Have You Mingled Your Wine?

“Wisdom hath builded her house, she hath hewn out her seven pillars: She hath killed her beasts; she hath mingled her wine; she hath also furnished her table.”

Proverbs 9:1-2

After considering yesterday the beasts this woman had killed, I find myself drawn to the next statement and the wine she had mingled.

Those words have given me something to consider beyond the original picture of the woman in Proverbs 9.

I began thinking about the idea of mingling, and how it might serve as a reminder of the two spirits at work in the life of a believer:

Our own spirit and the Spirit of God.

We each have a temperament, a disposition, and a way of responding to the world around us, but as children of God, we have His Spirit dwelling within us.

How much of our own spirit are we allowing to be influenced, governed, and shaped by His?

Are we bringing our spirit into fellowship with His each day, allowing Him to work in the very places where our flesh would otherwise take the lead?

This is an especially important consideration for a woman building a home, because so much of what she carries within herself finds its way into the atmosphere of the people she loves.

Our spirit influences our responses, our conversations, our patience, and the way we handle the ordinary frustrations of family life.

The condition of our hearts has a way of becoming part of the environment in which our families live.

I think we underestimate how much of ourselves we bring into the lives of the people closest to us.

Our moods, attitudes, dispositions, and the things we allow to occupy our hearts have a way of spilling into our homes.

I need His Spirit mingled with mine.

Daniel was described as having an excellent spirit, and I love that description of his character.

“Then this Daniel was preferred above the presidents and princes, because an excellent spirit was in him; and the king thought to set him over the whole realm.”

Daniel 6:3

There was something about the way Daniel conducted himself that distinguished him, even in a place where his convictions were continually tested.

I desire to have an excellent spirit.

I want the people who share my home to experience a woman whose disposition reflects her walk with the Lord, and I know that requires more than trying harder to be patient, pleasant, or agreeable.

It requires the Lord to do a work within me that I cannot accomplish through my own temperament.

I need His Spirit mingled with mine.

Paul gives us a wonderful instruction in Ephesians 5:18:

“And be not drunk with wine, wherein is excess; but be filled with the Spirit;”

The comparison is worth considering.

In Acts 2, when the disciples were filled with the Holy Ghost, those who witnessed what was happening accused them of being full of new wine.

Peter addressed their accusation, but the account brings our attention to the influence associated with wine, while Paul's instruction makes clear that the believer is to be filled with the Spirit of God.

I do not want to go about my days relying solely upon my own spirit, my own strength, or my own disposition.

I want His Spirit to have such an influence over my heart that it changes the way I respond to the people around me.

I want Him to govern my thoughts when my feelings are leading me in the wrong direction, temper my responses when my patience is wearing thin, and remind me of what is pleasing to Him when my flesh wants its own way.

Romans 8:16 tells us:

“The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God:”

What a precious relationship we have been given with the Lord.

His Spirit dwells within the believer, bears witness with our spirit, and works in us as we walk with Him.

I want to be sensitive to His leading and willing to yield when He reveals something in my heart that needs attention.

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I need His Spirit mingled with mine.

Galatians 5:22-23 gives us a picture of what His Spirit produces in our lives:

“But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, Meekness, temperance: against such there is no law.”

When I consider these qualities, I cannot help but bring them back to the walls of my own home.

Love, longsuffering, gentleness, meekness, and temperance are needed in the everyday interactions of family life.

Our husbands and children should have the benefit of living with a woman who is allowing the Holy Spirit to produce these things in her.

I know how easily my own spirit can become affected by the things I dwell upon.

A disappointment I continue to rehearse, a frustration I refuse to release, or an offense I allow to settle into bitterness can begin influencing my entire disposition.

Before long, something that began as a matter of my own heart is affecting the people who have done nothing to deserve it.

This is why I need the Word of God to have a daily place in my life.

Ephesians 5:26 speaks of Christ sanctifying and cleansing the church “with the washing of water by the word.”

His Word has a cleansing work in our lives, exposing what we have overlooked and correcting what we have allowed to become familiar.

I need to be filling my heart with His Word so that His truth has a place to meet my thoughts, correct my attitudes, and guide my responses.

I cannot expect to be continually influenced by His Spirit while giving so little attention to the things He has given me to know Him and walk in His ways.

I need His Spirit mingled with mine.

And when His Word exposes something that needs to be dealt with, I need to be willing to take it before Him in prayer.

David's words in Psalm 51:10 have always been a beautiful reminder of that need:

“Create in me a clean heart, O God; and renew a right spirit within me.”

David did not approach the Lord pretending his heart was already in the condition it ought to be.

He recognized his need for cleansing and renewal, and he brought that need before God.

We need to do the same.

We need to confess the bitterness we have been nursing, the pride we have been protecting, and the sinful attitudes we have grown accustomed to excusing.

I am thankful that the Lord does not leave us to manage the condition of our hearts in our own strength.

He has given us His Word, the privilege of prayer, and the indwelling Holy Spirit to help us walk in a manner that pleases Him.

I want to be a woman who makes room for His correction, seeks His cleansing, and continually yields her heart to His work.

When I return to the woman in Proverbs who was building her house, I am reminded that the work happening within us will inevitably find its way into the homes we are building.

We cannot separate the woman we are in our spiritual lives from the woman our families experience each day.

I want my spirit to be mingled with His.

I need His Spirit mingled with mine.

I want His influence to reach into my temperament, my attitudes, my conversations, and the way I love the people He has placed in my life.

I know I will have days when I fall short, and I am grateful for His grace when I do.

But I never want to become so comfortable with my own ways that I cease to seek His.

Yesterday, we considered the beasts that must be put to death within us.

Today, I want us to consider what we are allowing to fill the space within our hearts.

I want an excellent spirit.

I want a spirit that follows the Lord fully, that bears the fruit of His Spirit, and that brings the influence of Christ into the home I am building.