It's Time To Thaw

Hebrews 3:15b – Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts as you did in the rebellion. (NIV)

Since the first snowfall last October, winter has gripped many of us in a relentless deep freeze. At times, our lives came to a frozen standstill. Cancelled plans and commitments became the norm. The ground froze farther down than usual, freezing many buried water pipes. It was as if we lived in C. S. Lewis's Narnia, where the wicked White Witch's spell kept the land frozen in perpetual winter. If we had never known better days, we could easily have assumed that this was the norm, with no other season. But we know better. We know that the thaw must come!

Spiritual parallels are easy to spot here. Frozen pipes are like hardened hearts, insensitive to God's Spirit: Both are blocked on the inside; both prevent the flow of life-giving water; both can cause destruction resulting in the need for repair work, sometimes extensively. Hardened hearts can come from bitterness, unforgiveness, and above all, unbelief—that is, the inability to trust God. Lack of trust quenches the flow of God's life-giving Spirit in and through us. This condition has often become the norm among God's people—just as it was for ancient Israel. Habits and traditions become merely a form of godliness without the power; interest in Scripture and prayer dwindles. Whenever God's people get seized up in a spiritual winter, then it's time for a thaw, or, you could say, a Lenten season of repentance.

This past winter, my church in Kincardine succumbed to frozen pipes. The lineup of frozen pipe emergencies was so long that we had to cancel the entire week's schedule—even the Sunday service—because we were without water. But then we were blessed. A repairman came and used a heat gun to blow hot air onto the pipes and melt the ice. It worked! There was no need for a massive digging project, and we could reschedule the Sunday service. That episode reminded me of the breath of the Spirit blowing onto frozen hearts. Truly, only God's Spirit can bring about such a thaw. Without the breath of God, we would stay stuck in our frozen land of Narnia—forever.

Apparently frozen pipes can be prevented simply by letting a trickle of water continually run through the tap. That's all well and good to say. But we have to deal with reality: Pipes do freeze. And hearts do become hardened. We need the thaw. We need our personal seasons of Lent to open up our hearts to the life-giving Spirit of the resurrected Christ.

Joseph Scriven, the writer of the hymn, "What a friend we have in Jesus", was sensitive to our inner struggles—including our bent toward spiritual hardness. I discovered that by reading the original words in his own handwriting. Instead of the familiar words, "Are we weak and heavy laden", Scriven wrote, "Are we cold and unbelieving". I think it's a pity that those words disappeared from this hymn. They could help alert us to our need for the thawing Wind of God's Spirit—our own season of Lent.

May this be our prayer:

Dear Lord, sensitize me to the spiritual condition of my inner being. Am I cold and unbelieving? Have I unknowingly slipped into a frozen, unyielding state of cynicism toward Your promises? O Lord, I depend on You for revelation. I submit my heart to You—that the wind of Your Spirit may blow freely and perform a miracle within—that I may become an effective conduit, always flowing with Your grace in this spiritually-frozen world of ours. Amen.

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