The Holy Spirit At Work!

MELVIN NEWLAND, MINISTER RIDGE CHAPEL, KANSAS, OK

THE HOLY SPIRIT AT WORK!

TEXT: Romans 8:38-39; Acts 2:2-4, 36-43, 4:19-20, 8:1, 31-39, 9:3-5, 18:8, 22:10-16

(All the passages from the book or Acts are from The Inspirational Study Bible,

New Century Version, published by Word Publishing, 1995)

Melvin: Over the years I have been amazed at some of the ways that the Holy Spirit gets our attention. On Thursday evening of the Area Revival in the Kansas Park, our own Casey Marsh preached. And in his message he told how the Holy Spirit finally got through to him. And I would like for you to hear his story too.

MY STORY by CASEY MARSH

Casey: Let me tell you my story. Before I came to Christ I was 33 years old & I had a failed marriage. I had gotten kicked out of the military. I had 2 kids from 2 different relationships & had no communication with either of them at all.

In fact, I had no communication with anyone for about 4 months or so prior to my coming to Christ. Drinking, drugs, smoking, sex, not paying my bills, couldn’t hold down a job & I didn’t want to even hear someone mention God.

I had gotten caught up in all this conspiracy theory stuff. I had studied for years all these senseless things - hours upon hours, day after day, week after week. The reason though, ironically, was that I wanted the truth. I was desperate for it!

I would find some article or some blog that would pique my interest & spend inconceivable amounts of time just going deeper down these rabbit holes of nothingness.

I’d try to piece together anything I could, just hoping something would click. Nothing ever did, of course. So I would make up these theories in my head to fill in the blank spots. Essentially I was lying to myself rather than admit there was no hope in finding solid truth in any of it.

Eventually, after years of this, I’d decided I’d finally had enough. I just couldn’t do it anymore. I was lost without hope, & I looked back on my life at the trail of destruction I’d left in my wake. Just a big ole ball of hatred, burning every bridge I’d ever crossed with nothing but a pile of ashes to show for it. I was done.

So out of desperation I cried, literally cried out to Jesus to save me. I had nothing else to hope for. I had tried everything else I could think of. Honestly, I wasn’t expecting anything to happen after all the failed attempts I’d had trying everything else I could think of to get myself out of the mess I was in.

But to my surprise & my relief something did happen, something I didn’t expect. I felt this shiver go down my right side, cross over my legs & shoot back up my left side. Something was inside of me! I had no idea what it was.

I still don’t know to this day what it was but I remember it like it was yesterday. Folks, I kid you not. And this may be a little gross but it’s the truth, the next morning I went to go to the bathroom & out it came. But whatever it was, it was out of me & after that things started changing.

I was more aware of things. I was focused on things other than myself for once. I started reading my Bible & things started to make sense. In short, I was blind but now I could see. I started seeing truth, the real truth.

I looked back at moments in my life where I realized that what God said would happen happened. He had been guiding my life all along & I didn’t realize it, & Satan had been doing everything he could to cloud my judgment.

Now it wasn’t all smooth sailing either. There was a lot I struggled to overcome. There still is, but the Holy Spirit just kept pushing me & compelling me to get better & better. I struggled for a while to accept this change until this one thing happened that I have to share with you.

This red bird with the lungs of an elephant, it seemed, was always outside my front door every morning just singing his head off. I mean he was singing so loud it would rattle your ear drums, & he..was..bold. He would hardly move unless you came within 3 feet or so of him.

Anyway, I’m sitting out in my front lawn one day & as if I was talking directly to God, I looked up at this bird who was at this time sitting on the telephone wire above my house, & I said rather mockingly, “Yeah, well if you are God trying to get my attention why don’t you just come down here & tell me that?”