Rebooting the Spiritual Life

There is nothing more frustrating to the computer user than a crash. Though hard disk crashes do happen most of us won't experience that (hopefully). But, we all go through system or program crashes. And that is bad enough, especially if you hadn't saved your work.

But we must go on, so we simply reboot our computers and we are back in business. Well, the spiritual life can be much like our computers. As long as our computer is up, we can be productive. But if it goes down, the productivity come to an immediate and sudden halt.

Why do our computers crash? Electrical failure, bugs, memory problems, too much going on inside the computer, and who knows what else. But whatever causes these failures, crashes, and down times, they are frustrating indeed.

Sin is like a bug which causes a computer crash. It stops our spiritual life cold. Oh, we can continue to function, but not in a way pleasing to God. So to get our spiritual life up and running again, we must take appropriate action. And, like rebooting to restore our computer program, we must confess our sin(s) before God, if we are to become productive in our spiritual life.

I guess the most common way to illustrate our relationship with God, whether we are in the faith or out of faith, is the human relationship. When we are in love everything is great. All is well with the world. But if there is a break-up or a falling out due to a wrong committed by one against the other, the situation is immediately reversed. The injured is miserable. He or she doesn't eat or sleep. And they stay upset.

So what does one do? Does he go into denial and say nothing is wrong? Does he foolishly give the loved one the cold shoulder? Does he cast all the blame toward the other. If he does, there is no getting back.

He must get rid of his pride and seek to make amends. He must search his heart to determine where he got off base. When he discovers or determines where he went wrong, he must admit it to the other. Confession of wrong doing goes a long way. If the confession is accepted, the two are said to have made up. And once again, everything is all well with the world.

When we sin, we immediately fall out of grace, or out of the Sphere of Faith. We are no longer spiritual, but carnal. The Holy Spirit will then gently touch our hearts with knowledge of the sin. At that moment, we must not harden our hearts and refuse, or justify, or seek to blame another. We must admit, name, confess, or cite that sin to God. He will graciously accept our confession and immediately reinstate us back into fellowship.

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