Lay Hands Quickly on No Man

We are in a short series that began as a two-part series but has developed into a four-part series aimed at those who are beginning freedom ministries (or other ministries) in their church or community.  One of Paul’s warnings to Timothy, as a pastor, was not to be hasty in laying hands on others. (1Tim. 5:22). The “laying on of hands” could have two connotations in Timothy’s ministry and both apply to freedom ministries…especially in the developing stages.  When a leader laid hands on someone, he was either symbolically transferring authority for a leadership role or was imparting a spiritual gift…or both.

Paul’s admonition is a caution to delay designating leaders or imparting spiritual gifts until you know the person well enough to be confident that their character, emotional health, or spiritual maturity can bear the weight of the leadership or the gift.  I tend to say “yes” too quickly to people who want to serve in our ministry and have learned the hard way to slow down the process.  I have also learned to involve other people on our team who have strong discernment gifts.  Once someone is on the team, it is a messy process to remove someone whom you discover is not spiritually mature or emotionally healthy enough to be leading.

We should always remember that not only does God draw people to ministries, but so does the enemy.  We shouldn’t be paranoid about designating new leaders and team members but we should be wise and maintain a view for the long-term health of the ministry.  In the early stages of developing a ministry, we are typically desperate for other leaders and spiritually gifted people to be part of our team. We are looking for someone to carry the vision of the ministry with passion and excitement.  We are looking for spiritual gifts that strengthen the ministry.  When a person shows up that apparently has those qualities, we may rush to add them to the team.  Sometimes we’re glad we did so and sometimes, six months down the road, we regret the invitation. The regret sometimes is related to damage that was done to the ministry, but sometimes we regret damage that was done to the person we invited to be on the team.

Team members, especially in freedom ministries, need to be people who have a genuine grasp of their limitations and a genuine dependence on the Lord.  They must be quite willing to submit to others in roles of spiritual leadership because to have authority we must be under authority.  At the same time, those individuals need to have a healthy sense of who they are in Christ and confidence that Jesus can do and will do significant things through them.    

Occasionally, you will encounter genuinely arrogant or prideful people who will want to serve in your ministry…especially if it is impacting the church you serve in and is gaining some notoriety.  The danger is that those individuals always feel that they know better or are more qualified than current leadership.  It may be because they have exceptional spiritual gifts … prophecy, discernment, or a seer gift that peers into the spiritual realm.  Unfortunately, we have discovered that highly gifted people do not always have the character to govern the gift.  They may even have a “spirit of pride” or arrogance that fuels the fire.  In Part 1, we discussed the need to maintain a genuine humility in freedom ministries.  A few spiritually arrogant people on your team can mark the whole ministry.

Arrogant people will always be offended when they are “overlooked” for roles that that they see as significant.  With that mindset, they will either consciously or subconsciously seek to undermine other leaders in an attempt to elevate their own standing in the ministry.  They feel that they should be in charge or, at least, have significant influence, and so they subtly or not so subtly will seek that position. Unfortunately, position and praise tend to simply confirm their own view of themselves that they should be in charge because they are always the smartest, the most correct, or the most spiritual person in the room. 

Jezebel spirits may attack ministries through those men or women  and create division by suggesting that current leadership is not adequate, just as Absalom did in the days of King David (see 2 Samuel 15).  Arrogant or prideful men and women are prime real estate for Jezebel spirits whose primary function is to create division and to undermine leaders through gossip, inuendo, and even sexual sin. A Jezebel spirit will inevitably show up in a freedom ministry, so keep an eye out for the signs of that particular spirit. 

In Part 3 we will talk more about a Jezebel spirit and its impact on ministries as well as choosing other ministry team leaders.

Recently we have had the privilege of working with several parachurch groups and churches that are wanting to launch freedom ministries in their area.  These ministries are full of hope and potential for setting people free and increasing the health and power of the kingdom of God by doing so.  But they are also vulnerable to the strategies of the enemy.

When a ministry is beginning that specifically focuses on healing the brokenness of people and setting them free from demonic oppression, you know that Satan will give that ministry special attention.  If Satan cannot keep individuals from being saved, he will then work hard to limit their effectiveness and fruitfulness in the kingdom.  Keeping them in bondage to fear, anger, distrust, depression, self-hatred, and a bevy of addictions is his ongoing strategy to limit the impact of the kingdom on planet earth.  Freedom ministries confront that agenda head on so we need to be especially aware of his schemes when we serve or lead ministries in those areas.

In this blog and the next, I want to make you aware of a few of the schemes that need to be prayed against, trained against, and sometimes confronted so that those ministries are not weakened or eventually fail.  

Spiritual Arrogance

First of all, there must be an environment  of genuine humility in every freedom ministry.  I have visited with more than one senior pastor who had a bad experience with such ministries in the past and who was not interested in developing a new freedom ministry out of fear of having the same experience.  Their experience was that those within the ministry had begun to see themselves as spiritually superior to those who were not involved or “in-tune” with deliverance, inner healing prayers, words of knowledge, spiritual authority, and so forth. That arrogance damaged relationships and created division within their church.

It’s tempting to slip into a sense of spiritual superiority because freedom ministries are typically bringing something new to the church that people are excited about. It may be the only ministry in the church that is consistently experiencing the supernatural power of God. Suddenly, the “freedom ministry team” knows about spiritual truths that no one else seems to know about.  

In that environment, the flesh is quite willing to feel superior, but that sense of superiority will create division in the church, especially when ministry team members accuse anyone who questions or criticizes them of  “having a demon” or being “spiritually immature.” James 4:7 declares that we can resist the devil and he will flee from us, but the verse before it says, “God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble.  Submit yourselves, then, to God.”  Unless we humble ourselves before him, he will not empower the ministry and failure will inevitably occur.

