“Byron, let your yes be yes, and your no be no,” he said rather emphatically! I was in the pastor’s office after the opening night of a conference I led. I hadn't been doing my events for very long. Until then, I had been invited to participate in other meetings but hadn't presented my own.
As he shut the door to his office, he asked me to take a seat. “So, how do you think the evening went?” he asked with a truly positive and inquisitive tone in his voice.
Well, I think it went well. I could see the people were moved, and the Lord seemed to be working in their lives. I'm not sure what more to say. How do you think it went?
“Do you remember when you said you would have a healing time at the beginning of the evening, right after worship?”
Fighting back, something in my inner man was a slight twinge of something I didn’t like. I wasn’t sure what it was, but it had that uncomfortable feeling attached. I had to try to recall my comments from the time frame he suggested. “You’re right,” I responded.
I had said I would have a healing prayer time, and I forgot to follow up. I got caught up in the moment and did not fulfill my promise to everyone. That is when his statement came forth. “Byron, let your yes be yes, and your no be no.” He continued, “When you make a promise to one person or a group, it’s important to follow up. You said you would have a time of healing. Several people came to this conference to receive prayer for healing. What can we do about this?” He left it in my court.
It was time to ask the group for forgiveness. I spent the next session praying for healing. There’s more to this adventure than the pastor’s kindness to grow me up. Do you remember the twinge I mentioned? That uncomfortable feeling in my inner man. When I returned to my hotel room that night, I talked with Dad about it. I knew there was more to this story than a kind rebuke (oh, that’s good, a kind rebuke). The twinge carried in it human pride. The kind of pride that closes the door to hearing the fullness of the Spirit.
This moment of kind rebuke from the pastor was to teach me a human response to a promise. More importantly, it was to teach me that even the slightest of my pride will close a door to hearing the fullness of the Spirit. I confessed my lack of follow-through to the people attending this conference, and now it was time to talk with Dad about my pride — about that feeling, the twinge that represented a closed door.
That night in the hotel, I challenged my thoughts. Maybe it was the way the pastor said it that made me have this twinge. Nope, he was full of grace. I could find no issue there. Okay, maybe it wasn’t that big of a deal in the first place, and he was making it out to be something more than it was. Hmm, it seems I was still under the spell of pride. There’s no way this could be all my fault!
I’ve had more than one occasion when a leader kindly rebuked me for something. Each time, this little pride point would rise. There’s that twinge again. Then, I discovered the purpose of the twinge. It has been the Father’s heartbeat of love. It is the point of conviction. I also found that the quicker I respond to the twinge, the quicker I learn the lesson He is after, and I hear clearer.
The longer it takes to respond, it’s as if my spiritual hearing is clogged up, and when I finally get the point, my spiritual ears pop open. Remember when you've got water in your ear or after a plane flight, and after a while, they pop open, leaving you to hear again? Our spiritual ears lose their clarity when we let that twinge take over when, all the time, it was a loving Father providing an avenue of maturing in our walk with Him. Come on, Spirit - don’t stop now. Keep me learning.
I’m sure you’ve had these moments. We all do. Is there a moment that you’d share with us?
There’s so much I don’t know about the workings of the Holy Spirit. I get what you’re saying here about Him teaching YOU a lesson, but I find it hard to understand that the people who came to be healed would be denied if YOU didn’t jump through the right hoops. Doesn’t God know the thoughts and intentions of all our hearts? Couldn’t he just override your lack of followthrough? Jan (or am I just being twinged here in Missouri, too?)