No 36: To Create a People Passionate for Good Works

This is a very heart-felt chapter.  I desire more passion, more zeal - and I know that is a prayer God is always answering.  What I have deeply learnt in the last 5 years is that it has to be passion which He plants and grows.  He is a gardener: He must make space for His new plants by taking out weeds which He hasn't planted, and especially ones which look very like His new plants: passions in me which seem very moral and worthy, but have actually been nurtured by myself. 

I have been able to discover these by allowing God to tell me about my true motives.  Ever since I was taught by Mark and Patti Virkler to recognise how God speaks to us, I have been able to listen to Him teach me in remarkable detail.  It's every believer's birthright, and there's nothing more thrilling than imparting the same faith to somebody else, and watch the wonder in their eyes as exactly the same experience begins.  For me, the Holy Spirit seems to take the lead, although either or all of the Three Persons of God may start the conversation, and They often speak collectively as 'We'.

Most of what God has wished to talk to me about has been to do with my heart, and the Spirit has graciously dug down into it to bring to light the things He wishes to heal, change or remove.  At key moments, He has arranged for me to hear the same things in another way, so my faith in the way I am hearing Him is maintained and strengthened.  These other ways include prophecies given to me by somebody else, what I 'happen' to be reading in a book, the significance of circumstances and natural events, and, of course, the Scriptures.  The Virklers, echoing centuries of spiritual tradition, strongly recommend having one or more spiritual advisers who will read one's journalling and hear independently from God about it.  I've been a bit hit-and-miss at organising that, but by a mix of Susan, my wife, and various other friends, I don't keep anything to myself.  I would like particularly to thank Martin Shreeve in my church here, who accepted this role early on in 2008-9, when I was starting out.

One personal prophecy from Nick Pengelly on 31 May 2008 has been a vital waymarker for me, and brings me back to today's chapter.  He had a picture of a Morris Minor car* which had been completely restored; it looked the same as when it was first built, but every single part of it had been replaced.  God is replacing my passions with ones which are still 'me', but are now rooted and nourished by Him.

* My father had a Morris Minor for 12 years, which he sold when I was 10, and I loved.  He also gave my beloved sister one in the last year before she died aged 20, when I was 14.