When my son began to talk, he mispronounced many words and struggled to make certain sounds. Not out of the ordinary for a baby, and it was sweetly reminiscent of my little sister, Mary, who spoke with a slight lisp and chewed her words when she spoke in a way that mesmerized all she met. Mary’s little lisp was cute and captivating when she was a child, and she eventually grew out of it (for the most part – I can still hear it when she is really tired).
However, as my son Gabriel grew, so did the problem.
Darryl – my husband – understood him most of the time, but every now and then had to ask me what Gabriel said. My mother could understand him if she could watch him talk. When she had a conversation with him over the phone, I would have to translate for her.
I was the only one who could understand him all the time.
That is…until the time when I didn’t.
We had a bedtime routine that included the singing of many songs. Children’s Christian songs, folk songs, and songs my father had written and sang to me and my siblings. All of them were known by one or two word monikers that my kids used to request hearing it. “Silver Moon,” “The Bat,” “The Donkey,” and so on.
Gabriel was three-years-old at this point, and really loved this bedtime routine. As usual, he was requesting the songs and I was singing them, until I couldn’t understand what he asked me to sing. I was laying beside him in his little bed, and I just told him to say it again. It didn’t help. I knew this situation had the potential to be very upsetting for him, and I had to work through it very quickly. I began to go through the list of songs asking him if it was that one, or that one, or that one.
“Silver Moon?” “The Bat?” “The Donkey?”
One after one, he answered, “No.”
I sensed his building frustration and began to slow down, pause. I asked him to say the word again, slower. I guessed more songs. We were getting nowhere. He pulled the covers up over his head, turned away from me, and began to cry. It seemed so hopeless. He was devastated and defeated. I could hear him, but I couldn’t understand him. We were so close in every way, but so far apart in that moment.
Can You Hear Me Now?
This is what it’s like – with a slight twist – if you are a Christian who is not living in the fullness of God’s grace. You have a Spiritual Impediment and you need Spiritual Therapy.
Living in the fullness of His grace means that after salvation, you have continued to grow in your relationship with God. You seek Him daily. He’s first in your life. You read His Holy Word, talk to Him every day, serve Him, worship Him, and sing His praises in times of trouble. You cherish the fellowship of the brethren and have a deep desire to know God more. Your life has been changed as a result of the grace He has given you.
Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come, (2 Corinthians 5:17-18).
If you haven’t allowed God’s grace to change your life, you just handed over the keys to your house to Satan. Satan can’t steal the gift God gave you, but he can keep you from understanding and enjoying it by keeping you as far apart as he can.
Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! According to his great mercy, he has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for you, who by God’s power are being guarded through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time, (1 Peter 1:3-5).
Learning the Hard Way
I speak from experience.
I spent years, after I was saved, not living in the fullness of the grace He gave me. I had a spiritual impediment.
I know the powerful difference in my life now compared to before…before I put Him first in my life. Before I understood what that even meant. Before I got Spiritual Therapy.
Not until I sought Him did my life change.
I knew there was more to my relationship with God then I was experiencing. I started seeking Him. Really seeking Him. I got Spiritual Therapy to address my spiritual impediment. I didn’t get my therapy with a therapist, or preacher, or some other fleshly avenue. I consulted the only expert I trusted…God, the Wonderful Counselor (Isaiah 9:6). I started praying and reading the Bible. As my relationship with Him grew, I wanted more. He revealed things to me; I understood Him in a way I never had before. He changed me, and I was so richly blessed.
Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives, and the one who seeks finds, and to the one who knocks it will be opened. Or which one of you, if his son asks him for bread, will give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a serpent? If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask him! (Matthew 7:7-11).
The Good Gift from God is God Himself.
Christians say that God is first in their lives. Unfortunately, many of their lives do not exemplify that in any way. They go to church, but text and distract themselves during Sunday school or worship. They never read their Bible, rarely pray, or their lifestyle doesn’t reflect Christ. Maybe they haven’t been to church in years even though they are good, moral Christians who help their neighbors, or they are not grounded in God’s Truth.
These kinds of Christians need Spiritual Therapy.
If you are truly saved with a spiritual impediment, you have a parent who loves you desperately and knows you fully, but there is no way you are able to have any depth of understanding. You are so far apart, and you’re missing the true fulfillment and deep joy that comes by living in the fullness of His grace.
Until You Know Jesus
God established the way to have a right relationship with Him. There is a reason He wants us to read the Bible and pray. He wants us to know Him as much as we possibly can.
Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a worker who has no need to be ashamed, rightly handling the word of truth, (2 Timothy 2:15).
God knows, because He planned it this way, that the greatest fulfillment in life is when we have a real relationship with Him. You aren’t really living unless you know Jesus intimately.
“Rightly handling the word of truth,” as spoken in 2 Timothy above, is reading and studying scripture. Reading scripture is one way to deepen our relationship with Jesus, because the Bible itself IS Jesus.
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God, (John 1:1-2).
All scripture is God breathed out on the page, and all is there for the edification of our soul.
All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work, (2 Timothy 3:16-17).
Rejecting the Bible, by any means – not reading, failing to following, etc – is rejecting Jesus. He is in your Bible. Seek Him.
I have only begun to scratch the surface of looking at spiritual impediments.
Seeking the Therapy You Need
I was eventually able to figure out which song my son wanted me to sing. Not because I understood him – I never did – I finally guessed it.
The next day, I called the school district and started the process to have him evaluated for speech therapy. I couldn’t imagine another situation like the one we just experienced, and I knew things would only get worse for him when he started school. He had an impediment in the area of articulation, and stayed in therapy until the 3rd grade.
Friends, I realize I have written about this subject before, but it is on my heart in a powerful way. It’s like I have this secret…but it’s not really a secret, and I want everyone to know it. I want all Christians to live in the fullness of His grace. To have no spiritual impediments getting in the way of your relationship with God. I want you, not to just hear His voice, but understand what He’s saying to you. I just want to shout it from the roof tops for all to know the power of God and live a truly blessed life. It is such a shame to live without ever knowing that. I have such regrets about my life before I understood. It feels like such wasted time. I pray to save you from that regret and help you understand how truly precious your gift is.
What are your spiritual impediments? Look honestly at your relationship with Jesus. Do you need Spiritual Therapy? Do you need salvation?
May God bless your journey to know Him more.
Dear Heavenly Father,
We praise Your Holy name and thank You for the gift of salvation. Lord, forgive us, for by our ignorance and arrogance we failed to understand the richness of Your grace and became our own spiritual impediment. Bless us with a passion for You that drives us daily to seek You. Examine us and pull from us anything that may be a road block to a deep relationship with You. Open our eyes and our hearts so we may clearly see You and hear You. Increase our faith and give us strength.
In Jesus Holy Name,
Amen
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