One of Satan’s primary strategies is always division, whether in a nation, a family, a church, or a ministry.  Where division exists, love is not operating as it should.   Where love is not operating as it should, spiritual gifts will not be operating as they should.   Division will be spawned by anyone who feels that they are God’s elite in a congregation or community.  Those individuals always see themselves as being right, being more mature than others, and being more approved by God that others.  Criticism and a subtle or not so subtle attempts to undermine other  leadership will be part of the fabric of that elitist mindset.  Obviously, those attitudes reflect the character of Satan, not of Jesus.  When they show up in a ministry, they must be dealt with and corrected immediately.  If those attitudes are displayed in the ministry from day one and demonstrated by core leaders, the corrections will be easier.  You must also maintain the realization that freedom ministries are not for everyone even if they desire to be part of the ministry. 

Freedom ministries are exciting and impactful, but are no more necessary or spiritual than children’s ministry (I would rather face demons any day than two-year old’s), host ministries, worship, or the cleaning crew.  God has called everyone to a ministry and we are simply to be faithful in what he has called us to do while being cheerleaders for those he has called to other things. That attitude must permeate the leadership in any freedom ministry . Division will open the door to the enemy more quickly than anything and pride or arrogance will always create division.  

Next Week…Lay hands Quickly On No Man

There is an axiom in spiritual warfare circles that says, “Whatever or whomever you agree with,  you empower.”  When Adam and Eve aligned their thinking with the serpent’s suggestions about the character of God and eating from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, in some way they submitted to his authority.  By agreeing with Satan, they joined the ranks of the cursed.

One of the rules of debate is that you never allow your opponent to establish the premise upon which the debate will be argued. If the premise is faulty, there is no way to arrive at the truth. When we agree with Satan, we have inevitably accepted one of his premises that God is not good, that God does not have our best interest in mind, that God is not true to his word, or that God does not have the power to protect us from the enemy. Think about the people you know who have abandoned the faith, and you will recognize that they came into agreement with one of those premises. When Adam aligned his thinking with the serpent’s, he gave up his position as God’s representative ruler over the earth and Satan became the prince of this world.  Agreement matters.

Have you ever seen a child who got a cut or scrape on his hand while playing?  He cries and screams as if he is dying until Mom comforts him and puts a band-aid on the cut.  It’s not long until he is absorbed with other things and forgets all abound his terrible wound…until he notices the bandage again and then, suddenly, he is once again in terrible pain and needs emergency care from his mother.  When he noticed the bandage again, he came into agreement with the idea that his life was in mortal danger from the “terrible wound” he had suffered. The pain that was unnoticeable for a while, suddenly was empowered and became unbearable when he came into agreement with the idea that he was injured.  

It’s not that the child did not have a legitimate wound or did not feel some pain. Agreement simply gave the scratch more power over the child than was warranted. If he had not focused on the band-aisd, he could have conti ned to play and enjoy his day. His focus and his belief about what the band-aid represented side tracked his play time and took him back to a place of fear and pain.

The principle of agreement is found in 2 Corinthians 10:4-5. The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. On the contrary, they have divine power to demolish strongholds. We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ.

Paul reminds us that there are many things the enemy will throw at us that argue against the truths that God has revealed in his word.   But we are told to take hold of our thoughts and make them obedient to Christ.  That is another way of saying that we must make sure we align our thoughts and words with the truths and promises of God and not with the lies and inuendoes of the enemy.  Like the boy with the band-aid, we must keep our eyes on the promises of God rather than the problems we encounter.  If we focus more on the problem than the promises, we give the problem power in our lives.  If we focus enough, it will begin to have absolute power over our lives. For every problem and every challenge, Jesus and the promises he has purchased for us with his blood are the answer.

Remember when Moses sent the twelve spies into Canaan to check out the land they had been promised by God and were preparing to invade.  Ten came back overwhelmed by the size of the inhabitants and the walled cities in Canaan.  They came into agreement with fear and I’m sure the doubt that Satan had been whispering in their ears.  There words reflect their agreement with the problem and the whispers of the enemy. “We seemed like grasshoppers in our own eyes and we looked the same to them” (Num.13:33).     Joshua and Caleb declared that with God’s help they could surely take the land.  The ten never entered the promise-land while Joshua and Caleb were honored by God for their agreement with him. They entered the land and took possession of it.  

We are certainly facing challenges right now – Covid19, divisive politics, racism, a nuclear Iran, and a controversial election that threatens to splinter America even more than it already is.  Every headline and every news report is leavened with fear and hate.  Too many believers are believing the headlines rather than the promises of God.  

If we spend more time watching CNN or browsing social media than we do meditating on the promises of God, we will find ourselves in agreement with the world and the prince of this world rather than being in agreement with God. Our lives will be infected with fear and hopelessness rather than faith and courage.  If there ever was a time that we need to make every thought obedient to Christ, this is that time. I see believers shrinking back in fear, seeing themselves as grasshoppers when the word of God promises us his presence, his protection, and his provision.  Mediate on his promises and thank him for who he is for us.  If you have come into agreement with fear and anger, repent.  Change that today.  Psalm 91 and Romans 8 are two great places to live right now.  You might begin and end every day by spending time in those passages.

As the writer of Hebrews declares: So do not throw away your confidence; it will be richly rewarded. You need to persevere so that when you have done the will of God, you will receive what he has promised. For in just a very little while, “He who is coming will come and will not delay. But my righteous one will live by faith. And if he shrinks back, I will not be pleased with him.” But we are not of those who shrink back and are destroyed, but of those who believe and are saved. Heb. 10:35-11:1

Do not judge, or you too will be judged. For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you.  Matthew 7:1-2

You know the phrase. You hear it from friends or acquaintances in the work place…maybe even at church. It usually is uttered by someone whose life is an ongoing train wreck of bad decisions and consequences. He or she has just made another one and is telling you not to speak into their life unless it is a word of total approval. If it is someone at church, they like to quote scripture as a rebuke to you even thinking of disapproving of their decisions.

