The Crumpled Letter

“If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children, how much more shall your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to them that ask him?” — Luke 11:13 (ASV)

When John Hyde went aboard his steamer in New York, a letter was waiting for him. It was from a friend of his father's, an older Christian who had longed to be a missionary himself but had never been allowed to go. “The words were not many,” Hyde said years later, “but the purport of them was this: 'I shall not cease praying for you, dear John, until you are filled with the Holy Spirit.'”

Hyde was furious. He told a close friend exactly how he reacted:

“My pride was touched, and I felt exceedingly angry and crushed the letter and threw it into a corner of the cabin and went up on deck in a very angry spirit. The idea of implying that I was not filled with the Spirit!”

He was going out as a missionary. Who was this man to suggest he wasn't ready? He paced the deck with “a battle raging within.” But he loved the man who wrote the letter, and he knew the holy life he lived. Deep down, Hyde admitted, “there was a conviction that he was right and that I was not fit to be a missionary.” So he went back to his cabin, got down on his knees to hunt for the crumpled letter, smoothed it out, and read it again. And then again.

For two or three days he fought it, “until I felt perfectly miserable.” Then, “in a kind of despair,” he asked the Lord to fill him with the Holy Spirit, “and the moment I did this the whole atmosphere seemed to clear up. I began to see myself, and what a selfish ambition I had.”

It was a struggle almost to the end of the voyage. But before the ship reached port he had made up his mind. He told the Lord he was willing even to fail his language exams in India. He was willing to be a missionary “working quietly out of sight.” He would do anything and be anything, “but the Holy Spirit I would have at any cost.”

There are two tellings of this story. In one he throws the letter on the deck; in the other, into a corner of the cabin. Details like that drift when a story is told years apart. Both agree on what matters: a hard word from someone who loved him, a proud reaction, and then a change of heart. One of Hyde's friends understood that the letter-writer was the minister who later wrote a short book about Hyde. That may be true, but nobody can be certain, so treat it as a possibility.

The young man who wanted to shine asked instead to be hidden. As it turned out, that was almost a description of the rest of his life.

Everybody gets a letter like that sooner or later: a comment from a parent, a coach, a youth leader or a friend that stings because part of it is true. Pride crumples it up. Grace goes back to look for it. Not every criticism comes from God, and some of it deserves the bin. But some of it is what Proverbs calls the “wounds of a friend.” And notice how simple Jesus makes the answer to feeling spiritually empty. You ask. The Father gives the Holy Spirit “to them that ask him.”

One thing to do this week: think of a criticism you brushed off recently. Go back and smooth it out: write it down and ask honestly whether any part of it is true. If it is, thank the person who said it, and ask God for the help you actually need.