Wisdom & Discernment

On Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday of this past week, I was fortunate enough to be able to go and see Walt graduate his first cycle of recruits. I learned more than I will ever need to know about the function of the Drill Instructors, their levels, different duties, and courses required. Oh, and terminology. I learned there are 4 hats that make up a DI team even though they never call the things they wear on their head anything but a “cover”. The most interesting thing I learned was a lesson on wisdom and discernment.




Walt invited me to watch graduation practice on Wednesday. The graduating battalion was made up of 8 platoons of about 70 recruits each. Now almost all DI’s have the kind of voice you would expect from someone who does what they do for a living. There was one DI, however, whose voice seemed to carry over and above everything else everywhere! Each platoon was supposed to perform a left-face on command from their specific Senior DI. Well, this one had such a powerful voice that half the battalion responded to the command and preformed the action called out. The problem was almost all of them who did it were supposed to remain at attention!



You can picture the First Sergeant in charge of the ceremony correcting the mistake with his soothing and compassionate voice. Yeah, RIGHT. Like that would actually happen! No, there was an immediate and equally vocal question put, not to the recruits who acted early, but to the DI’s in charge of those platoons. DRILL INSTRUCTORS! WHO IS IN CHARGE OF YOUR PLATOON!?



Yes, you would be correct in assuming the DI’s who had been embarrassed by the recruits took immediate and vocal action to correct the situation so it NEVER happened again, and it didn’t. They had obeyed a command. It just wasn’t a command from the person who had authority over them at that exact moment. They had followed another voice.



How like us as Christians!? Fortunately, our Heavenly Father is far more forgiving than those DI’s were on Wednesday. He does correct us and call us home. Even though there might be some earthly and unavoidable consequences for our missteps, we are not sent on an extended run or made to do pushups until our arms give out. Sometimes we need the same wisdom and discernment those recruits needed, the ability to know who is in charge of us, who we are and, even more importantly, WHOSE we are!



Who are you listening to? Satan, himself, wants to give you orders. He wants to tell you what you can and can’t do. The only problem with that is that his voice is not the one you need to be listening to. He has no authority over you in this situation. You answer to another command. We do get that mixed up on a regular basis though, don’t we? We end up facing the wrong direction at the wrong time and feeling like a complete fool, maybe fearing the wrath of some heavenly DI. Instead, though, we get the love and forgiveness that only Jesus Christ has to offer us. We are blanketed by assurance from the Holy Spirit who reminds us who we are and, especially, whose we are. We are called back to and by the one true voice that leads in the path of peace and salvation. AMEN.

Pastor Craig