The verse above comes from Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount.  Of course, we call it by that name, he didn’t.  That verse and other’s like it have been misused on many occasions to protest any admonition or rebuke levied against an individual’s sin or misbehavior.  The current cultural gist of the phrase means that I don’t think anyone should hold me accountable for any of my bad, hurtful, destructive, or just plain stupid behaviors.  

If “judging,” in the sense that Jesus used it, meant calling another person to repentance or a course correction, then Jesus himself sinned on numerous occasions as well as most of the other writers of the New Testament.  Jesus pointed out the sins of the Pharisees on numerous occasions. He also encouraged the “adulterous woman” of John 8 to “go and leave your life of sin. ” He warned the paralytic he healed at the pool of Bethesda to stop sinning or something worse would happen to him. In addition, the writers of the New Testament often pointed out sins in the churches to whom they were writing as they called them to repentance and, on occasion, even called out people by name. From time to time they even ordered church discipline to be administered to those who persisted in sin.

So, if the “judging” Jesus warned about is not a prohibition against pointing out the sins of others, what is it ?  It’s an important question and one that needs to be seriously considered in the area of spiritual freedom and spiritual warfare.  

As in most spiritual issues, the key seems to be the condition of the heart and our motives for “judging,” that makes the act either a sin or a righteous act on our part. In the context of the Sermon on the Mount, I believe the “judging” is a matter of condemnation of another person from a sense of self-righteousness or moral superiority.  It is one thing to point out a behavior that is misaligned with God’s will out of concern for the sinner and quite another thing to condemn the person while holding ourselves up as models of virtue.

The key is that righteous “judgment” is out of concern for a person’s salvation and the spiritual health of the body of Christ.  There is no self-righteous component in which church leaders are feeling morally superior to the person caught in sin.  Love is motivating the discipline in the same way that love motivates a parent to discipline a rebellious child. The goal of proper judgment is always redemption motivated by love.

The judgment that Jesus warns us about is a personal judgment based on a feeling of superiority or a desire to wound or demean another person. We tend to leap past the behavior and label another person as if we know his thoughts, his  heart, his motives, and his history.  Instead of saying that a young woman is involved in sexual immorality, we simply label her as a slut…verbally or in our own minds. At that point, we have made her “less than” us, although we undoubtedly have another variety of sin in our own life that we justify or don’t recognize.  That judgment exalts us and diminishes the other person.  We don’t feel concern, but rather contempt. We don’t love, but reject.  We judge the person’s worth and value, rather than letting God be the judge. Here is the danger.  When we judge with that heart, we align ourselves with Satan who is the chief accuser of the brethren.

2020 has been a miserable year. People are stressed, discouraged and afraid. In the wake of that, people make bad decisions and calls for marriage counseling have increased. For me, the most difficult thing in marriage counseling is to deal with judgment.  Once a spouse has judged his or her partner as selfish, hateful, perverse, manipulative, etc., it is difficult for that person to see their spouse in any other light.  Even when that spouse is trying to change, the one who has made a judgment will not see the change or credit the effort.  Eventually, the “judged” spouse will give up trying to be different because they sense that whatever they do will never be enough. The spouse who has made the judgment will always feel superior to the other and their disdain or disrespect will poison the relationship.  Believe me, Satan will work hard to justify and maintain that judgment in the mind of the spouse who has made it. You can see how damaging this kind of judgment can be.

Secondly, Jesus says that “with what judgment you judge, you shall be judged.”  When we judge others with a heart of moral superiority we have entered into the realm of pride and arrogance, which opens us up to the enemy.  That kind of judgment is a form of “unforgiveness” in which we have condemned another and refuse to let go of our condemning attitude. We have defined another person without mercy or forgiveness.  When we judge another, in this context, we sin and the unrepented sin is an open door to the enemy.  Not only that, but once we have cast another person in a certain light through judgment, we typically dismiss or “filter out” all evidence to the contrary. If you think about it, that seems to be the basis for racism and bigotry.

This kind of judgment, because it is sin, gives the devil a legal right to afflict us.  That is how our judgment comes back on us.  Remember…with what judgment we judge, we shall be judged. If we judge someone to be a perverse person, Satan can deal with us as a perverse person. If we judge someone to be selfish, the enemy can deal with us as a selfish person. In finding freedom, people not only need to repent of active sin and unforgiveness, but of judgments as well. In the same way that we repent of sin and renounce it, we must also repent of judgments and renounce them before we can dismiss every demon. Again, this is not a denial of sin, but a change of heart toward the sinner and any sensei of our own superiority.

Once again, identifying behavior as sinful, based on the word of God, is not the same as labeling a person and thinking less of them because of our personal agendas.  The kind of judgment the apostle Paul calls us to honors the word of God and humbly seeks restoration of a person caught in sin. The judgment Jesus warns us against, actually diminishes the chance for restoration because we feel no obligation to try to redeem that person we have labeled and often seek to have others join us in our judgment against him or her through gossip and inuendos.  

So, as we examine ourselves to see if we are in alignment with the Father’s will, we may want to scan our own hearts and history to see if judgment is opening a door for the enemy or is keeping us from reconciling a relationship.  If we are ministering freedom, to others, judgment is an area that needs to be explored.  If we have placed a judgment on ourselves, we also need to repent of that judgment and renounce it.

Suddenly, life in America has taken on a surreal feel.  Here in West Texas the coronavirus has shut down schools, churches are going online instead of meeting on Sundays, and the shelves in every grocery store are emptied. On top of that, thirty-dollar oil looms over our area like a dark cloud. It seems to be the perfect storm.

