Reading Plan:
Acts 19|Psalm 51


Our Thoughts:
There are marked moments in our lifetimes, indelibly and internally etched in a Christian’s memory, where we can each say with confidence: “God did this for me, and I was forever changed.”
I like to imagine that each of us has a number of internal altars where, upon remembering a personal, transformative moment, we have the opportunity to kneel to give thanks again and again. Perhaps we built an internal altar when we experienced a moment of great success, a time when circumstances flowed in our favor and a deep sense of communion with God’s Spirit was made all the sweeter by an advantageous result.
There are other moments, however, like those in Acts 19 when the sorcerers burned their scrolls, where an internal altar was built because we experienced utter, divine rescue. And that rescue was not from an outward enemy—that rescue was from ourselves. We were headed in one direction, full and strong, and by the mercy of God, the Spirit brought revelation through our pain, our suffering, or as a sovereign gift of divine mercy. We were diverted from a path that led to death (Prov. 14:12), and we are so grateful that we were.
You may have some of those moments in your own life and are visiting your internal altar of thanks even now. I know that I do. Feel free to pause here, and to sing a song of praise with me.
One way I like to do this is to go back to the Old Testament, to Psalm 51. This Psalm is David’s song of praise. It’s a powerful, remarkable external expression of how grateful David was for the Holy Spirit, the Spirit who entered the chaos he had caused and saved him from himself.
We know the story.
David had sinned with Bathsheba. He had her husband Uriah murdered. He weaved a tangled web and was using his power to justify it, fix it, and ultimately, hide it under a rug. He lacked accountability; he was at the top of the food chain. Now, on the same track as all the other queens and kings of his time, he was headed toward their fate, following unbridled lusts toward a hell of one’s own making.
But one thing set David apart from all the others. David had the Holy Spirit at work in his life. David had a covenant with the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob running through his mind and heart. David had the worship habits of his people ingraining truth into his disposition and habits. David belonged to God—and the Spirit was making sure he didn’t completely forget who he was and whose he was. The Spirit saw the chaos coming, and out of sheer mercy, stepped in to make something good out of it (Rom. 8:28). Nathan the prophet steps in, speaks by the Spirit, and David chooses to repent. Psalm 51 is the outer altar he builds for the inward altar of remembrance that is now set permanently in his soul.
The same thing took place in the lives of those who turned and “honored God” in Acts 19. They were rescued from themselves, and their lives were forever changed.
Pray David’s deep and enduring awakening prayer as your own today: “Do not . . . take your Holy Spirit from me.” David was unwilling to go on without God’s abiding presence searching his life, scanning his heart to expose wicked ways that lead to chaos and death, leading him into everlasting ways (Ps. 139:23-24). The Holy Spirit does this for us as well.
Do not take your Holy Spirit from me, O God. Your presence is life to me.


More Questions:
• What is one “altar moment” when God rescued you from yourself? Give God praise for that today.
• What is something you need to get rid of in your life to show honor to God?


Prayer:
Jesus, I have so many altars in my heart coming to mind at which I can give you thanks! Thank you! Come, Holy Spirit, stir in me the steady songs of praise that will keep me singing, following you on the path that leads to life. Like the sorcerers in Acts 19, we cast all of our former things away so that you may receive all the honor, glory, and power. We pray in Jesus’ name, amen.


Author: Blake Houston