Making Hay with the Holy Spirit

At our previous residence, we lived across the road from a hayfield. I love hayfields. I love to watch the mowers, rakes, and balers. I love the smell of freshly cut hay. I remember a few humorous times as I mowed my yard and the hay man cutting his field, we would pass by every few laps and wave at each other – me on my 38" cut John Deere™ and he on his big tractor.

Every February or March, my neighbor would burn his hayfield; torch the entire spread. The purpose was to burn away the thatch that collected each year at ground level and threatened to choke the grass and deprive it of much needed (and there extremely scarce) rain water and nutrients. The burning also served to rid the field of bugs and others pests that would jeopardize the growth of the grass and remove the seeds of weeds that would threaten the crop. The controlled burn removed lots of bad stuff.

Whenever I would watch the burn, I remembered these words from John the Baptist:

I indeed baptize you with water unto repentance, but He who is coming after me is mightier than I, whose sandals I am not worthy to carry. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire.
His winnowing fan is in His hand, and He will thoroughly clean out His threshing floor, and gather His wheat into the barn; but He will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire." – Matthew 3:11-12

We claim to want the Holy Spirit to fall among us and bring revival. We pray for it, but for the most part, it's business as usual. I think I have an idea why we don't see an outpouring of the Holy Spirit in our lives and in our churches. It's because we want the excitement and thrill that we think accompanies the Spirit, but we are unwilling to let Him do His necessary work in our lives first.

A true Holy Spirit revival in our lives would be first painful, then exciting. We have a lot of spiritual thatch and sin-laden bugs that we need Him to burn away before the refreshing and nourishing water of God's Word can effectively feed our soul. We need the Spirit to remove the junk that chokes us so that God can bear fruit in our lives.

Oh that we would invite the Holy Spirit to burn the field of our heart until He remove every sinful attitude, thought, habit, relationship, and affection. My prayer is that the Holy Spirit shows up and causes a great repentance, and that it starts in my life.

Search me, O God, and know my heart;
Try me, and know my anxieties;
And see if there is any wicked way in me,
And lead me in the way everlasting. – Psalm 139:23-24