The Fruits When the Prophetic Is Present
It has been a while since I have attended a worship service with an actual air of expectance, an excitement that something different is about to happen because the Holy Spirit is present. I am getting so use to a regimented service, that one can quickly lose the anticipation of the Holy Spirit’s moving and really expect nothing but the usual usual, or same old same old. There is safety in knowing what is going to happen because we are in control, but there is anticipation and expectancy when the Holy Spirit is in control.
When the Holy Spirit is freed to move the way he wants, a lot of ministry takes place and a spirit of unity and awe prevails. Things just mesh, fall in place, dove tail. There is usually a definite message or theme that flows throughout the gathering. Many are involved, often most if not all are involved in his moving.
If you have been following my blogs, I often refer to the prophetic as the passion to release the Rhema Word, the active, living Word that is based on the Logos or written Word. “In the beginning was the Word….” (John 1) “And the Word became flesh and dwelled among us.” Jesus’ disciples did not know how blessed they were when they witnessed the Word that was the basis of their Torah in living, human form right before their eyes until he was gone, resurrected, returning to His Father in heaven. God’s Spirit in the flesh, active, alive, living! Today, God’s Spirit, the Holy Spirit, is still active, alive, and living in the flesh in the believers of Jesus Christ. We, believers in Jesus Christ, must learn to activate that Spirit, release that Spirit, and trust that Spirit if we want a life of expectancy and anticipation in our faith journey. On Pentecost, the early Church believers gathered, anticipating, expecting a “promise” Jesus had made them, not knowing how that expectancy would manifest itself. When it came, it did not come as another sacrificial service in the Temple, or a grain offering, or a peace offering of a dove, or what they had become familiar with when going to the Temple, but it came in the form of tongues of fire, a life rejuvenated, a life of faith on fire. After that day, their gatherings were not for the purpose of traditional exercises of faith like prior to Pentecost, but an anticipation that the Holy Spirit would move among them and an expectancy that he would manifest himself in any way he wished. Just as they arrived corporately, the Holy Spirit would also arrive, usually arising out of their spirits.
If you have the Logos Word without the Rhema Word, there is a good chance your faith will dry up in traditionalism, but if you have the Rhema Word without the Logos Word you will burn up by falling into heresy. We need the refreshment of the written Logos Word with the fire of the Rhema Word to be effective witnesses for Jesus Christ!
We have to realize we need the written Word and the spiritual living Word. Jesus told the woman at the well that there would be a day we would worship the Lord in “spirit and in truth” and today is that day. We do not have to be like the traditionalist Jew who not only worshiped at his temple but ended up worshiping his temple and his Torah, nor do we have to be like the spiritualist Samaritans and worship on their mountains. We are to be grounded in the written Word, the Logos Word, and release the living Word, the Rhema Word so we can anticipate and expect the Word to be our foundation as well as our life.
A true prophet sees spiritual insights when reading the Logos Word. Passages come alive! Soon the life of those passages become the foundation of our faith journey, and the anticipation and expectancy of the moving of the Holy Spirit becomes a normal thing we Christians should be doing. I urge you to release the Holy Spirit in your life and begin to expect him to move in your life making the foundation of your faith, the written Word, the Bible, alive in your spirit.
If we first practice this as individual believers, then we can begin to practice it as corporate believers, and a new dynamic will become a reality in our corporate Church gatherings giving new meaning to a “worship” service. Can we just gather not knowing what will happen, but trust the Holy Spirit to arrive as those in the upper room did at Pentecost?