Those that know me, know that I love the summer. For the most part, you will never hear me complain about the heat. The hotter it is outside, the more I enjoy it. While some people look for the shade under the trees, you will find me sitting out in the sun as much as I can.

Now, with that being said, I can remember one summer growing up in the b.c.a. era, (before central air), we had a heat wave come through that lasted several days. As hot as it was outside, it was much worse inside. Our house could have been used as the furnace that Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego were thrown into. I remember the air felt so heavy, it was stale, stagnant and suffocating. The moment you walked in, it would hit you right in the face and take your breath away. We did everything we could to generate some fresh air, we had the windows open, we had several fans sitting around the house, but all we were doing was moving the same stale, stagnant and suffocating air. We needed something that had enough power to cut through the heavy, stale and stagnant air, and provide a breath of fresh air for us to breathe in. Thankfully for us our deliverance from the heat came in the way of a window air-conditioner unit that dad put in.

There are times this world shows us how suffocating it can be. We can find ourselves in conditions like I just told you about, in a stale, and stagnant environment. Which is exactly where satan wants you to reside. We, as Christians, have to be careful that we don’t become products of this environment.

One of the ways we prevent that is by receiving the same thing the disciples received when they were in a similar situation.

In John Chapter 20 we find that they were in hiding, afraid to come out of the house fearful of what the Jews would do to them for being Jesus’ s followers. They had the wind knocked out of them and they were in need of a breath of fresh air.

John 20:22 says

And when he had said this, he breathed on them, and saith unto them, Receive ye the Holy Ghost:

Jesus breathed on them. He gave them the fresh breath of God, in doing so He set the atmosphere to the right condition for God to do what He was going to do with His church. God is sending that breath of fresh air still today, He is setting the atmosphere, to drive out the stale and the stagnant. He is the only one with the power to do so. Any other is just moving the same air, not producing new.

When Jesus sent them that breath of fresh air by breathing on them, the disciples had to take in the fresh air that was given to them. The same goes for us, if you are in need of some fresh air, all you have to do is receive what Jesus is giving you.

If you do so you will become like the disciples, who went from needing a breath of fresh air to becoming a breath of fresh air for others.

That is our responsibility to our fellow man,

Jesus is still breathing on us!

Be someone’s breath of fresh air today.