The most obvious thing in the spiritual landscape is the spirit of fear that is attached to all of this. There seems to be no rational reason for people to be hoarding everything from toilet paper to corn flakes, but here we are.  This is a time when we need to remember that our struggle is not against flesh and blood but against spiritual principalities in heavenly realms.  I’m not saying that the coronavirus is not real and is no threat, but the fear response is way out of proportion to the reality.

Fear is an open door for the enemy.  Demonic spirits smell fear in the atmosphere like sharks smell blood in the water and are drawn to it.  As we move ahead, I want to encourage you to bind and command any spirit of fear to leave you in the powerful name of Jesus.  In fact, you may want to do that every day or several times a day if you feel it encroaching on your mind.

I also encourage you to command any spirit of infirmity to leave you and your family as well.  I encourage you to do so daily. Demonic spirits mimic real diseases and health conditions and so some will be feeling the symptoms of the coronavirus without actually having the virus.  When the spirit is driven out, the symptoms will subside soon. Again, I’m not saying that there is no actual coronavirus.  There is.  We don’t deny reality, but in the name of Jesus we can defy it and, especially, when the demonic is involved. You should engage in spiritual warfare as soon as you begin to sense any symptoms and before you head out to the ER or clinic.  If the symptoms go away, you know it was spiritual.  If not, go on to the clinic.  Medicine is a grace of God as well as supernatural healing….although God’s healing is much better.

One abiding principal of spiritual warfare is that we empower whatever or whomever we agree with.  Adam and Even came into agreement with Satan in the Garden and in doing so submitted to his authority.  Their agreement gave him power over them.  We must be careful to stay in agreement with the word of God now, rather than coming into agreement with the news or the panic on social media. If we come into agreement with fear, we will certainly create an open door for the enemy and not only will fear camp out in our living room but infirmity will likely follow.

The New Testament instructs us to fix our eyes upon Jesus and that is the key to navigating times like these.  Jesus has all authority in heaven and on earth and that authority includes authority over coronavirus.  As we fix our eyes on Jesus, we should invite the Holy Spirit to impart to us and his church greater measures of faith, courage, wisdom, and health for this time.

In one of his Messianic prophecies concerning Jesus, Isaiah declared, “Surely he has borne our infirmities and carried our diseases; yet we accounted him stricken, struck down by God, and afflicted. But he was wounded for our transgressions, crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the punishment that made us whole, and by his bruises we are healed” (Isa.53:4-5, NRSV).

Part of our inheritance in the Lord is health…by his wounds we are healed (I Peter 2:24).  Remember that we are to pray, “thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.”  There is no sickness for God’s children in heaven and so sickness is not his will for his children on earth.  John reminds us that Jesus came to destroy the works of the devil (1 Jn.3:8). His primary method if evangelism was to proclaim the kingdom of God and then demonstrate it by healing the sick, casting out demons, and raising the dead.  Sickness then is a consequence of sin and a work of the devil. It is not God’s will for his children.

God’s heart has always been to defend his people from disease. He said, “If you listen carefully to the voice of the Lordyour God and do what is right in his eyes, if you pay attention to his commands and keep all his decrees, I will not bring on you any of the diseases I brought on the Egyptians, for I am the Lord, who heals you” (Ex.15:26).  The psalmist also declares,” Praise the Lord, O my soul, and forget not all his benefits— who forgives all your sins and heals all your diseases.  David also wrote, “Surely he will save you from the fowler’s snare and from the deadly pestilence. He will cover you with his feathers, and under his wings you will find refuge; his faithfulness will be your shield and rampart. You will not fear the terror of night, nor the arrow that flies by day, nor the pestilence that stalks in the darkness, nor the plague that destroys at midday. A thousand may fall at your side, ten thousand at your right hand, but it will not come near you” (Ps.91:3-7).

That was God’s heart for his people even under the Old Covenant and we live under a much better covenant sealed by the blood of the Lamb. Our inheritance is health and healing. Jesus demonstrated healing as a sign of the presence of the kingdom.  Peter declared that by his wounds we are healed.  James promised that if any believer is sick, he can call the elders of the church to pray over him, anoint him with oil, and the prayer of faith will bring healing.  In addition, the Holy Spirit has given gifts of healing to the church and so we know that healing is a blessing that Jesus has purchased for his people.

These are the promises we should agree with rather than aligning our hearts with fear and projections of disaster.  We should also remember that these promises are for God’s people whose lives are also in alignment with his will.  By his grace, we also have the privilege of praying for unbelievers and seeing them healed by the power and authority of Jesus as an expression of the Father’s love for them.

Let me encourage you to declare these promises over yourself and your family daily and declare that you are healthy and healed in the name of Jesus. The Israelites dabbed the blood of a Passover lamb over and around their doors as a sign of God’s protection.  The plague that had been released over Egypt did not enter a door covered by the blood.  If you are comfortable doing so, you might even dab anointing oil (olive oil) above and on the sides of your door at home as a declaration of faith that the blood of the Lamb also has power over the enemy and over disease in your house.

Passover is near and we are praying that God will sovereignly end this coronavirus crisis supernaturally and quickly in a way that points people to Jesus.  Will you join us in that prayer as we walk in faith and not fear because he that is in you is greater than he that is in the world? Blessings and health in Him.

When I became a Christian, I heard the gospel through a Cessationist church.  These were people who loved God and were ardent students of the Bible. The lens through which they interpreted the word was, however, Cessationism.  That simply means that the denomination that church aligned itself with believed that the miracles, supernatural interventions by God, and the miraculous gifts of the Spirit ceased to operate around the end of the first century when the last of the apostles died.

