A lion in my tank !

My dad’s Mini Clubman was a car ‘well stricken in years’! Her former classy chassis was starting to rust; nonetheless I was ever so appreciative of being able to borrow it. This was my first set of wheels to tide me over between college days and work in real world. Dad had kindly added me to his insurance policy, allowing me to frequent the home of my then fiancée and now wife of thirty-eight years. Dad’s generosity had spared me the inconvenience of public transport or by using what he used to call “shank’s mare” – a colloquialism for saving me using my legs to walk, as my mode of transport.

However, the orange coloured beat-up car was starting to show her age. One evening the accelerator cable snapped and she came to an abrupt stop. When the accelerator cable was opened, the car released the petrol to the engine, giving it the power necessary to move the car forward. What on earth were we to do? How could my fiancée and I get the old mini moving?

Stuck on the Craigantlet hillside, just behind Stormont and overlooking Belfast, the mother of invention, ingenuity kicked in. A wire coat hanger was used to save the day. By lifting the bonnet and connecting the coat hanger to an accelerator lever, we found this to be an alternative, although somewhat unconventional, way of releasing the petrol to restore the flow of fuel back to the engine again.

So with limited vision and the bonnet almost vertical, I held a wire coat hanger out of the drivers’ window until we made it home. 

We had never laughed so hard, and were to tears at the novel way that we’d managed to release and restore the power back to my dad’s old car.

It’s one thing knowing that the car needed power, but it was another thing understanding how to release the fuel for its intended use.

Similarly, the secret power of every Christian is that Christ lives within (2 Corinthians 13:5). It’s also imperative that we learn how to release that inner power into our everyday lives. The Apostle Paul asked the rhetorical question ‘Do you not know that you are God’s Temple and that God’s Spirit dwells in you’?  (Romans 8:11). Yes, the Spirit of Jesus, the power of God’s presence has been poured out on all flesh and we are now partakers of His divine nature (2 Peter 1:4).  Part of God’s reason for this outpouring is to shape and transform us to become more and more like Jesus (2 Corinthians 3:18). It's certainly more about Him in us than about us. 

The fuel company used to brag in adverts about  "having a tiger in your tank" when you filled up with Esso petrol. We all need to be reminded that we have the Spirit of God within us! Aslan arise - the Lion of Judah - Christ in us the hope of glory.  

Let's depend on His Spirit and demonstrate God's love to a broken and hurting world. The Kingdom is within us!

Selah.

#JIM-JesusInMe

#Christinus

#Releasingfuelforthejourney

#GodsSpiritwithin