Walking the Path of the Wind

Today, as is my custom I was reading the essential blog 

Blue Eyed Ennis,

 and delighting in it's challenge
 to keep our faith and hearts open and questing,

whilst acknowledging our need for orthodoxy.

For many years I have wrestled with these questions.

I used to anxiously ask my spiritual director,
"Am I falling off the edge?"

Gradually I have come to see my walk with God
 is actually a continual dance.

To stay in step I surrender my need to feel "safe",

(or do I mean"right" and in control?)

to the more urgent need 
to be constantly moving, alive, open, 
and trusting the challenge of relationship.

I have come to think of it like this:-

"Just as you cannot understand the path of the wind  

or the mystery of a tiny baby growing in its mother's womb, 

so you cannot understand the activity of God,

 who does all things."

 Ecclesiasties 11:5 ( New Living Bible)

Perhaps the best illustration of this 
"path of the wind" 
for me is the memory of the field 
at the back of the house where I was born. 
 When the grasses grew long and lush
  the wind whispered through it so 
it stirred and murmured like the sea.

 Often as I watched,
 a path created by the wind would open up 
and carve a clear path across it.
I don't think I ever saw a straight way cleaved by the wind,
 rather it meandered like a stream,
 only to disappear as soon as it became visible.
 Then a new one would appear.
There's a dance, and a delight in this way of finding a path,
as for all it's apparent elusiveness it is an earthed,
 and true way.


In the new testament of the Christian bible 
the Holy Spirit of God is referred to as the pneuma, 
which is Greek for breath, or wind, 
 or it can mean soul or spirit as well.

The old testament similarly uses the Hebrew  ruach elohim 
 to mean the Spirit of God,  ruach being breath, or wind.

Also Jesus said,

" The wind blows wherever it pleases.

 You hear its sound,
 but you cannot tell where it comes from  or where it is going.

 So it is with everyone born of the Spirit." John 3:8.

As well as describing the mystery of the Spirit's path
 this image suggests much more about God's dealings with us.

The movement of a summer wind

 can be a gentle breeze that caresses,

 even warms and soothes us.

 Then again a cool breeze can lift, refresh,

and re-invigorate us. 

Sea breezes, or mountain air  

stirs the blood making us feel more fully alive.

I personally love a wild day

 when the trees are thrashing in the wind 

and making me want to dance.

My teacher friends all say that the kids in the classroom are especially skittish and lively on such days, 

so it's not just me!

The days when it is so fierce

 it buffets and pushes you along in it's direction 

is only a tiny taste of the wind's immense and fearful power.

No wonder we look to harness the raw energy of the wind 

to try and save the earth's precious resources.

Scripture, (and experience!) tells us however that 

 the wind of the Spirit of God 

can neither be harnessed nor directed.

Rather it is for those who have given themselves

 to God in Christ

and are "born of the Spirit" 

to rely upon the breath of God

to direct, guide, energise, 

and even bear them along the path of life.

Still and all,

 the tension of leaning on the power of the Spirit

 and knowing His freedom has always to be set against

 the possibility of getting carried away 

with steps of our own.

So we stay on our toes,

dancing on the wide tight rope path of faith.

I wish you the joy of the dance

Be Blessed this Weekend.

Updated and amended from an earlier post.