The idea is that God performed his miracles through Jesus solely in order to prove that he was the Son of God and the long awaited Messiah.  He performed miracles through the apostles in order to validate them as leaders of the church and to validate their writings as inspired by God. The argument continued that the miraculous gifts of the Spirit were also given to validate the early church as the body of Christ and gifts such as prophecy and discernment were needed because the church did not have the complete New Testament canon until the end of the first century. However, once there was enough historical record of miracles in the life of Jesus and his apostles and once the entirety of the New Testament had been penned, the need for the supernatural acts of God and his church were fulfilled and God began to work only through natural means.  Most American mainline churches still hold this view in varying degrees.

Of course, that perspective leaves much unanswered.  For instance, why all the miracles in the Old Testament if miracles were only to validate Jesus?  If miracles were only given to validate the apostles and their writings, then why did Luke gain a place in the New Testament with a gospel and the book of Acts as well as James, the brother of Jesus, not the apostle James? Neither were apostles and we have no evidence that either of them ever performed a miracle to validate the inspiration of their writings.  Why did the church need gifts of miracles, tongues, healings, and the capacity to cast out demons if the miraculous gifts were only to make up for a lack of a complete New Testament?  Those gifts did not fill in the “yet to be written” word of God for the church. If the church needed miracles to validate that it was approved by God, why would the church not need the same validation today in the face of Islam, Hinduism, or Buddhism?  In addition, if the biblical record shows that God interceded for his people with miracles from Genesis to Revelation, why would he stop intervening for his people after the Holy Spirit had been given to the church and since God himself does not change?  He is the same yesterday, today and forever.

In addition to those questions, being taught that all of God’s miracles, supernatural interventions, and miraculous gifts were relegated to the past had an unintended side effect, I believe.  As I was taught to read the Bible through that lens, I also came to believe, at least at a subconscious level that we could no longer do great things for the Lord.  The Bible stories of David slaying Goliath, the Red Sea parting, supernatural strength in battle, fire falling from heaven, Philip being transported by the Holy Spirit, and so forth seemed to take on an almost mythological aura in the sense that these heroes of the past were not like you and me.  God would not work through us as he had through them.  I was reading the Word to see what God had once done, not what he would do.

The question becomes why the story of all those people and the story of all those supernatural events were even recorded if we cannot be like the people we are reading about.  God’s mighty works sound like stories that happened long, long ago in a far away galaxy.  And yet, I believe that the stories of David running toward Goliath, Joshua marching around Jericho, Elijah facing the false prophets of Baal on Mt. Carmel, Gideon routing the enemy of Israel with clay pots and torches, Peter being led from prison by an angel, etc. are to be emulated by us, not just remembered.

I believe that the stories were written to tell us who God’s people were and who they can be again.  They are written to tell us that we can be those people. These were real people with flaws and fears and great misunderstandings who eventually did great things through faith and the supernatural interventions of God.  If we are to be like them…if they are our role models then we cannot be like them without faith and we cannot be like them without the miraculous power of God working in our lives as it did theirs.

To take away the supernatural operation of God in our lives is to take away the possibility that we can be another David, another Gideon, another Esther, another Elijah, another Mary, another Peter, Paul, or John.  In an effort to explain why we personally haven’t seen someone heal the blind or raise the dead, we create a theology that denies the miraculous today and, at the same time, cuts the legs out from under the church and the church’s ability to “turn the world upside down” once again.

The Bible isn’t simply a history book as much as it is a book that demonstrates how men and women have encounters with God and that demonstrates what every believer’s life can look like in fellowship with God. What the Father has been willing to do in the past he is willing to do again because he does not change.  In my first church home, I was taught to run away from the miraculous because I might be deceived and led astray.  Of course we are to test the spirits to see if they are from God, but I believe that scripture actually instructs us to run toward the supernatural because we may just find God there.

I was reading through Matthew the other day and was struck with a paradox. One the one hand, Jesus seems too be telling us that we should think of ourselves as weak and lowly while in other scriptures we are told how significant we are in the kingdom of heaven.   The two thoughts sometimes seems contradictory.   However, throughout the Bible there seem to be numerous scriptures that hold us in a kind of tension between two absolute positions. For instance, we are told, “Do not answer a fool according to his folly, or you will be like him yourself “ (Prov. 26:4).  The very next verse says, “Answer a fool according to his folly, or he will be wise in his own eyes” (Prov. 26:5). Somewhere in the middle of those two positions we are called to exercise judgment and to be sensitive to the leading of the Spirit in a given situation…one  situation calling for no answer and another calling for an answer to the “fool.”

I find that same kind of tension in the New Testament where we are clearly called to humble ourselves if we desire to be great in the kingdom while at the same time knowing that we have this amazing identity of status and authority in the kingdom of God.  Matthew records a moment when some of Jesus’ apostolic band asked, “Who is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven” (Mt.18:1).  Jesus answered, “I tell you the truth, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Therefore, whoever humbles himself like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.”

The word humble in the original language means lowly, weak, insignificant, or poor.  So to be great in the kingdom we must see ourselves as lowly, weak, or insignificant.  Yet, at the same time we are told over and over that we are priests, royalty, friends of the Most High King, ambassadors, co-heirs with Christ, sons and daughters of God, saints, and so forth. We seem to be called to see ourselves as insignificant, while, at the same time, knowing how significant we are.  We get the same flavor in James when he directs us to humble ourselves before God and then to resist the devil and he will flee from us. We are to humble ourselves before God but we are to have a very different bearing when we face the devil.

So do we see ourselves as insignificant or highly significant?  Do we see ourselves as weak or strong enough to send the devil to flight? Do we see ourselves as lowly or highly favored and established in heaven?  The answer seems to be “yes” to all of that.  The key seems to be in knowing that our significance, strength, and standing in heaven has all come to us as a gift, rather than as something we possess apart from Christ.

Our humility comes from knowing that apart from Christ we are weak, insignificant, powerless and lost.  He has given us value, significance and position but on the basis of his inherent greatness not ours.  We walk in strength, authority and confidence because it is his strength and authority operating in us.  To feel less than we are in Christ is to take away from what he has done and who he is, but at the same time we walk in humility knowing that all we have has come from him.

