Unshackled Moments ~ November 13 ~ Bad Battery

I am shopping for a new motorcycle battery. I bought the one I have a little over a year ago, and it has never been much good. I should have taken it back and replaced it from the start, but I just kept trying to make it work and borrowed my father's charger a lot. The first real issue I had was that once the cooler weather hit and it started dropping into the 50's or lower at night it would not hold a charge well enough to crank in the morning, regardless of how much I'd ridden the day before. When it got really cold, for East Texas anyway, I would have to jump it in the morning, ride to work and throw a charger on the battery by lunch or I couldn't crank it to get home.

Once the warm weather returned it would crank the bike fine as long as it didn't sit for more than a couple of days. Now it's getting a little cooler again, and it's worse. It's not charging while running. The alternator will keep it going for as long as I want to ride, but if I have to kill it I better be somewhere I can charge the battery or jump it off. It's not even marginally dependable. I have to get a new one.

What does this have to do with recovery and spirituality? Well, it occurred to me this morning as I struggled to get going that my heart is a lot like this defective battery. Perhaps you can relate, Dear Reader. We have a 24 hour reprieve from the bondage Christ has freed us from, contingent upon the maintenance of our spiritual condition. If we do not maintain our spiritual condition and contact with God, then it becomes harder and harder to turn on the power within us that gives us the ability to deny self and obey God, to flee and resist temptation and stay stopped in those areas where we needed God to defeat in our lives.

As long as my spiritual battery is charged through proximity to my Power Source, I am able to walk in freedom and do what's right. I can't speak for anyone else, but my battery sucks. I can't let it sit for a few days or get cold and expect it to fire up when needed. I can't change that, and I can't replace my battery. This is who I am. What I can do is plug into my relationship with God every chance I get throughout the day, end my day charging up and give it just a little more juice in the mornings.

If I don't do that then as my spiritual condition weakens the struggle becomes harder. I slip slowly back into the bondage of self. Sooner or later the power will be insufficient and I will be left stranded without defense against selfishness, the first drink, the first drug or whatever it is that I need God's power to keep me free from. It's not that God failed me. It's that I failed to pursue the relationship that empowers me and tried to go too long on my own power. But I am weak and defective and don't have much power of my own and don't hold a charge long or in extremes. I must charge daily, and I highly suspect that this is true for most. Charge up, ride free and enjoy the journey without fear of insufficient power to carry us through and keep us going.



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