Eagles Soar

This series on the Biblical metaphor of the eagle resulted from my most retweeted series ever. This is the fifth post inspired by the success of that series. In the first, we discussed how eagles wait upon thermal winds that lift them high above other birds and carry them along. This is the picture portrayed in Isaiah 40:31 where we are told to “wait upon the Lord” and we will “mount up with wings like eagles”. The winds that would topple us, if we accept them and turn into them become the winds that allow us to lift off. In the second, we considered the patience of eagles as hunters as compared to the Biblical view of “patience”. An environment that is peaceful includes people with patience. Thirdly, we noted that eagles are conspicuously marked; Christians are exhorted to be conspicuous in order to draw others, ultimately to God, as His work is displayed in our lives — we are to be “light” to the world. Last time we explored the idea that eagles are also majestic, they are pleasing to our senses and also powerful. We are built to understand majesty because we will one day see all majesty.

What does it feel like to soar like an eagle? When God created us to see the majesty of a soaring eagle, did He intend for us to draw something more from it. Would you like to soar? Let’s explore the Biblical evidence that “soaring” is being filled with the Spirit. Separately, we’ll consider two different Greek words used for “filled”, unveiling hard evidence for the two meanings of  filled with the Spirit and how it leads to soaring.

Let’s start with what we do know.

Now I am going to him who sent me, yet none of you asks me, ‘Where are you going?’ Because I have said these things, you are filled with grief. But I tell you the truth: It is for your good that I am going away. Unless I go away, the Counselor will not come to you … (John 16: 5-7a)

We know what it feels like to be filled with grief, it is consuming. Sometimes we can’t get out of bed, it feels like weighty sadness. It’s tangible and well known, so much so that there are agreed upon stages of grief. Jesus’ responds to the disciples’ grief by pointing out that the Counselor will come to them, so their grief was recognized and acknowledged.

But that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins….” He said to the paralyzed man, “I tell you, get up, take your mat and go home.” Immediately he stood up in front of them, took what he had been lying on and went home praising God. Everyone was amazed and gave praise to God. They were filled with awe and said, “We have seen remarkable things today. (Luke 5:24-26)

Like being filled with grief, we know the experience of being filled with awe. I recently went on an Alaskan cruise where the sights of Glacier Bay filled me with awe. I was also filled with awe when I got off the ship and spotted a bald eagle on top of a light post.  This feeling is tangible, it can be recognized, it is known. I would expect being filled with the Spirit to tangible, recognizable and known, because the same word is used.

And suddenly there came from heaven a noise like a violent rushing wind, and it filled the whole house where they were sitting. And there appeared to them tongues as of fire distributing themselves, and they rested on each one of them. And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak with other tongues, as the Spirit was giving them utterance.

Now there were Jews living in Jerusalem, devout men from every nation under heaven. And when this sound occurred, the crowd came together, and were bewildered because each one of them was hearing them speak in his own language. They were amazed and astonished, saying, “Why, are not all these who are speaking Galileans? And how is it that we each hear them in our own language to which we were born?” (Acts 2:2-8)

This was an historic moment marking the transition to the time of the Holy Spirit enabling Christians to reach out to every nation under heaven. How? They were filled with the Spirit and supernaturally enabled to speak in the various languages spoken by this large and diverse group. This was recognizable, in fact, the observers were amazed and astonished (as in filled with awe). The experience was unknown tangible (mighty wind) and the reactions were known.

On the next day, their rulers and elders and scribes were gathered together in Jerusalem; and Annas the high priest was there, and Caiaphas and John and Alexander, and all who were of high-priestly descent. When they had placed them in the center, they began to inquire, “By what power, or in what name, have you done this?”
Then Peter, filled with the Holy Spirit, said to them, “Rulers and elders of the people, if we are on trial today for a benefit done to a sick man, as to how this man has been made well, let it be known to all of you and to all the people of Israel, that by the name of Jesus Christ the Nazarene, whom you crucified, whom God raised from the dead–by this name this man stands here before you in good health.” (Acts 4:5-10)

This is a historic opportunity. Not only is Peter being directly threatened the religious elite, he also has an opportunity to share Christ with them. He is filled with the Holy Spirit to empower him to speak boldly (Acts 4:31) despite the size of the threat and the opportunity. This is the context but what about the results?

Now as they observed the confidence of Peter and John and understood that they were uneducated and untrained men, they were amazed, and began to recognize them as having been with Jesus. (Acts 4:13)

Once again the results are obvious, they were amazing and they were observed. In fact, later they prayed filled with the Spirit and the ground “was shaken” (Acts 4:31). That would be hard to miss. Paul (Acts 13:9-10) later is “filled with the Holy Spirit” in order to discern an evil spirit of sorcery.

Do these kinds of experiences happen today? It is undeniable that they do not, I’ve heard no reports of tongues of fire descending into a room nor of a gathering that included every nation where the Spirit spoke through emissaries to an entire crowd and it was knowingly received by the entire audience as its own language. There’s an element of the occurences of Acts that is historic, it was a time of transition, of big change, and God made His plan unmistakeably clear.