Paul put it this way,  “Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me. That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong” (2 Cor. 12:9-10). Knowing that we have no strength, power, authority, or glory of our own allows Christ’s glory to shine through us.  We actually are not self-confident but Christ-confident so that we can walk both in humility and glory at the same time.

Jesus modeled the tension between these truths as he walked the earth knowing he was the Son of God who could call twelve legions of angels at any time, yet at the same time totally submitting himself to the Father.  The Son of God simply made a decision to only do what he saw the Father doing and only speak what he heard the Father speaking.  That was God himself operating in humility.  Ultimately, humility is a mindset of total dependence on another for our needs.  Jesus was humble in that he chose to be totally dependent on the Father in every circumstance even though he knew heaven would come running at his call.  When we walk with that mindset, both humble and significant,  we can be great in the kingdom of God.

I have noticed a lot of social media comments this week about the half-time show at the Super Bowl.  I watched the game but not the half-time show.  Of course, the objections were for the over-sexualized production at half time that has been described as disgusting, shocking, perverse, and so forth. This was just the latest addition of such half-time shows going back to Janet Jackson’s wardrobe malfunction and Beyonce channeling her spirit (demon) in a hypersexual way.  The debate over the production reminded me of an article that our pastoral staff discussed only a week or so before the Super Bowl.  I thought you might be interested in some takeaways from the article related to a sexualized culture.  The article was written by Kirk Durston and was based on a book entitled Sex and Culture written by J.D. Unwin, a Cambridge social anthropologist. He studies a number of cultures contemporary and historic based on several criteria – one of which was a cultures level of sexual restraint.  It is a highly academic book so I will try to keep the quote brief.

Why Sexual Morality May be Far More Important than You Ever Thought

A few days ago I finished studying Sex and Culture for the second time. It is a remarkable book summarizing a lifetime of research by Oxford social anthropologist J.D. Unwin.  The 600+ page book is, in Unwin’s words, only a “summary” of his research—seven volumes would be required to lay it all out. His writings suggest he was a rationalist, believing that science is our ultimate tool of inquiry (it appears he was not a religious man). As I went through what he found, I was repeatedly reminded of the thought I had as a philosophy student: some moral laws may be designed to minimize human suffering and maximize human flourishing long term.

Unwin examines the data from 86 societies and civilizations to see if there is a relationship between sexual freedom and the flourishing of cultures. What makes the book especially interesting is that we in the West underwent a sexual revolution in the late 1960’s, 70’s, and 80’s and are now in a position to test the conclusions he arrived at more than 40 years earlier.  

Unwin’s degrees of sexual restraint

Degrees of sexual restraint were divided into two major categories—prenuptial (pre-marital) and postnuptial (married). Prenuptial categories were:

1. Complete sexual freedom—no prenuptial restraints at all
2. Irregular or occasional restraint— cultural regulations require an occasional period of abstinence
3. Strict Chastity —remain a virgin until married

Postnuptial categories were:

1. Modified monogamy: one spouse at a time, but association can be terminated by either party.
2. Modified polygamy: men can have more than one wife, but a wife is free to leave her husband.
3. Absolute monogamy: only one spouse permitted for life (or until death in some cultures) 
4. Absolute polygamy:  men can have more than one wife, but wives must “confine their sexual qualities (i.e., activity) to their husband for the whole of their lives.”

So what did he find?

Here are a few of his most significant findings:

1. Effect of sexual constraints: Increased sexual constraints, either pre or post-nuptial, always led to increased flourishing of a culture. Conversely, increased sexual freedom always led to the collapse of a culture three generations later. 
2. Single most influential factor: Surprisingly, the data revealed that the single most important correlation with the flourishing of a culture was whether pre-nuptial chastity was required or not. It had a very significant effect either way.
3. Highest flourishing of culture: The most powerful combination was pre-nuptial chastity coupled with “absolute monogamy”. Rationalist cultures that retained this combination for at least three generations exceeded all other cultures in every area, including literature, art, science, furniture, architecture, engineering, and agriculture. Only three out of the eighty-six cultures studied ever attained this level.
4. Effect of abandoning prenuptial chastity: When strict prenuptial chastity was no longer the norm, absolute monogamy, deism (a culture in which considerations about God shape the culture, and rational thinking also disappeared within three generations.
5. Total sexual freedom: If total sexual freedom was embraced by a culture, that culture collapsed within three generations to the lowest state of flourishing — which Unwin describes as “inert” and at a “dead level of conception” and is characterized by people who have little interest in much else other than their own wants and needs. At this level, the culture is usually conquered or taken over by another culture with greater social energy.
6. Time lag: If there is a change in sexual constraints, either increased or decreased restraints, the full effect of that change is not realized until the third generation.

The conclusions of the writer were that America is far along the path (Super Bowl) and that we hit the self-destruct button, which began our countdown back in the 60’s.  The Cambridge scholar did not try to determine why cultures that showed sexual restraint flourished while those that did not began to circle the drain, but he thought maybe the energy that would have been expended on sexual pursuits were actually channeled intoscience, technology, the arts, etc.

I have another thought on that:  Righteousness exalts a nation, but sin is a disgrace to any people (Proverbs 14:34 ). God created sexuality to be a holy thing shared by one man and one woman in the covenant of marriage. He designed it to knit hearts and emotions together in a way that would strengthen the bond of marriage more than almost anything else.  It is such a holy thing that adultery was a capital offense under the Old Covenant.  Satan has made sexuality a prime target since the Garden of Eden.  In our time, a lack of sexual restraint has created a generation of fatherless children, a bevy of sexually transmitted diseases, a world haunted by gender confusion, an inability to bond properly with a spouse because of multiple sexual partners before marriage, a epidemic of brutal sex trafficking – both boys and girls, an additional epidemic of pornography, and most importantly, the removal of God’s blessing from nations.

