Before the days of computer games and social media, kids had to be creative in finding fun activities. I remember one summer day as a child constructing a kite with newspaper, glue, sticks, and a torn-up t-shirt. After my masterpiece was finished, I took it outside for launch. Finding an open field, I ran across the field with my kite behind me. I let out more string and ran a little faster. My kite briefly rose in the air but quickly crashed. Surveying the situation, I concluded that my kite was either too heavy or there was not enough wind.
Not enough wind is an accurate way to describe the spiritual lives of many of God’s people. We occupy ourselves with running around and around fully engaged in a busy life. We serve where needed, we show up to meetings, and we fill up our devotional notebooks. But we still can’t get our kite off the ground. We may be steeped in discouragement and grounded in defeat. What can we do? We need more wind. We need God’s Holy Spirit to fill us, to control us and to lift us. Jesus told the disciples in Acts 1:4-8: “And being assembled together with them, He commanded them not to depart from Jerusalem, but to wait for the Promise of the Father, which, He said, you have heard from Me; for John truly baptized with water, but you shall be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from now. But you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be witnesses to Me in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth."
The early church was so effective and accomplished so much that it was said of them: “they turned the world upside down”. You and I as followers of Jesus are in possession of that same Spirit that energized those early Christians. We need to allow the Holy Spirit to lift us in joy and victory; to fill us with power and boldness.
Do you feel your kite is crashing? You don’t need more running you need more wind.