The following blog was written by Pastor Corey in October of 2020.
Not firing on all cylinders. On Wednesday, October 28, 2020, I started my car for my 30-minute drive to work. Yet, something was not right. The car was shaking and jerking and not accelerating properly. The whole 20+ miles in the rain I was praying to God that I could get to work safely. Very thankful that I did. In my car is a gift from dad, an OBD II code reader. I plugged it in and turned on the key to find out the code for the issue I was facing…P0302. That means nothing without a guide. Thankfully I have a book that gives a brief description and an internet connection for more details: Cylinder 2 misfire detected.
The mechanic I would normally be able to take the car was full so at my lunch break I called my dad who has a wealth of automotive knowledge. He and my mom would come down to meet me after work to see what could be the issue. After looking over the possible causes it turns out that it was a small coil of wire connected to my spark plug did not have a good electrical spark. I am not a mechanic, nor do I want to pretend I know how everything works, but I thought how often am I not firing on all cylinders because of my lack of Bible reading, prayer, and confession of sin to God? Maybe I am misfiring, because I am not living the way God wants me to live.
Does your spiritual life/walk sometimes leave you in a funk? Do you feel like you are do not have the same joy and power of God in your life? Now, just to be clear our Christian life is more than feelings and emotions, but sometimes the lack of joy in our life is the result of our sin or the result of us not communicating with God through prayer or allowing God to communicate with us through His Word. Maybe you are being squeezed/conformed to the world’s mold by the bombardment of its lies and its image, when you should be allowing your mind to be transformed by having it renewed daily by God’s Word (Romans 12:2).
Going back to my car issue yesterday, the code reader has a message on the back of it that says “clearing code does not repair car.” I found the code for the issue and with the scanner I could have cleared the code, yet it would not have fixed the problem. We know the error code, SIN and that payment for sin is spiritual death /separation for eternity from God (Romans 3:23; Romans 6:23). That is the error code. The solution is how can it be fixed? The Bible tells us that Jesus Christ is the solution, the only solution (John 3:16; John 14:6). For those who know that solution and have been eternity fixed and we have been made new by Jesus Christ. For those of us who have been redeemed and saved by Jesus Christ, sin and apathy in our Christian walk can cause us to misfire as my car did. We are coasting through life and maybe we do not even realize we are out of fellowship with God. Maybe we have let sin slide into our life and the check engine light of the life is blinking because the Holy Spirit is prompting you to confess your sins, because God is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness (1 John 1:9). Don’t ignore Him, turn to Him and have Him fix your spiritual condition today.
Thankfully the main issue of my car was able to be fixed yesterday though there is still some work to be done. Just like our spiritual life, God is always working to make us more like Jesus. I know that “He who has begun a good work in me will complete it until the day of Jesus Christ” (Philippians 1:6). Check your spiritual engine light today and get right with God.