to the story, but you have to peer beneath the surface.

I’m always admiring trees but I never think about the roots. Their visual brilliance obliterates a massive underground foundation supporting the entire tree. This network of limbs spreads out farther than the weighty upper branches. But how do they penetrate the many obstacles of granite ledges and centuries-old layers of hard packed earth?

Wind! The force of air against leaves and branches rocks the tree and tugs at the roots, loosening the soil and making necessary room for the roots to stretch and grow.  Growing space is created by this God-given force, which in extreme cases of hurricanes or tornados, threatens to topple the entire tree.  But the very gales that threaten to destroy it, actually make it stronger.

In the spiritual realm, we have seasons, too. The testing and trials of my life are God-sent to build a wider foundation and deepen my spiritual roots. My obstacles and pressures are creating some growing space to exercise my spiritual muscles and apply God’s Word. Wiggle room for my faith! 

If your life feels like a constant swirl of conflicting patterns and obstacles, if it seems they threaten to undo or destroy you (we have a cunning foe), don’t give up! Go deeper. It’s okay to wiggle!

You will be okay. Persevere gracefully like the swaying trees. 

We can accept trials of many kinds because they lead to spiritual strength and maturity.

James 1:2-4 

Part I - You Hear the Wind

One night in Jerusalem, well after everyone was shut into their homes for the evening meal, a member of the high order of Pharisees came to talk privately with a rabbi as he wrestled with his teaching. This Rabbi Jesus was the buzz of the city, and stories of his words and healings filled the streets. Nicodemus just had to know for himself, but not publicly. Too much was at stake. He wanted a private audience to voice his questions to this miracle-working man who called himself the Son of the Most High. 

Nicodemus was trying to make sense out of everything he was seeing and hearing, but it was terribly confusing. So when he finally met Jesus face to face, his thoughts must have tumbled out rather awkwardly. Where do you begin when you come to the One who calls himself God? 

“I think you have to be sent from above,” he stammered. “You have to be from God, as you claim, or how could you do the things you’re doing? We've seen the man born blind regain his sight, and a man who was lame from birth walking in the temple courts.” Then his unspoken questions hung in the night air between them, but the Lord shot straight to his heart and addressed what he was missing. 

Jesus started his lesson with a very basic spiritual principle. “I tell you the truth, no one can see the kingdom of God unless he is born again.” It comes like a word of caution to an educated man. Beware, Nicodemus, you can’t figure it out in the normal way, with your natural mind. The life you seek doesn't come through the mind of man, or the things you're relying on. You need to start over, with a rebirth.

“How?” Nicodemus asked. This doesn’t make any sense. His whole life revolved around religious studies and his prestigious role, but he never heard anyone talk about the necessity of a second birth. That’s impossible! I was already born, he wrestled. Aren’t I good enough? I’ve studied Torah and tried to do the right things. I’ve attended religious services and followed all our regulations with the diligence and devotion of a saint, BUT a full-grown man can’t start life over again! How can we go back to birth? 

When we’re in a state of shock, and the boat’s rocking like this, God knows he has to go slowly, as a Father teaching us in baby steps. So, Jesus said it again. “I tell you the truth, no one can enter the kingdom of God unless he is born of water and the Spirit… Flesh gives birth to flesh, but the Spirit gives birth to spirit.”

Jesus was opening his eyes to an entirely different type of birth. Nicodemus was only familiar with the earthly birth of the flesh, but there’s a whole new realm into which God leads us. Without it, we will never know him. Period.

The blood drained from his face as Nicodemus grappled to understand if all his efforts and religious studies, the wearing of robes and his scholarly achievements, were now quite at risk of washing down the drain entirely. 

How sad, how frightening, to be confronted with such a daunting realization. Isn't there any value to what I’ve done? Jesus was saying that the fate of all religion is clear. You will not get to heaven this way. You’ve been barking up the wrong tree! You need to start over.

Are you serious? At my age? How many of us would turn and walk away at that point? But Nicodemus needed to see that duty and the law didn’t provide the answers he sorely needed to “meet God.” The accumulation of knowledge and accolades, the titles, legalistic fanaticism, and all the externals were not going to get him there. Religion isn’t enough! The world is full of religion, but we have a famine of the personal knowledge of God.

Did you notice the difference in the way Jesus articulated the essentials? The first time, Jesus said, “No one can see the kingdom of God,” and the next time he expanded that to say, “No one can enter the kingdom” without this new spiritual birth. There is progression in these statements.

We can see something from a great distance, but you only enter through actualization, in the step-by-step experience. You enter at your own pace and at discretion. It is personal. And certainly, we cannot enter what our hearts cannot see, or believe. Faith gives us the spiritual sight required where the kingdom of God is concerned. Entering in requires walking it out in an exercise of our own faith muscles. We must take the baby steps, spiritually speaking.

Knowing the thoughts of his heart, Jesus continued. “You shouldn’t be surprised…” In other words, don’t let yourself think that you know it all. You’re not there yet.  Let me explain what your heart is aching to understand.

I’m fairly sure that at that precise moment a great wind stirred as the Lord’s audio display. We can’t say, “look at the wind,” because it’s invisible, except for the dust it carries and the trees it bends. So the Lord said, “you hear the wind…” in another of his incredible universal illustrations to the planet. There's more to it than meets the eye! I need to develop other senses. 

“Don’t 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.”

Mystery! God wants us to come in faith and to respond in love by the tugging of our heartstrings, rather than the academic workings of the mind, so he has not removed all of the mystery.

The wind beautifully illustrates the undeniable presence and power of the Holy Spirit—invisible to our human eyes. We only know the wind exists by the things it does.  We can see leaves rustling, trees leaning over, or clouds moving across the sky. We love to watch a kite or an eagle soaring above the mountains. Wind sustains their flight. Wind makes it possible. We cannot deny its force or prevalence, but it is unpredictable, invisible, and mysterious.

“So it is with everyone born of the Spirit,” Jesus said. God works and dwells in the invisible realm. He calls us to believe in what we cannot see, for now, and I’m okay with that. 

I am only alive because I can breathe what is invisible, and I would die in a minute without it. Wind is all around us, and I never question its existence, do you? Either way, the day will come that I will see it clearly. "Now we see but a poor reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully..." I Cor. 13:12

My spiritual life also depends on an invisible source, except I must choose to breathe it in. As Jesus explained to Nicodemus that night, He came for this reason, “that everyone who believes in him may have eternal life.”

So we [must learn to] fix our eyes [spiritually] and pay greater attention to what is not seen, for what is seen is temporal and passing, but what is unseen, and invisible as the wind, is eternal.

2 Corinthians 4:18 

John 3