Alignment with God is the key to a free flow of power from heaven through God’s instruments on earth.  We are those instruments.  Most of us have had the experience of placing a sprayer on the end of a garden hose, turning the faucet wide open, dragging that hose across our yard in an attempt to water a flowerbed or tree. We have also had the experience of pulling the trigger on the sprayer to see only a tiny stream trickling from the end of the hose.  Typically, as we backtrack we find a kink in the hose obstructing the flow.  The problem was not in the water or the valve; it was in the delivery system which was the hose. Somehow the hose became twisted or misaligned and that twist restricted the flow of water.  Once the kink was eliminated and every part of the hose was realigned, then water flowed powerfully from the hose.

In essence, once the kink was removed, life flowed through the hose to the plants where we directed the water. We are God’s delivery system on the earth. When we are aligned with God, his authority and power flows easily through us as his instruments.  Sin and disobedience however, create kinks and greatly restrict that flow.  As we move toward a new year we need to reflect on the past twelve months to see if any “kinks in the hose” have developed in our lives.  If you read this blog, you probably have a desire for God to work in you and through you in greater and greater ways.  You probably want 2014 to be your greatest year of fellowship with the Father, the Son, and the Spirit and you want it to be a year of breakthroughs in your exercise of spiritual gifts that you have earnestly desired.

As I look back on this past year, I can see kinks that have formed in my life as well as in the lives of people I know, people I have prayed with, and people I have counseled. First of all, 2013 was a year of distractions.  I don’t know when I have felt pulled in so many directions by ministry, family, crises in the life of friends, cultural shifts and so forth.  It was a year in which it was hard to find a consistent spiritual rhythm.

And yet when I look at Jesus, I see a man who knew he faced a brutal death within 36 months of his baptism.  I see a man pulled on by thousands of people clamoring for more healing and more deliverance with each group or community pleading with him to stay longer.  Others pressured him to have political aspirations and to step up and take charge of Israel’s promised destiny.  In addition, he had the responsibility of training twelve rough-cut disciples to be leaders of a worldwide church that would face temptation and persecution at every turn. The twelve alone were a constant source of frustration without everything else that was going on.  On top of that, Jesus was always in the crosshairs of satan who sensed some imminent threat to his kingdom in this Galilean. In the midst of all those potential distractions, Jesus stayed on course and never seemed to be hurried even as the clock ticked quickly toward his death.

This year I need to find his secret. I think that secret was in knowing who he was, having a simple sense of what his life was to be about, and spending extended times with the Father realigning his thoughts, emotions, and vision with heaven, I need to do that more and do it better this year.  I also need to examine my heart to seek if kinks have formed there.  Those kinks may be small offenses I have picked up or resentments about demands others place on me.  They might be ways of thinking that have drifted out of alignment with God’s truth or laziness that has crept into my discipline of study, prayer, writing, and good health.  It could be small fears and anxieties about the future, about financial security, about health care options, or even loss of religious freedoms in our culture.  All of those things can create kinks in the flow of life and power moving through me.

For others I know, grief at the loss of loved ones, serious health challenges, secret addictions, lustful fantasies, unforgiveness and bitterness towards those who wronged them in 2013, etc. can create serious kinks in their spiritual lives. As life dings us, it is even easy to pick up small offenses toward God as well that need to be resolved.  As 2014 arrives in just a few days, it would be good for all of us who desire more of God and more of his Spirit to scan our lives to look for even the smallest things that are out of alignment with God’s heart and God’s truth.  It would be good for each of us to realign our lives through repentance, confession, and the reordering of priorities or whatever it takes to stay in step with heaven this year.

This coming year will undoubtedly be a year of continuing challenges in our culture and in our lives. But it will also be a year of unprecedented opportunities for Jesus to shine in our lives through our faith and obedience to him.  It will be a year of unprecedented opportunities for the power and authority of Jesus to bless others through our spiritual gifts and boldness.  It will be a great year to put down deeper roots into the heart of God so that the winds of change don’t move us.

So…over the next few days you may want to ask God to shine the light on any kinks in your life that might be restricting the flow of God’s love and power through you.  Where kinks have formed, God is quick to forgive, quick to realign, quick to restore and quick to begin to release heaven through his people once again.  There is no reason to hesitate.  We can all begin the year with the unrestricted flow of God’s Spirit moving through us.  Why would we not?  May this upcoming year be an amazing spiritual year for each of us.  Be blessed in Him.