Don't Stop Until the Holy Spirit Stops You!

    

      

          I once walked across a mountain Ridge called: "Knife Edge" on the trail up Mt. Katahdin in Maine. The name Katahdin is an Indian name meaning: "the greatest mountain." One of the descriptions of Knife Edge reads something like this: "Knife Edge is a ridge that at some spots is about one foot wide with a drop off of 1000 feet on either side. The Ridge is about 1.1 miles long." DO NOT HIKE KNIFE EDGE IF IT IS WINDY! Somewhere around 44 people have died since records started being kept in 1926. I have climbed 23 of the United States Highpoints and Katahdin is among my all time favorites.

           When you are on top of a high mountain, your view is a 360 degree panorama of more mountains. It's like the immeasurableness of God. Most folks agree that you cannot live life on top of a mountain and that's a physically true statement. Is it really a spiritually true statement? Yesterday my wife and I attended Life Church Buffalo. We were invited by my good friend/mentor/teacher/pastor Mike Pelechaty. The preacher was a dude named Craig McLeod. His message was about Paul the Apostle and his fervent passion for becoming like Christ. To sum up what I heard him say in my spirit, it would sound something like this: "Don't stop until the Holy Spirit stops you!"

           My wife and I love hiking on mountains. My good buddy Daryl Boss and I have been taking young people mountain climbing for many years. We are Mentors who help teach people how to climb the Mountains of Life. We will keep on climbing until the Holy Spirit stops us. Sometimes He will use a physical representation of His power to stop our physical climb to teach us a spiritual lesson.

           I have been stopped from reaching the summit of Mt. Marcy because of a blizzard. Marcy is the tallest mountain in New York State. A blizzard caused my visibility to shrink to less than ten feet in front of me. That is not good on top of a mountain. I was approximately 800 yards from the peak. I knew this because I had been here before and I recognized the terrain. For the first time in my life, I turned around on a mountain before I had reached my goal. God taught me a few lessons. I believe the Holy Spirit stopped me.

           What did I learn? Not all mountains are to be climbed. Every mountain (or idea that is birthed in my spirit) is not for me to personally climb. I have to know when to recognize the signs of spiritual seasons and make the necessary route changes. The shifting of spiritual weather patterns are like contrary winds that will cause us to leave familiar terrain and launch us to new destinies.

           Last week I became a small cog in a great big machine. A force of nature in the form of a flood had left 70 homes with substantial damage. A physical weather pattern caused a spiritual growth pattern. An army was summoned to don the gear of servanthood. The staging arena was the Winchester Community Church. Over 220 people volunteered there time to help folks in need. Leaders like Daryl Boss, Joe Lenhard, Pete Andrews and others marched up and down the streets - unstoppably!

           In what seemed like the blink of an eye, I found myself in a closet pulling nails from the floor. A few minutes earlier I was marching up and down the streets from one house to the next in my typical hiking style. The Holy Spirit stopped me.Now, my face was inches from the wall and I was alone - with God. I thanked Him for stopping my busyness and placing me in a closet. He had me alone. It was a quiet, peaceful, enveloping awe inspiring moment - I was on the Mountain of God - in a closet!

           God will stop you even when you think you are doing the service that honors Him. What He wants the most is your fat. He wants your finest or your first fruits. I can serve until the cows come home, but If I don't first seek Him and His kingdom, I might as well be in a closet or a mountain top without him. Both places would be like spitting in the wind. Read God's Word and be a doer of His Word, the Holy Spirit will stop you when in the proper season. Stop what you're doing. Drop all of your plans. Roll your spirit into oneness with Him. Read the weather as a Holy Spirit forecaster.

Thanks for your time.
Go do something nice for somebody.
JLYASDW

 

2 Samuel 22:29-31

Suddenly, God, your light floods my path, God drives out the darkness. I smash the bands of marauders, I vault the high fences. What a God! His road stretches straight and smooth. Every God-direction is road-tested. Everyone who runs toward him Makes it.

 

Job 22:11 The Mesage

Suddenly the tables have turned! How do you like living in the dark, sightless, up to your neck in flood waters?

Leviticus 3:16-17

“All the fat belongs to God. This is the fixed rule down through the generations, wherever you happen to live: Don’t eat the fat; don’t eat the blood. None of it.”