So does the Super Bowl half time show really matter?  In one sense, it is just one more expression of a culture that has become sexualized to the point of shamelessness.  But more importantly, it is a probable indicator of the impending collapse of a great nation once blessed and used by God.  The good news is that there are still many who find such expressions objectionable.  We should.  The church must be the conscience of a nation for who else will speak out for righteousness?  Of course, speaking out is only part of the battle.  The only true solution is to evangelize the nation with the good news of Jesus Christ and the true freedom found in Him.  There are so many things the enemy has stolen from our culture that need to reclaimed and taken back by the church. A holy sexuality is one of those things and we must be in the fight…beginning with our own personal purity based on the Lord’s standard not the standard of our culture.

One of the most familiar stories in the Old Testament is found in 2 Kings 6 and is part of the chronicles of Elisha’s life and ministry.  In this section, we find the king of Aram at war with Israel. Whenever the king of Aram would lay plans to attack the king of Israel, the Lord would reveal the plan to Elisha who would, in turn, send a message to the king of Israel, revealing the plan.  The king of Aram began to believe that there was a spy in his camp who was alerting Israel but his men declared that it was the prophet Elisha who was alerting Israel so that Israel could avoid the ambush.

The king of Aram then commanded, “Go, find out where he is,” the king ordered, “so I can send men and capture him.” The report came back: “He is in Dothan.” Then he sent horses and chariots and a strong force there. They went by night and surrounded the city. When the servant of the man of God got up and went out early the next morning, an army with horses and chariots had surrounded the city. “Oh, my lord, what shall we do?” the servant asked. “Don’t be afraid,” the prophet answered. “Those who are with us are more than those who are with them.” And Elisha prayed, “O Lord, open his eyes so he may see.” Then the Lord opened the servant’s eyes, and he looked and saw the hills full of horses and chariots of fire all around Elisha. As the enemy came down toward him, Elisha prayed to the Lord, “Strike these people with blindness.” So he struck them with blindness, as Elisha had asked.  (2 Kings 6:11-18).

Most of us can identify with Elisha’s servant who suddenly found himself facing overwhelming odds and so panicked and despaired of his life.   The prophet answered with the most frequently stated command in scripture, “Don’t be afraid.”  What we see in this story is the manifest difference between eyes of faith and eyes of flesh.  The servant, although he was a follower of God and a personal witness to numerous miracles, still viewed life from the flesh – as a natural man.  Elisha viewed life as a spiritual man. The servant was aware of his limitations.  The prophet was aware of the endless and powerful resources of heaven.  The servant believed he was on his own as he faced his crisis.  The prophet believed that the resources of heaven were available to him.  The servant’s reaction was fear and anxiety.  The prophet’s reaction was peace and confidence.

Elisha did not deny his circumstance.  He did not dismiss the reality that he and his servant were totally surrounded by an enemy army. But what he also knew was that the God of heaven was poised to fight for him with an army of angels.  Here is the question.  Did Elisha have faith because he saw the angel army or did he see the angel army because he had faith?  I believe God showed him what he had faith for.  The apostle Paul encourages each of us to live by faith, not by sight (2 Cor.5:7) and that seems to be the principle by which Elisha lived as well. The writer of Hebrews declared that “faith is being sure of what he hope for and certain of what we do not see” (Heb.11:1).

So if we don’t see it, how can we be certain of it?  We are certain because God says it is so.  That seems simple and is always the correct answer but it is apparently much easier said than done.  Otherwise, scripture would not have to encourage us over and over to not be afraid.  And yet, faith that moves heaven is a certainty that abides in us even when we cannot see the solution or cannot see God moving.

Hebrews 1:14 states that all angels are ministering spirits sent forth to serve those who will inherit salvation.  I am confident that Elisha believed that promise before he ever saw an angel.  By faith he was convinced of their activity on his behalf and so because of that faith, God opened his eyes to see what he already believed.  Elisha believed that God was actively working on his behalf in supernatural ways so by faith, his spiritual eyes were able to see into the spiritual realm.  I believe we all have spiritual senses that can be activated by faith, but most of us still struggle to have real faith in what we do not see.

The difference in living by faith rather than sight cannot be overstated.  When Jesus challenged his apostles to feed 5000 men plus women and children, all they could see was the five loaves and two fish that a young boy offered. They could only see their immediate resources and their obvious limitations.  They were still operating in the natural.  Jesus, however, acknowledged no such limitations because he was aware of the unlimited resources of heaven and by faith called on those and thanked the Father for the provision.  By faith, God’s provision was not only enough, but more than enough. Jesus viewed the situation through spiritual eyes.

My goal is to view every situation by faith and not by my natural sight.  My goal is also to be able to see into the spiritual realm by faith and expectation so that I can see what God is up to.  Not only are resources different in the spiritual realm than in the natural realm but strategies are different as well.  Elisha did not ask for the armies of heaven to destroy the army of Aram surrounding him, but simply to strike them blind for a season.  How fun is that?

We live in a world and culture permeated by fear.  Terrorism, natural disasters, climate change, mass shootings, a nuclear Iran, cancer, and a host of other things that exude fear are the stuff of headlines, politics, and the 24-hour news cycle.  Even for believers it is easy to live with crippling anxiety but God tells us over and over, “Don’t be afraid.”  What God has for us in the spiritual realm is more than enough to overcome threats or lack in the natural realm.  In 2020, pray for faith to believe what we cannot see and for the daily capacity to live by faith rather than sight.  Perhaps, like Elisha, we will see God’s chariots of fire surrounding us as well.

