Lead Crystal Effect
In my twenties, I worked for Birk's Canada, and received an education in the finer things of life. Learning about quality items like diamonds, fine jewelry, china, silver and crystal is just wonderful. I adore these beautiful baubles, so becoming familiarized with their process and manufacture was right up my alley. One of the things I’ve never forgotten is the sound that lead crystal goblets make when you gently salute them against each other. There’s a tone that rings pure, and hangs suspended pristinely resonating for several seconds. It’s unmistakable. It’s the ‘lead crystal effect’.
Experience has taught me that exactly the same striking vibration in the spirit is created when someone speaks the truth, with vulnerable sincerity, from the heart. Raw, unvarnished, visceral emotion is unforgettably potent in its undiluted moment. No matter how difficult the words, its authenticity is distinctive. You learn to recognize and cherish these moments when they happen, because they’re not as common as we like to boast.
In case you haven’t already guessed it, I’m still ruminating on the great Alpha and Omega revelation. Our question is this; I have a voice…how am I using it? Am I communicating at the highest possible level? Does the Lord, in His majesty, hallmark my attitudes? Do I have clout, rare and redeemed, or am I playing fast and loose with lyrics, the more the merrier? Do I enjoy entertaining the false, the frivolous, or the downright fraudulent? Every day, we dance with our words, and sometimes, we dance with the devil. Then, we wonder why heaven isn’t coming down. We have no influence.
Our man Job recalled the glory days of his blessing, in no small part marked by the power of influence he possessed. He describes it this way: “When the ear heard me, then it blessed me; and when the eye saw me, it gave witness to me…Unto me men gave ear, and waited, and kept silence at my counsel. After my words they spoke not again; and my speech dropped upon them. And they waited for me as for the rain; and they opened their mouth wide as for the latter rain.” Job 29:11, 21-22 In the prime of his power, Job commanded the attention of princes. This is what we all aspire to, isn’t it? Later, on the ash-heap, though he is speaking the rude truth as he knows it, he can’t even get his closest friends to listen and believe him. He protests, entreats, reasons, refutes, and defends himself vehemently, but he cannot overcome their entrenched bias. He’s using more words than he ever has, but they’re having far less effect. Interesting.
You may not have realized it, but one of the greatest stories about the power of influence found in the Bible is a tiny little story tucked away in the lesser-thumbed pages of 2 Kings 5. In an unlikely tale, we enter the house of an enemy, Naaman, captain of the Syrian army. On one of their many forays into Israelite territory, Syria raided a village, and a little damsel was taken captive. She became a servant in Naaman’s household, and against all odds, grew truly fond of her new master. Apparently, Naaman was a man of great character who treated his people well, because our little unnamed heroine became truly distressed about his ongoing fight with leprosy. One day, as she was doing some menial task in the kitchen courtyard, “…she said unto her mistress, Would God my lord were with the prophet that is in Samaria! for he would recover him of his leprosy”. 2 Kings 5:3
These simple words, spoken from the heart, forked with lightning speed through the ranks. They went from mistress, to master, to the king of Syria, to the king of Israel, and finally, to the ears of the prophet. When Elisha heard them, he immediately recognized in them the voice of the Lord. In due process, Naaman was indeed healed of his leprosy. Why should these few words (twenty; count ‘em; twenty!) spoken musingly from the peanut gallery, have such a galvanizing effect? How could a little nobody, whose opinion would normally have been thrown out with the potato peels, have this much influence?
May I suggest that a sterling combination of three elements were present. It was the right word, spoken in the right spirit at the right time. This is the ‘lead crystal effect’. In Christian, charismatic circles, we call it ‘the Anointing’. Words with God’s touch in them ring, even when delivered through the humblest of agents. This is not some kind of spiritual razz-a-ma-tazz; a one-off, available only to the top echelon of the elect and impossible to reproduce. In fact, Scripture goes to great pains to tell us how to get the moxie of God behind our language. In the last chapters of Paul’s epistles, he deals extensively with attitudes, words, intent and results. It’s a master-class that separates disciples from dissimulators, presto.
In an age when we are literally drowning in words, we had better comprehend the true privilege of communication. At a time when the coordinated witness of hundreds of women still cannot bring predators to legal justice, we’d better re-examine our understanding of authority. We need to go straight to Alpha and Omega Himself. Fortunately, we are invited to do so! Jesus made some incredible promises to those who would be disciplined by Him, to those who would believe His words. He promises to bestow on them His very own authority.
“… For I [Myself] will give you a mouth and such utterance and wisdom that all of your foes combined will be unable to stand against or refute.” Luke 21:15 Amp Jesus is Alpha and Omega. When all the dust clears and the cacophony of the age is silenced, He’s going to be the last man standing. His words are going to outlast all others. How much part do we have in this authority which literally upholds the universe?