Lent 11. Old habits die hard

This time last year my Mum stopped driving as she was losing her eyesight.  She gave me her almost new Ford Zetec and I drove it home from England - I have never owned such a pristine and barely driven vehicle.  There was only one issue with the car - its an automatic.    Having learned to drive 35 years ago and only ever having driven manuals it was a big challenge for me to drive an automatic and for the first proper journey to be a trek right across England to the ferry.  It took some getting used to and for several weeks I was forgetting to put it into Park and stamping my feet on imaginary pedals.  But it didnt take too long to get used to it.

For the past year Ive been driving the automatic and I have to say one does have to wonder why anyone would drive a manual - or indeed why manuals are still made!  Its a lazy way to drive that's for sure 😀  But you can safely eat a cheese sandwich whilst negotiating a roundabout in an automatic...... nuff said ! 

Yesterday I flew to England with the boys to visit Mum.  I hired a car at Luton airport - and of course the hire car was a manual.  I was a bit nervous on getting into the rather snappy little MG they gave me, in the pitch dark at 10.30 at night and wondering if after a year of driving automatic Id remember how to do the manual thing.   But of course it came to me easily - because 35 years of driving have ingrained something on my brain which means that even after a long pause I can still remember how to drive with gears.  My body knows what to do - muscle memory or something.  Where to put my feet and hands and how to listen to the engine and feel the revs.  It is an old habit and one which I am unlikely ever to forget.

Here's a thought - what if there are two different types of Christian vehicles we can drive.  One is where we do all the gear shifting.  We judge when and how we need to shift gear and we keep on doing it over and over in order for us to get from place to place.
The second is a vehicle in which the Holy Spirit does the gear shifting and all we have to do is control the speed we are travelling.  He automatically optimises our necessary changes of gear and does that work for us so that we are always being effective and efficient.

There are so many reasons why the Holy Spirit is such a huge blessing in our lives and why we need to embrace Him and everything He brings. In this season of waiting for Easter, for resurrection and for life, let's agree to give up our control and hand the gearstick over to Him.