Leveling Something Larger Than Ourselves

Isaiah 60:2 “For behold, the darkness shall cover the earth. And deep darkness the people; But the Lord will arise over you. And His glory will be seen upon you.”

There is a beer commercial (unfortunately some of the greatest media creativity is found in these), where men are running around half-crazed thinking its raining beer. Finally some guy runs into a bar where real beer is consumed and their ignorance is supposedly exposed. The moral is; when you’ve been deprived of the genuine you’ll be vulnerable to the deception of a watered-down counterfeit, until you encounter the authentic. When people haven’t experienced the power of God- they’ll call anything divine.

I cut my teeth in ministry, by reaching out to college students & Universities. This divine set-up cured me of thinking that if I could become intellectual enough or technologically savvy enough, that I could win them to Christ. Looking back, I’m grateful that God never allowed me to have lasting results or pseudo-success leaning on the arm of the flesh (See Jeremiah 17:5-8). My competition was not the fraternities, sororities or bars, but an unyielding thick pervasive darkness. I needed something more than what would Dr. Phil do sound-bites ( no dig intended!).

There’s nothing the devil would like to see more than for us to push the Holy Spirit and the supernatural power of God to the fringes – while we operate on human abilities and man-made strategies for Kingdom advancements. Pursuing authentic supernatural power should be a core value of all end time believers.

Isaiah prophesies that Zion can’t shine with her own light – she was to reflect a transcendent radiance. Darkness wants defections rather than reflections. The light doesn’t come from her but is given to her. Isaiah declares that a unique supernatural darkness will pelt down on people and attach itself like a dark damp blanket. What will be our weaponry and recourse in this PENETRATING CRISIS OF DARK ACTIVITY covering humanity? I’m convinced that God wants to deploy the most powerful substance and catalyst of the Kingdom into modern society – His PROACTIVE AND PERVASIVE SUPERNATURAL PRESENCE. The supernatural is the technology of the future and we must learn to tap into that. We must manifest the mystery and feed on the reality of the Holy Spirit to offset the darkness. For us to become what we were meant to become it is vital to face the darkness head-on and not avoid it. You can shout at the darkness, but we need something more than being loud. Not everything in the dark is to be feared – there are treasures hidden in the darkness! God does not intend that we approach the world on its own terms. Only in the realm of God’s transcendence can we be resourced for this end-time battle for our culture. Our world stands at a point of crisis brought here by powerful dark forces beyond our human ability to foresee or forestall.

The good news – miracles are birthed out of crisis. The word crisis means a time of threat and extreme danger. A secondary meaning is a turning point in the course of something. No one is immune to crisis. Yet the type of crisis will determine the kind of miracle required to bring redemption to that crisis.

Modern darkness is on a roll and can sense that the “normal” church is in retreat and the darkness is thriving in the territory that we are backing away from. New beliefs must replace old ones that have diminished our reality of the Holy Spirit. Beliefs have consequences – meaning that what we believe will determine what we do.

 

According to Isaiah our first response is the reception of His holy invasion of supernatural light. We must be armed with more than an argument. This supernatural light has a certain illumination; a certain gravity; a certain clarity and impressiveness. Show me someone who could take or leave the power and glory of God and I will show you someone who will end up discouraged and defeated (Zechariah 4:6). Infatuation with the human factor (as a solution) bereft of the God factor will end up making us more of the problem than the solution. Ask yourself today, “What is holding you back from embracing Next Level Holy Ghost reality!”

Our second response is to release this holy invasion of supernatural light. Isaiah prophesies that the unsaved will be impressed by the transcendent heavenly substance that we must carry. The phrase “Arise and Shine” carries the connotation to be in active operation with Divine force. Cooperating with the Holy Spirit and bringing the power of the eternal realm to bear upon the resisting realm of darkness is our only hope

We can’t be led by the opinions or offenses of man, if we do, we’ll be dancing around the truth – instead of standing upon it.