Our expectations for the Christian life matter and those expectations tend to create a gulf in the body of Christ. On the one hand, a major stream of theological thought holds that Jesus came, lived a life of miracles to prove that he was the Son of God, and purchased the forgiveness of our sins through his sacrifice on the cross.  His intent for us is that we come to faith in Him and his completed work on the cross, live a moral life, teach others the tenants of our faith, and do good to the people around us.  The expectations of these believers keep them from ever seeking more.

A second stream of thought is that Jesus came and lived a life of miracles to not only demonstrate that he was the Son of God but also that the Kingdom of God had come with power. His intent is not only that we would come to faith in Him but that we would also continue to demonstrate his reality and the power of the kingdom of heaven by doing the miracles he did as we lead others to Christ while doing good to those around us.

Perhaps, it seems like a small difference but in practice it is not.  The first stream of thought believes in the historic miracles of Jesus and the early church but holds that the historic record is sufficient for belief.  No current miracles are necessary to bring others to Christ and, therefore, the Holy Spirit no longer distributes gifts of prophecy, tongues, healings, miracles, and so forth.  Moral living, loving others, and preaching the gospel are the defining marks of the church.

The second stream of thought would echo moral living, loving others and doing good but would add the element of miracles not only for the purpose of evangelism but also as an ongoing expression of the love and compassion of God for hurting people.  Jesus did public miracles in order to establish who he was but he also did many in private telling the person who was healed to tell no one.  His motivation for healing as much out of compassion as it was to prove that he was the Son of God.  He is still compassionate.

There are all kinds of religions and religious groups who claim to have revelation from God concerning salvation.  They also point people to living a moral life, loving others, and doing good.  They nearly all have some form of historic miracles on which their doctrines and stories stand.  So…how will a Muslim, a Hindu, a Buddhist, a Scientologist, or a Satanist determine that Jesus is the real God versus the one they have been taught to worship since birth?

Moses seems instructive in this matter.  Remember when he had his showdown with Pharaoh and the false gods of Egypt (Ex. 7-12).  Pharaoh called on his magicians to match the miracles of Jehovah….and they did….for a while.  Moses had Aaron throw down his staff and his staff turned into a snake, but so did theirs by “secret arts”.  The snake from Aaron’s rod ate the snakes of the magicians, but both displayed impressive power.

Moses then commanded the waters of Egypt to turn to blood.  Pharaoh’s magicians did the same by their “secret arts”.  Moses called up a plague of frogs. The sorcerers of Egypt matched that as well.  However, Jehovah through his servant Moses continued to display his power and when a plague of gnats was called out, the magicians could not match it nor any of the plagues that followed. Then those same magicians declared to Pharaoh, “This is the finger of God.”

There came a point when the works of darkness could not compete with the works of God and those who saw the miracles began to believe.    Since our struggle is not against flesh and blood (Eph. 6:12), we need to understand that miracles were not just to impress men, but also to demonstrate the superiority of the Kingdom of Heaven over the kingdom of darkness.  Jehovah declared that his plagues were not just judgments on the men who had enslaved his people but also were judgments on all the gods of Egypt (Ex. 12:12).  In most parts of the world, men still do not need to be convinced that a spiritual realm exists.  Their question is not whether there is a god but only whether the God we serve is more powerful than the god they serve.  That can only be demonstrated by the miraculous hand of God.

Jesus reflected that same reality when he said to the Pharisees,  “But if I drive out demons by the finger of God, then the kingdom of God has come to you” (Luke 11:20). A demonstration of power was always at the center of Christ’s ministry as well as those he sent out.  When he sent out the twelve and the seventy he gave them power and authority to heal and cast out demons. When he gifted the church, he gave gifts that demonstrated the power of the Kingdom of God through prophecy, healing, miracles and so forth.

Throughout the book of Acts we see the supernatural move of God through miracles, angelic activity, and moves of the Holy Spirit.  That is the model of evangelism and church growth that we see in the New Testament. Interestingly, many of the churches that reject the miraculous move of the Holy Spirit today claim to model themselves after the New Testament church and yet omit the very things that demonstrated the reality of Jesus over the demonic spirits that were being worshipped throughout the New Testament world.

Jesus made an interesting comment about John the Baptist in the gospel of Luke.  He declared, “I tell you, among those born of women there is no one greater than John; yet the one who is least in the kingdom of God is greater than he” (Lk.7:28). How could a brand new Christian or even a mature Christian be greater than John the Baptist?  Certainly, he would not be greater than John in character and faith but he would be greater in capacity because the baptism of the Holy Spirit makes a lifestyle available that not even John had access to.

By Old Covenant standards, John was the culmination of the prophets although we have no record of him doing any miracles.  But Jesus said that the least New Covenant follower would be greater than John. He said that because he was going to send the Spirit for all of his followers after he returned to the Father. Why would Jesus give us such capacity for power through the Holy Spirit, but not want us to exercise that power just as he did?  After all, he promised that anyone who had faith in him would do the works he had been doing and even greater things (John 14:12).  That sounds like an expectation for all who have faith and he did not put an expiration date on that promise.

In a world where no one knows who to believe or what to believe, it will take authentic demonstrations of the reality of the Kingdom of Heaven and the finger of God to convince the world that Jesus is who he says he is. Living a moral life and doing good is praiseworthy but it does not set us apart from others who claim to have God’s seal of approval and who live relatively moral lives and do good. Even Satan appears as an angel of light.  It will take miracles that outstrip what others can produce even by their secret arts just as in the days of Moses so that the truth of God’s word and the reality of Jesus become undeniable. My hope then and my prayer is that the church in America and each of us will begin to embrace the power of the Holy Spirit in order to duplicate the ministry of Jesus that will once again turn the world upside down.  The apostle Paul summed it up when he said, “The kingdom of God is not a matter of talk, but of power” (1 Cor. 4:20).  The question for each if us then is, “How is that power being displayed in our lives or our churches?”

Blessings in Him.