What you got

We were at a fab conference recently and, in addition to some GREAT teaching,  we we enjoyed amazing worship. One evening they did a fun medley of joyous songs about the Holy Spirit.  One of the songs goes like this:

"They were rockin' and a reelin' on the streets of Jerusalem. 
People thought they were crazy, they were having so much fun! 

Peter said
"These are not drunk as you suppose they're just very very filled with the Holy Ghost.
This is that, spoken by the prophet Joel..." 
(Here's the link in case you want a listen; it will bring a little joy! bit.ly/Thisisthat) 

It is referring to the following prophecy:

Joel 2:28-29
And it shall come to pass afterward, that I will pour out my spirit upon all flesh; and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy,  your old men shall dream dreams, your young men shall see visions: And also upon the servants and upon the handmaids in those days will I pour out my spirit.

This was first fulfilled at Pentecost; the day which marked the arrival of the Holy Spirit in a new way.  He no longer came and left as He did under the old covenant, but settled in the believer to stay!  He is the very same Spirit that raised Christ from the dead; He is the essence of God's miracle working, planet-creating power and for those that have been baptised in the Holy Spirit, He now he lives and works in us! That's powerful! 

Anyway, few weeks after the conference, I was in a church and as worship progressed the minister got up and said a whole bunch of stuff, that basically concluded with "We need another pentecost Lord..."

And it made me think.  Actually if I am honest it made me a little cross.

Christian churches today seem so bent on waiting for God to 'do something' or to give them 'more' or 'bring revival'. But the truth is GOD GAVE HIS HOLY SPIRIT AT PENTECOST!  He's not going to 'pour out more' today!  When you get baptised in the Holy Spirit (different from being baptised in water. If you want more info this is a really simple and good teaching about that at https://bit.ly/AWMHolySpirit) you got everything God has for you to walk out faith in this world!   

We don't need MORE of him! REVIVAL isn't something God sends; we're not waiting for God to do something else and we don't need another pentecost!  We just need to use what we got! (I know you may think that's bad grammar, but actually I mean we need to use what we got when we were filled with God's spirit.)

Revival happens when we realised that God has given us EVERYTHING -absolutely EVERYTHING - we need for life and godliness...

2 Peter 1:3-4 (TPT)
Everything we could ever need for life and complete devotion to God has already been deposited in us by his divine power. For all this was lavished upon us through the rich experience of knowing him who has called us by name and invited us to come to him through a glorious manifestation of his goodness. As a result of this, he has given you magnificent promises that are beyond all price, so that through the power of these tremendous promises you can experience partnership with the divine nature, by which you have escaped the corrupt desires that are of the world.

We have been blessed with all spiritual blessings

Ephesians 1:3
Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ:

We know all things

1 John 2:20
But ye have an unction from the Holy One, and ye know all things.

We will do GREATER works that Jesus did!

John 14:12
Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that believeth on me, the works that I do shall he do also; and greater works than these shall he do; because I go unto my Father.

And soooo much more!  If that isn't enough to bring revival, nothing will!

These are just a few of the things things the word says about us, but if all Christian would just stop asking for 'more' and start WALKING IN more, imagine what would happen! 

Philemon 1:6 (TPT) 
I pray for you that the faith we share may effectively deepen your understanding of every good thing that belongs to you in Christ.

In the KJV that reads:
That the communication of thy faith may become effectual by the acknowledging of every good thing which is in you in Christ Jesus.

We need to start by acknowledging what is ALREADY in us! We need to allow what is already in us to flow out. From this same Spirit comes healing, words of knowledge and wisdom, miracles, joy, peace and more and more and more!

Revival isn't something God sends.   It's something that happens in us.  When churches get busy preaching the Gospel, healing the sick, raising the dead - we won't need gimmicks and posh coffee to induce people into church they will come out in the droves to see what's going on. Jesus and the disciples didn't have social media, TV news crews or printed flyers but the world caught the flame of pentecost from them - it was contagious!  

There isn't going to be a 'fresh' outpouring of the Spirit - God did that already and now he is just waiting for US to do our part!  There will a fresh uprising of believers that decided to get out of the boat and do the impossible!  It's for US to step out in faith and act like Jesus!  Yes we are going to see a greater manifestation in miracles and salvations as the days get darker, but that is because we are going to press in, take God at is word and see his power at work in us!

Ephesians 3:20
Now unto him that is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that worketh in us,

That phrase 'according to' means 'in conformity to' or 'in agreement with' or 'to the degree that'   God's power is already available to do more than we can even ask or imagine, the thing that we're waiting on is us! 

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Come and see

Image
I was listening to one of my favourite carols Noel ft Lauren Daigle - https://youtu.be/aBZ6Lqx1OHk   if you want a listen. I was struck by one of the lines "Come and see what God has done" as the angels are speaking to the Shepherds and it hit me that they didn't appear a week before and say 'Go and see what God is going to do'.  They spoke about what GOD HAD DONE.  Jesus was already born and the Shepherds went off to see him.  Often we can look to the future and wonder what God might do, where he is taking us, or how he can take change our current situation, but sometimes, we need to look at what God HAS done and fix our hope on him.  When we look and see all that God has done for us, starting with coming to earth as a baby, growing up to die on the cross and then brining it into our own lives, we can easily say "See what the Lord has done"!  There's most definitely a time for looking forward, but there's also times to remember what has already ...
Read more

Withdraw!

Image
Following on from my last post, I heard a great analogy this week, which really made the point well: When we say we want 'more of God' as if we are waiting on him, it is like us having a bank account with an unlimited balance, but rarely or never using our bank card to withdraw from it.  We still have the account (salvation) and the money (the Holy Spirit) but we never use it.    We live in a world full of death, depression, sickness, sin and all the rubbish that came into God's perfect and beautiful creation at The Fall.  Christians have the one true solution, and yet so often we are either hiding it,  ignoring it, or just simply not using what God has placed in us for his glory.  That's just sad!  The great commision says we are to preach the Gospel, cleanse the leper, heal this sick, make disciples, raise the dead (not necessarily in that order), but honestly in my opinion, a high percentage of us settle for Church attendance, maybe a mid week bible...
Read more

Not done!

Image
Today at church we sang a new (to me) song and one of the lines was  "If I'm not dead, You're not done, g reater things are still to come."  Sometimes it's hard to see what God is doing, whether that's big picture stuff or little details in your life, we can often get distracted by the cares of this world and forget that God is not done with us yet.   God called us not so we could live a comfy little life, but so that we would be conduits of his power to draw people to him, to demonstrate his love towards others and to preach the gospel!   If you woke up this morning he's not done with you yet.   1) He's not done transforming you.  2 Corinthians 3:18 (MEV)  But we all, seeing the glory of the Lord with unveiled faces, as in a mirror, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory by the Spirit of the Lord. We are never to stop becoming like Jesus.  Every day we wake up is a day we get to be more and more like him 2) H...
Read more