May 20, 2015
There I Am With Them
In my visit to a charismatic
church one of the leaders shook my hand in greeting and said he hoped my worship
would be Spirit filled. I responded with something akin to knowing the Spirit
was in this place. With a bit of an authoritative air he said, “But we want
the Spirit to be in you.” Well now, not exactly the evangelistic
outreach I expected. Certainly the Spirit of God dwells within a
believer, but He also makes His presence known and felt in the collective.
Jesus assured believers, “Again, I tell you that if two of you on earth agree
about anything you ask for, it will be done for you by my Father in
heaven. For where two or three come together in my name,
there am I with them.” (Matt 18:19 20 NIV).
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1 comment:
Gail;
-----The early twentieth-century became known as the fascist moment of the Western world in part due to this idea that the Spirit is in the collective. The collective, being led by the Spirit, surely would effect more and more heavenliness on earth until Jesus just couldn’t stand being away from the holy, wonderful, perfect place the collective made it, so He just couldn’t contain Himself any longer from bursting through the clouds to be a part of it all!
-----No matter what the brand, BS runs deep. For sure the Spirit is in the collective, because He is in every individual being a part of it. But neither fact renders the individual’s determinations or the collective’s expectations into any sort of perfection or correctness. Charismatics and dullards alike (gee, what else do you call non-charismatics?) still sin, and they still hold divergent doctrines, which means one or the other or both partly think wrong.
-----This matter of being righteous or holy or correct has always been perplexing. The Bible tells us we need to be it and are it, but then tells us we can’t be it and won’t be it until our bodies die, too. Consequently, each of us feel we’re right though we know we can’t be. Therefore we act like we’re right though we aren’t completely sure what is right. Then we go worship with those who think about the same as we do to find verification in their acceptance of us, by which acceptance we soon forget that we are in large part still inaccurate in most of our perceptions. Consequently, our thoughts are not made with a great deal of realization that the perfection the Bible says we are is Jesus’ perfection attributed to us, and the only part we might possibly have in it is that we desire perfection, at least in as much as we can even do that.
-----The Holy Spirit plays a very serious role in the life of our spirits, and everyone who has come to the Lord has the Spirit. But that does not mean His Spirit instantly turns all of the meat-loaf of our minds and emotions into pastrami and caviar. It’s yet meat-loaf, maybe bettered some, but still meat-loaf. Paul says it clearly, “For now we see in a mirror dimly.” (I Cor 13:12) It will be later when we see face to face, when we are actually perfected, by the way I see it. But many others see it as meaning we saw dimly as in a mirror before the New Testament had been completed. Until then we knew in part, and now that we have it we understand fully. Does my idea about this really need validation from other men before I can feel it might be right? Do theirs? “Let every one be fully convinced in his own mind.” (Rom 14:5) “We who are strong ought to bear with the failings of the weak, and not to please ourselves; let each of us please his neighbor for his good, to edify him…that together you may with one voice glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.” (Rom 15:1-2,6) This is how the Spirit works in the collective. It doesn’t work to make everyone think they are right. It works to make room for everyone calling on the Lord to know what he can know although much of what he does know is at least somewhat wrong, “Welcome one another, therefore, as Christ has welcomed you, for the glory of God.” (Rom 15:7) That is the fundamental movement of the Spirit in the collective, the starting point for the being of a body.
-----This leader’s need to correct you is interesting. Truly he demonstrated the partial thought Paul discussed at I Corinthians 13, not having given enough thought to what Paul said at I Corinthians 4:6 about not going beyond what is written, or at Romans 14:4, “Who are you to pass judgment on the servant of another?” Why would he think you yet needed the Spirit in you? Unless he was speaking with rhetorical carelessness.
Love you all,
Steve Corey
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