Moved by the Spirit

I have a story to tell about how the Spirit moved me the other day. This feels like one of those stories you only see in your e-mail, but I must say that I never felt this moved by God before in my life. It's a little long, but bear with me. There is no great climactic scene of someone coming to Christ, just a cool story about what it's like to really do as God has moved us. By the way, thanks to BH for letting me know this was a bigger deal than I really thought it was:

It was this past Sunday and the unpacked boxes from our move were starting to annoy me in the garage. So I decided it was time to get rid of them, as well as some of the Goodwill stuff I had been meaning to deliver for about 2 weeks. As I was breaking down the boxes to put in my truck, I was still debating whether or not I should wait and take them to the closer trash dump on the next major street over when they opened Monday morning, or just take them over to my old Dunedin stomping grounds. My wife looked at me and asked me what I was going to do and I had to think for a minute. And another minute went by as I started thinking of other things I could do with my time instead of driving all over Pinellas and Hillsborough counties for 2 hours. Then our awesome God laid something on my heart: go to Dunedin because there is someone I want you to talk to at the recycle place. So I did, not thinking that anything would really happen.

I got the truck packed up, tucked Ethan into his car seat, and headed to Goodwill and then on to Dunedin. It was cool to see the old hometown. We pulled into the dirt lot where the recycle bins were and started to put all the stuff into its respective bins. As I was putting some of the newspaper into the dumpster, I noticed an older gentlemen thumbing through the old papers looking for articles of interest. I had 2 office paper boxes full of old magazines so I proceeded to ask if he wanted to thumb through them and take what he wanted. He obliged and we walked over to the bed of my truck. He wasn't interested in most of them because of their aviation nature, but he took the TIME magazines. As I took the rest of them over the proper bin, the old man offered to help me with the boxes and we struck up a conversation. He told me how he was from upstate New York and about the old dairy farm that was turned into an airport near his childhood home. We exchanged pleasantries over jobs, and background, interests and family. I thanked the man for his help and went about my task fo buckling my hyperactive son back into his car seat.

Just when I finished this task, I told Ethan to hold on for a second. I had to go over and talk with the nice man for just one more second. God was still pushing. I wasn't done with Steve yet. I grabbed one of the invite cards to our church out of my wallet and walked over to the man again. I asked he had a church and he said he did not. I asked if he was married and he said that he was not. I told him about our church a little and that we would love to have him join us this weekend. He knew the area where it was and seemed to be pretty receptive to coming on over. What's more important, he seemed very happy to talk with someone. I felt content with myself: the operative word being MYSELF.

Then I started driving. About ten minutes down the road to see the grandparents, I realized something: God pushed me to do something earlier didn't he. Wait a minute, he laid it on my heart that someone was there to talk with me and I didn't even realize it was happening, I just followed as I was lead! Whoa. This doesn't happen to me. I "follow" God all the time and he doesn't necessarily listen. Or is it the fact that I am following my own inhibitions and God is waiting on me to do what he wants, not what I want?

What happened on Sunday shook me up and made me start REALLY "listening" for the Spirit. What about you?

Turning up my spiritual hearing aid,
Jesus Freak Out!