I had a conversation with a group of Pastors about “What’s wrong with the Church?” As these men bantered back and forth with different theories, I held my peace. Finally I remembered the quote in this chapter by John Stott, “As a body without breath is a corpse, so the church without the Spirit is dead.” As I shared this quote the conversation ended with a soft “amen”. When we realize the problems of the church all stemmed from our lack of realizing we must allow the Spirit of God to fill and control the church. The other reality is that the church is not a BUILDING! WE ARE THE CHURCH! We are the tabernacles of the Old Testament the same way God’s glory filled the tabernacle is the same way God fills us. God sent His Son the Lamb of God to be the greatest sacrifice the world would ever know. He became the Passover Lamb for the world. Why? So the world could experience His glory. God wants us (the Church) to be filled with His Glory. Many of our churches are “Ichabod”, meaning the Glory is gone. We trust our programs, our intellect, our degrees, and our wealth more than we trust the power of God.
We are to be “Walking Holy of Holies”. There can be no revival without the presence of God. He must fill and overflow our services. We have to allow Him to have free reign over our programs and services. Worship is a key to experiencing His presence in the sanctuary. God created us for worship! He inhabits the praises of His people, this means when we worship Him, He “pulls up a chair” in our midst. This was the problem with the Church prior to the Reformation; they legislated God out with liturgy and formulas. In many of our churches today we are so traditional and rigid the Holy Spirit is not even welcome. It almost seems like we need a new reformation.
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