The Air was Cold

There’s a story that my pastor tells us all the time at church. It’s a picture of what life is like.

(For those of you who go to my church here it is again! But can you really ever hear it too many times?) So in this story there are 3 characters walking a ridgepole. The first is Fact, who walks the ridgepole with perfect balance for its truth. The middle character is Faith, that’s us and as long as we keep our eyes forward and on Fact we walk the ridgepole perfectly balanced like him. (This story would be really great if it stopped right there!) Unfortunately there’s a third character in this picture that comes behind Faith his name is Experience. Now Experience is a loud mouth and shouts all the time about what has happened in the past and how things didn’t work out and as soon as you turn around to consult him the both of you fall off the roof! But if you keep your eyes on Fact, Faith walks the ridgepole, and slowly your Experience begins to line up and all three can walk.

So today was another hot day and I was going out to run a few errands. I was getting mentally prepared to be hot on my trip for the AC in my vehicle has been broken for the last couple summers. Every year my dad and I try juicing it up and it will be cool for a few days then it leaks out what we put in and I spend the rest of the summer sweating. (I’ve gotten used to it and I still love my yellow car!) Well this year I went out and bought a couple new O-rings to try in hopes it would seal the lines better and not leak. We then juiced it up and I took a couple nice drives with my AC. Well that was about a week ago and as I approached my car there was a hint of hope that by some outside chance the AC might still be working but in honesty I was convinced it would be hot and thus was ready to open the windows and sweat. I climbed in, started the car, and began opening the windows. The AC was on full blast and the air was warm. As I proceeded to open the back windows the air began to feel a little bit cooler. I then stopped and stuck my hand in front of the vent and began to grin. I WAS WRONG! I laughed in delight and drove away while I shut the windows.

In I won’t let you Fall I talked about prayer and asking the Lord for the things in your heart. Well this is another reason why asking for the things He’s put in your heart or even promised you, can be hard. Experience. You hope for change but you don’t expect it. Of course I wanted my AC to work but experience told me it wouldn’t and believed it. It’s hard to pray with boldness for something that you don’t think is going to happen or looks and seems impossible.

The other day the kids were watching a Bible video that was telling the story about the man who went to his neighbor’s house in need of bread.(Luke 11:5-8) He knocked and pestered his neighbor until he finally (in this video anyway!) threw the bread out the window at him! If that man had gone to his neighbor’s house with the same level of confidence that I had in my AC working he would have left empty handed after one try. As a child I was taught not to nag and in regards to your parents that’s an important lesson, but persistent prayer isn’t called nagging, it’s called Faith.

He who promised is faithful and cannot lie! Experience may be telling you that what you are seeking is impossible and will never happen, but you never know… you could be wrong…. And the air might come out cold.

⁷ “Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. ⁸ For everyone who asks receives, and he who seeks finds, and to him who knocks it will be opened. ⁹ Or what man is there among you who, if his son asks for bread, will give him a stone? ¹⁰ Or if he asks for a fish, will he give him a serpent? ¹¹ If you then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask Him!

Matthew 7:7-11