Just to Receive
Cars have a one-sided relationship with air. Air, of the triumvirate “spark, fuel, and air” that Automotive Engineering 101 students know makes internal combustion engines work, and that leading automotive experts manipulate to gain more and more power or/and more and more fuel efficiency, is vital to cars.
Yet cars only leave air more polluted. Cars give nothing to air besides toxicity. Some internal combustion engines recirculate a little exhaust into their air-induction systems, for the purpose of slightly cleaner exhaust, and other engines use exhaust gasses to spin turbo impellers (neither of which concern the simple side-draft carburetors on a Lotus Super Seven), but these engines need fresh air to run in the first place.
Something must provide the air. This is true for cars, human bodies, and, most importantly, our souls.
Throughout the Bible, God uses His breath to give His life to people. God uses something so easy to imagine, like CPR, to explain something so profound as new spiritual life, perhaps because He doesn’t want us to over think it. He breathes out, we breathe in. He breathes out and gives life to Adam (Genesis 2:7), presence and peace through the sound of a whisper (1 Kings 19), much-needed spiritual revival and purpose to Israel through the symbol of dry bones (Ezekiel 37:9), and the Spirit of God (John 20:22) to followers of Jesus – which includes those who follow him today.
God breathes out, but what does God breathe in? Our human bodies draw air into lungs to oxidize red blood cells and give us life, but what substance created by God gives life to God? Nothing. What can we give God in return for His grace? Again, nothing. Theologian and author Henry J. M. Nouwen put it this way: "Perhaps the challenge of the gospel lies precisely in the invitation to accept a gift for which we can give nothing in return. For the gift is the life breath of God, the spirit poured out on us through Jesus Christ."
This is definitely a challenge for Christ-followers, even if we don’t know it. We struggle to simply receive the life breath of God without giving something in return, and it looks like this:
When we obsess over creating a church or ministry that’s just right for God to use, or compulsively prepare ourselves for how God will use us, we forget that God prepares us for the work He has prepared for us.
When we tirelessly, slavishly, and sometimes fiercely argue and say we’re defending God’s truth or witnessing, we forget that our role is to either plant the seed or water it, but God makes it grow (1 Corinthians 3:6).
When we think our financial offering is going to God, or our prayers elicit favor from Him in some way, or doing enough good things will make Him – or us – forget some of the bad things we do, we forget that good works are for God’s people, not God – giving money to the organization that helps refugees is to help refugees, not God – and that “the work of God is this: to believe in the one he has sent.” (John 6:29)
When we do these things, we’re just breathing out, and thinking that benefits God in some way. It doesn’t. Our exhalations can’t give life to the one who created life. God’s breath flows only from Him to us. Like a car, our relationship with air – His breath – is one-sided.
After Jesus was resurrected, he breathed on his disciples to send them the Holy Spirit. This was after he had carried their sin to the cross and defeated death. It’s only after God justifies us that He equips us for the work He has in mind. He breathes on us and justifies us. Anything we do after that is merely passing that life-giving breath along to other people. Like exhaust-driven turbo impellers, it’s just taking air from somewhere else and passing it on.