 

5 REASONS WHY WALKING IN GOD’S POWER IS NOT AN OPTION

1. Without Power Realities - Christianity would lapse into another earth-bound philosophy.

All over the world terrorism, human sacrifices, unnecessary plight and oppression all takes places because Religion demands it. When fire fell on Mt. Carmel for Elijah, it separated Jehovah God from a cow-god and an oversized tooth pick (Baal and Asherah). Labeling and framing is everything in modern society. Heaven knows how to frame the Gospel and that is with the supernatural. This Gospel is about introducing another realm, not just doctrine or self-help advice. Some, who have experienced the supernatural power of God, have divorced themselves away from it for what ever reason. Their experiences of dunamis power have been eroding for years in favor of being progressive, contemporary, or respected. We can do without, that type of so-called dignity!

 

“Do not attempt to water Christianity down. There must be no pretense that you can have it with the supernatural left out. So far as I can see Christianity is precisely the one religion from which the miraculous cannot be separated”–C.S. Lewis

 

2. Without Power Realities - the church is forced to be bureaucratic in our leadership rather than apostolic.

Bureaucratic is a system of government characterized by a hierarchy of authority and adherence to fixed tradition. It is marked by officialism, red tape and policy making. The book of Acts church prayed, got the mind of the Spirit and launched forward to plant new churches with power demonstrations. Bureaucracy is what brought the church into the Dark ages, when the philosophies of men crowded out the gifts of the Spirit and the manifest Presence of God. Like begat like – church bodies will take on the wrong DNA, if we don’t get this one right. Any church culture that doesn’t have a mechanism in place for a demonstration of power will become blurred scenery on the spiritual highway of modern culture.

 

3. Without Power Realities - this generation’s darkness will go unchallenged, while the captives go unchained.

People who are trapped in addictions, sexual immoralities, and demonic darkness need the power of God to get free. Without the dunamis, the demonic can operate and legislate. As the current darkness escalates it requires that we escalate (Not Escalade!) in authority and the Power of God as well. A talk on “10 Ways How to Have a Good Vacation” is not appropriate to a bound and suffering first-time visitor who desperately needs some anointed help. That’s not being sensitive to them or the Holy Spirit. We need the Holy Spirit’s reality a fresh. The Holy Spirit has been called “the author of every positive revolution in history”, “Satan’s unsolved problem”, or “God’s secret weapon”, bringing explosive life to His people. We must not neglect Him or what He brings to the table!

 

4. Without Power Realities - the army of God does not feel emboldened to take their field in the market place.

There’s something about feeling equipped and prepared that releases something profound within an individual. I saw it on my son’s state championship basketball team. They were more ready to go the distance than anyone they faced. So at ARCO arena, they acted out what they had rehearsed in so many practices. In Jerusalem, the young believers of the church had a strategic prayer meeting to thwart off insecurity, fear and possible discouragement. This is the Holy Spirit’s response to being risk-aversive – skip the classes! Their petition was that God would stretch forth Hid hand with miracles and give them boldness to speak. It worked! (Acts 4:29-31). It still does!

 

5. Without Power Realities - God doesn’t receive the glory (Psalms 96:3).

The supernatural will bring forth a bevy of fresh testimonies among a post-modern generation, where one’s unique story means everything. The real reason Christians don’t believe in the miraculous power of God is that they have not presently experienced one. We desperately need some fresh encounters of power.

Several years ago, I did a series of meetings at my daughter’s Christian school that floored me. We had 2 days where we began at 10:30 a.m. and ended after 3:00 p.m. We saw healings, deliverances, life transformations and demonstrations of power. I began the week with this incredible burden that they would experience more than a service and encounter something bigger than human personality. We ended the week with classes turning into spontaneous prayer meetings and students prostrate by the hundreds. It looked to me like what I had heard of the Asbury College revival. One teacher stated that the school had never seen anything like it in its history. We’re still getting praise reports and e-mails! The whole miracle was predicated and punctuated by God’s Manifest presence and Power.

 

Many break-out meetings are poised for you to experience. Get ready for His reality and Presence to flow through you like never before. If this thirst is filling your soul, begin to press in for an ever-deepening reality of the Holy Spirit in your life.

Grace & Peace, Sean