We are clearly in the time period now between Jesus’ first and second coming, the time of the Gentiles. What does still happen today? My interest was piqued a few months ago when I shared my testimony at Fellowship Cross Creek in Branson, Missouri. Pastor Joe Cross, both a college and seminary buddy, invited me to share my prodigal returned testimony with his congregation. God ran to me a couple of years before that but I had only just returned to church a few months before.

Pastor Cross reasoned that his congregation was full of returned prodigals and had recently committed to total honesty in their spiritual journey together. The stage was set, no traditional church in their right mind would let someone speak with my background at that time — no church has done so since.

I drove to Branson on Friday and Joe and I, along with his wife Rhonda, sat around and discussed our spiritual journeys. Joe was the last Christian I spoke to before beginning my 27-year prodigal run, now he was marking my return as well. We talked at one stretch for 20 consecutive hours, rejoicing in God’s handiwork in each of our lives and rejoicing in each other.

I was already prepared to speak on Sunday, but late on Saturday Joe suggested that I use a rope or similar prop to demonstrate the stages of my prodigal journey — I would tie knots to mark each segment. We made the short drive to Fellowship Cross Creek to find a prop. When we located a rope, he picked it up and asked me to talk him through the stages as he demonstrated his idea for the use of the rope. I couldn’t remember any of them, I froze with nervousness. The time was now near enough that stage fright was hijacking my heart and mind.

I awoke early on Sunday, as was my custom when I spoke, and began to turn my thoughts to the task at hand. I had two friends send me encouraging words on Facebook and I started to let go. I lay back down, now communing with God and ignoring my speaking ritual of going over ideas over and over and over. I felt the anxiety drain out of me and peace settle in.

I arrived at the church building where Joe set about doing whatever pastors do on Sunday mornings, so I was alone in a group that had no idea who I was. No one approached me. I desperately wanted the time to be recorded so I could share it with my family and online friends but soon discovered that the equipment was not working, something that would normally have bothered me. Instead I got a sense that what I shared was for this crowd and this day only or least not for the extended crowd I imagined.

I sat in a front seat where I was again approached by no one. I sat alone, something that would normally make me uneasy. The music started; Christian music makes me teary. I had requested “Raise Me Up“, my favorite song at the time and Rhonda volunteered to sing. Joe had “warned” me that she sang like an angel and she did. As the beautiful notes sprang from her lips I beg to sob uncontrollably in gratitude that God had called me back. I lost it so bad that they had to get me an entire box of tissues. Joe had his face on the floor praying. The song ended and it was time to speak.

My eyes bloodshot, my spirit drained of everything but gratitude, we took the floor. Joe had agreed to interview me to take the pressure off, so we sat on stools and he asked me the first question. That’s the last thing I remember, I don’t even remember the question. Joe told me later that I stood and spoke for 50 minutes. I stood amazed at what had just happened; I was possessed by the Spirit, I was aware that I was speaking but was not aware of what I was saying. I have foggy memories of picking up the rope to demonstrate the stages of my prodigal run and return but very foggy. I heard sobbing from the congregation, from more than one location, but it sounded like it was far off in the distance, I felt like I was observing my body from the outside. At one point I turned to see Joe, still on the stool beside the one I vacated, also sobbing.

As with the examples above of being filled with the Spirit, both the speaker and the audience knew what was happening, knew that it was an unknown occurrence but that the effect was known. After the service, people waited to speak with me for about a half hour. The first couple desperately pleaded for advice on how to approach their prodigal son. A second man wanted to compare notes with me on his own lengthy prodigal journey. A third thanked me for “putting the mystery back in Christianity”. One week later, in church-wide email, Pastor Cross described the day as “spiritual open-heart surgery”.

Kenneth Wuest, in Word Studies in the New Testament (Volume III), describes the meaning of this word pimplemi as the Spirit “possessing the mind and heart of the believer” (p. 103). “Pleroo”, the other Greek word sometimes translated “filled” (Ephesians 5:18) is more properly translated “controlled” (p. 104) but the former implies that the whole being is possessed by the Spirit. Wuest goes on to point out that this is not an experience to seek, the verb is “passive” in every case in the original language — the Spirit moves when God wills, not when we will.

Like the earlier Biblical examples, I can say that this filling of the Spirit still occurs, I experienced it myself and it fits the description of the text both in tone and effect. I can only guess why the Spirit moved that day, it’s fun to try and I think it plays to God’s sense of humor. However, there’s no experience to seek in any of these examples, we are passive, we can only seek to abide in Him, to live and breathe Him. I’ve described my role in this but it’s best described in a phrase I would utter a couple of weeks later that became my most successful single tweet ever (measured by retweets):

He works in ways we don’t expect toward an end we don’t imagine using tools we did not forge.

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