I know it is time to vacuum when I put
my G-boy on the floor and five seconds later, I am plucking
petrified raisins, toenail clippings, rogue Legos or hairy dust balls
out of his chubby hands.
If he would just leave all that crap
alone, I wouldn't have to vacuum.
But he doesn't. You know why?
My one-year old G-babe (miracle that
he is) lacks DISCERNMENT.
Okay, maybe I skipped a few core developmental stages in there.
First, my G-baby will need to develop
enough Knowledge to understand what toenail clippings are. But
Knowledge alone is not enough. Knowing what a toenail is doesn't mean
he won't put it in his mouth because, you know... he's a guy.
It
will take him a bit longer to learn Right from Wrong, and even
longer to determine Good from Evil. By then, he'll have grown so tall
that the dust balls are no longer eye level. (Though he may still choose to
eat petrified raisins in full Knowledge and Understanding that
they are going to taste Evil, ala Garden of Eden.)
This is where Wisdom comes in. But only with
experience. And often from mistakes. For example, every parent knows to pick up the Legos before
getting up to pee in the middle of the night. It only takes one barefooted misstep to gain such wisdom.
Hopefully, Wisdom eventually leads to
Discernment.
I say 'hopefully', because the older I
get, the more I realize Discernment is not a developmental tool in everybody's arsenal.
Facebook has taught me this lesson well.
The sparsity of Discernment on my news feed is downright depressing. Never
more so than during times of social and political upheaval.
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We are at war, y'all.
But our enemy isn't angry young men
wielding AK-47's or pressure cookers.
Our enemy is Satan. And his weapons to destroy us are many.
He uses hate, bigotry, ignorance,
deception, defeat, doubt, division. He breaks our hearts, he
confuses our minds. He paralyses our souls with fear...
Then he sits back in satisfaction, watching as we
destroy each other.
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These people we call “extremists”...?
They are making extremists of us all.
We're acting like a bunch of soulless
knuckleheads.
When did we forget that we are spiritual beings
having a human experience?
We.Are.Spiritual.Beings.
Our hearts may be broken, but are souls are intact. We are not defenseless.
The Holy Spirit dwells within us.
Just writing those words gives me
chills.
Yet there are so many believers who
never unwrap this God-given gift. It reminds me of those little wooden Russian
dolls that stack inside of each other. How sad it would be to never figure out how to open the biggest doll and discover the other little dolls
nesting inside.
So it is with the Holy Spirit. Open
up the Big Gift and you will find seven more:
Do you realize what a gift this truly is? We have within our possession –
within our very soul – every single tool we need to be More Than Conquerors.
Doesn't it make sense to develop these gifts and put them to use?
Isn't it time?
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This world can seem very dark.
We The People, perpetuate that darkness with our divisiveness and
judgment. We rush to jump on bandwagons and leap joyfully into piles of false
assumptions, seemingly driven by a self-serving desire to be right.
Discernment is
not self-serving, but considers the common good.
Discernment relies
on the Holy Spirit for guidance.
And if our guidance is coming from
anywhere else, we're nothing but a bunch of fools...
(Which reminds me, I need to go vacuum.)
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