Power Drain

I have had the blessing of having a really good landlord over the years. The owner of our rented church facility is actually a child hood friend of mine, Julie McMurry Thames, who has been a wonderful host to us for more than 12 years.

I recently had to tell her that we will be moving out because the good people at First Baptist in Joshua are selling their building to us and allowing us to move in sometime in early October. It’s a huge upgrade for our band of believers and actually a dream come true for all our leadership team. I’ll tell you more about that in the weeks to come, but let me first tell you about an issue with another rented property.

About ten years ago, we began to rent a building, not belonging to my friend Julie, which we would use as our youth facility. It was old and run down, but we accepted the challenge of a huge renovation and built it from the inside out. It lacked even a bathroom, and after four months of hard work, we were able to open a facility for teenagers to hang out and for young lives to be changed. We called it the Power House, and as it turned out, the name would be prophetic. Our first electric bill there was somewhere around $850.00, and other than during the construction, we were not even using the building.

We had some professional electricians come over and see what our problem was and turns out, there was no problem. Every month after that, no matter what, our electricity bill would be some where in the order of a thousand dollars. Though it was terrible and a huge financial strain on a little ministry like ours, we decided to go ahead and keep the facility because: number one, we have a huge heart for reaching teenagers; number two, we had spent more than $8,000.00 getting the building operable; and number three, we were locked into a contract with our landlord.

For ten years, we kept up the building, never missed a rental payment and loved on teenagers while watching that electricity bill get bigger and bigger. This year, it went above $1,500 several months in a row, and I finally had enough. Mind you, we use the building for one night a week. We began shutting it all down and moving out this last month while moving our youth services to Saturday night in our other facility. In the process, we turned off all the electricity and lo and behold, the meter was still spinning. We did a little investigating and discovered that the surrounding buildings don’t have a meter at all! Someone has been stealing electricity from us for more than 10 years.

The Texan in me wants to go to war over such a thing, and I am still contemplating, but it’s made me think a lot about the subject of a power drain. It’s just not an option for me to live a spiritually powerless life! I don’t want to miss out on what Paul calls “...the exceeding greatness of His power to usward who believe . . ."

We receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on us (Acts 1:8). Living life in the Spirit, by the Spirit, is a constant work in progress for all Christians. We get to live and operate in a different spirit and attitude than the world we live in. I love that!

We learn of the power of God through "great and precious promises" (II Peter 1:3-4). We unwrap and discover our destiny as we continually discover who the Lord is to us. That power goes to "all things that pertain to life and godliness." It’s learning to pray and learning to throw a curve ball. It’s wrapping our heads around theology and understanding the housing market. It’s raising our kids and leaving a legacy. God’s Power is for everything we are involved in.

We see the power of God in our lives when our character reflects "all patience and long suffering with joyfulness" (Colossians 1:11). Now we’re talking supernatural power to not throw a constant fit. To live in conflict without living in strife. Come on Jesus!

I know right now, there are lots of things out there with the purpose of stealing my power. Let me serve the devil notice: you cosmic punk, you can’t have it! There are too many people depending on me, and the person reading this, to continue to allow you to steal from us anymore. We choose to partner with God and put an end to the drainage as of right now. It is my responsibility to be full of the Spirit and to live life in such a way that is more about Easter morning than Good Friday.

So, Elvis has left the building but with a right mind and a right heart. Since I couldn't turn off the electricity, I thought it wise to go ahead and shut off the water at my meter. It turns out I couldn't do that either. As soon as I did, the neighbors came out and said I had shut all the water off to their building.

Troy Pastors Open Door Ministries near Joshua and can be found at www.opendoorministries.org and www.troybrewer.com