I have known by experience the spiritual maxim that there is no standing still in our walk with Christ. “Go against the flow”, as the old t-shirt with the fish proclaimed. The Spirit is on the move, and if we think we are just standing still we are deceiving ourselves. We are actually sliding away from Him.   

 But I have sensed for a while that there is some kind of multiplication factor in the rate of acceleration going on right now. At first I thought it was just me, or that I was only realizing what our grandparents always said about time speeding up as you grow older. However as I talk with others in the Body of Christ, those who belong to Him, I see He is revealing this reality to us all. People who don’t know Him are also sensing it. And it is not just time that is accelerated, but also there are extremes in the weather, in politics, in economics, in entertainment, in crime, in churches-- in everything it seems.   

Another word to describe what I am sensing is polarization. Think of the old experiment with two magnetic forces which attract, but which also repel each other. There is no middle ground. (There never really was, we were only under the illusion that it existed.) Lukewarm anything is of no use to the Lord. In fact, it is worse than that. (see Rev. 3:16)   So the effect of this polar force field is that if I am not intentionally seeking the face and the will of the Father, I will actually be pulled by a force toward the other extreme—and fast. This can show up in behavior patterns that I thought I had dealt with already. If I do not “reckon myself dead” to the old nature of self-centeredness, people-pleasing and all other sorts of fear on masquerade parade, I am not living in  Christ.  And I “suddenly find myself” (was I missing?) back in the same pattern, or now, worse.   

His grace gives us (yet another) chance to learn, but the problem with treading water is that we drift further away in the current until it is very difficult to hear the Voice calling us back to shore, to safety with Him.   

If the current acceleration toward sin is extreme, I can trust that the acceleration or pull of the Spirit is stronger than ever. Because the negative pull of the enemy is always just an opposition reaction to the One who created, redeems and sustains all. He is drawing us to Himself with a force that cannot be conquered. And the times, they are a changin’ fast.