I have a new friend, a sister in Christ, who crafts these things herself from antique flatware, glass jar lids, beads, and anything else she can find as she wanders through flea markets and small dusty shops. Mine has all these beauties hanging from an antique silver salt cellar, something I must explain to anyone younger than 60. All of her creations are beautiful and unique, and mine has that particularly melodious sound that made me choose it from its fellows.
Outward beauty does not determine the sound that a wind chime produces. It can only make the sounds that its various elements make. You won’t get the same sound from iron bars that you will from silver and glass. Ever do the trick with your glassware, pinging an empty one to see if it’s truly crystal or just ordinary glass? That’s the way it is with wind chimes, and that’s the way it is with you and me. A stony heart will not produce the same fruit as a soft one. An iron heart will not act the same way a heart of gold will.
You also know this: the harder the wind blows, the louder the chimes. When it seems like the storms of life blow us about the most, those are the times that what we are becomes most obvious. Those are the times that people see what we’re made of. Even if they don’t really care about the faith you may have tried to share, it becomes so obvious they cannot miss it. The wind blows where it will, and you hear the voice thereof, but know not from where it comes, or where it goes; so is every one that is born of the Spirit, John 3:8. People will not see the Spirit within you personally, but they will see its effects on you. You cannot disguise whether or not you are filled with the Spirit of God.
If you would like one of these beautiful chimes, just get in touch and I will share my friend’s contact information. But today think about this far more important thing—you are God’s wind chimes. People will not be satisfied with your appearance. The point of the chimes is the sound they make. What sound does the Wind produce in you?
And they that are in the flesh cannot please God. But you are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwells in you. But if any man has not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his. And if Christ is in you, the body is dead because of sin; but the spirit is life because of righteousness. But if the Spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he that raised up Christ Jesus from the dead shall give life also to your mortal bodies through his Spirit that dwells in you, Rom 8:8-11.
Dene Ward