Nervousness by many among us fear that we are going to let God do too much. It doesn't take much reflection upon some of our past doctrine to realize man created rules to tone God down and keep Him on the shelf for the purpose of being able to give better (man-made) answers to religious questions. If there’s one great need among us, it is that God would show up!
The Word says we are to be filled full of God (Eph. 3:19) and that particularly He works within us more than we can imagine (:20). The Word says we are co-laborers with God (II Cor. 6:1). The Bible says the Word is the sword of the Spirit (Eph. 6:17). Why, then, is there such hunger and fear among us that God will work? Some hunger because they are desperate to see Him provide while others work at quenching Him (and His followers) from fear He will do something we can’t control or explain.
One of our missteps in refusing to allow the Living God to fill our lives is that due to our obsession with control we have reversed one of the above truths. Modernism in the church has reversed Ephesians 6 and taught that the Spirit is the sword of the Word. Not so. The Word doesn’t wield the Spirit; the Spirit swings the Word. The Word can be seen. The Spirit cannot be. Yet again, we’ve opted to go by sight (the Word) rather than faith (the Spirit). It must be considered, I believe, that the Word gets it’s slicing and penetrating power from the muscle of the Holy Spirit. The Word is powerful only due to the Spirit's strength; not the reverse. The Bible did not create the Spirit; the Spirit wrote the Word to inform us of the Spirit of Christ.
A matter which helped me shift from thinking the Holy Spirit was some gray mist among us with little meaning is to realize the Personhood of God and that God is spirit. His spirit is holy…the Holy Spirit. This Holy Spirit (God) is revealed through information in the Bible for our enthusiasm about His dwelling and working from within. Some want to stop the Spirit at the door and say, “Look, you can walk through here but don’t touch” as if believers were some sort of museum to be preserved. We are not for preservation. We are for spending. We are God’s money and He desires to spend us for kingdom use.
What’s going on around here? God is always willing to break in and work. One of the things we pray for regarding our Sunday assemblies is that we plead with God to please participate. We do not want Him to leave us by ourselves. We will ruin everything. God working inspires worship. Worship is what’s going on around here….every day.
2 comments:
The Sword of the Spirit is the Word of God. According to John 1, Jesus is the Word of God. I love the Bible, but the Bible itself is not God.
Yes, we learn about Jesus by reading the Bible but I think we have a control problem when try to make everything a head thing rather than a heart thing. We want to be able to read something, analyze it, make outlines and power point presentations about it. We get into trouble by starting with the law of grace and liberty and trying to make it another law book. How much time do we spend talking to God and really listening to Him? Do we really want God to be in control when we don't know where He is leading?
Is it just me?
Lisa Foreman
uh oh Terry. That is some dangerous thinking you are challenging us to do...Keep it up! I love it.
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