When I was around eleven years old, my brothers, six and years older than I, decided they would teach me how to drive. Off we went in my eldest brother’s 1958 Pontiac. When we got far enough out in the countryside, they deemed it time for my first lesson. They parked on the side of a road with farmers’ fields on both sides. I got into the driver’s seat, listening to a few elementary instructions. I pulled the lever down into Drive, touched the accelerator, and the car lurched violently forward, off the road, down into a ditch, up again onto the farmer’s field, back down into the ditch and up again onto the road before my brother pushed me aside and stopped the car. I was really scared of what they’d say. Not to worry, though. They were both laughing hysterically, seeing the whole thing as the funniest thing ever. Meanwhile, I was traumatized by the wild, unleashing of power that had taken over.
Coming out of the reading of the Pentecost story just two days ago, I feel the Lord saying, ‘Don, the power you experienced all those years ago pales into non-existence when placed said by side with Mine. I am Omnipotence. All-power, all-powerful. All the manmade machinery in the world can’t hold a candle to that. So, rest in that. And please live boldly in the confidence of it.’
All of Jerusalem experienced a flipped script the day the Spirit came. The evidence? Three thousand souls came alive to truth in Jesus that very day. Countless millions since then have had life-alterings through encounters with the undiminished power of that same Truth, that same Life, that same Way. Our privilege, today, is being present to those God puts in our lives as they’re on their way to the flipping of the script. And what a joy-filled privilege it is! PD
Don graduated from Regent University in 1988 and moved to France for seven years, coming back to the US briefly to marry Sue in 1990. The work in France included working in a Christian School and helping plant a church before returning in 1995. He’s been pastor of Peninsula Vineyard since 1999. He enjoys counseling, especially married couples, traveling back to France (with Sue), reading, doing Sudoku puzzles and sleuthing out good, dark chocolate. Don serves as the senior pastor of the Vineyard Church Peninsula, in Newport News, Virginia.