Thursday, February 12, 2009

What's Your Identity?

I was pondering "identity" this morning as I was driving back from work. The reason it came to me was because I was listening on my IPOD to Rob Rufus when he spoke at JoshGen church in South Africa last year and he mentioned one of my favourite verses in the Old Testament - Exodus 33:14-18.

"And He said, "My presence shall go with you, and I will give you rest." Then he said to Him, "If Your presence does not go with us, do not lead us up from here. "For how then can it be known that I have found favor in Your sight, I and Your people? Is it not by Your going with us, so that we, I and Your people, may be distinguished from all the other people who are upon the face of the earth?" The LORD said to Moses, "I will also do this thing of which you have spoken; for you have found favor in My sight and I have known you by name." Then Moses said, "I pray You, show me Your glory!"

Rob was talking about it in a very interesting context. He was arguing that the "glory of God" is actually more than His Presence. Because God already promised that His Presence would go with Israel but this wasn't enough for Moses - Moses had to go on and ask for the glory itself. Rob argued that he felt the "glory" is all the concentrated manifest goodness of God into one moment in time and space.

But what grabbed my attention was the underlined section of the passage. "Is it not by Your going with us, so that we, I and Your people, may be distinguished from all the other people who are upon the face of the earth?". And I got thinking about the three churches I have been to and I asked myself a very difficult question. Was it the Prescence of God that was that church's identity and the thing that singled them out?

Certainly in my first church - New Covenant Church in Dunstable - that was my inheritance and my recollection as a child. As a child I remember long, long meetings where our parents would stand with their arms raised and tears pouring down their faces singing beautiful songs of worship. I remember hearing singing in the Spirit very often and thinking how beautiful it sounded. I remember the sense of excitement when my pastor would open the time celebrating the Lord's Supper and then simply sit down with the other elders and "wait". What would happen!? Yes the Presence of God certainly was it's identity as I grew up and I am so thankful for that.

God reminded me this morning of my very first vision. It came before I was even baptised in the Holy Spirit, before "I had even heard there was a Holy Spirit" - but it came when I was about 13 and was on a newspaper round. And I saw a vision of revival hitting my home town of Dunstable and something of what that would be like! Thousands joined in the song of the Lamb!

The other two churches - SGM's identity I would have to say was certainly a weekly talking about "the Cross". Male and female gender roles would be another identity marker. C J Mahaney was something else that got mentioned very frequently. The Presence of God? I'm not sure. Scott reminded me that the first care group meeting I took him to was of great impact to him. I was asked (for the first and only time in SGM!) to lead the worship and chose a couple of simple worship songs and it was a thrilling time - God came and rested on the meeting and there were some awesome prophecies and visions and people got touched but then worship times were stopped in care group.

Newfrontiers has always been very close to my heart as everyone will know and they have unique identity markers too. Vision, church planting, spiritual gifts. Certainly the Presence of God is dearly welcomed and loved and longed for at the past Brighton conferences and Stoneleigh. I felt so comfortable and at ease when I first went to Stoneleigh because many of us agreed how it reminded us of New Covenant Church and the balance of Word and Spirit that we remembered with such affection.

So let me ask again - is the PRESENCE OF GOD the distinguishing marker for us as the PEOPLE OF GOD? Because if church meeting after church meeting goes by and we have to think whether God was actually present there in power then surely something is wrong. And let me add a caveat - I KNOW that God is omnipresent so of course in a sense He is present everywhere. But He was present everywhere in Moses time too - yet Moses still asked that "His Presence" would go with them. So clearly Moses was thinking of some special manifestation of that Presence - namely the cloud and the pillar of fire.

Are we walking with the cloud? Or have we allowed it to fall behind us? I was sobered by something else Rob mentioned. He reminded me of Ern Baxter so much in talking about "the Land". Chris Welch and I have been discussing this over on his blog - and we spoke of how a generation died in the wilderness because of unbelief and how we felt that applies to today. Ern Baxter challenged the Dales Bible Week 1976 that they were at the Kadesh Crisis and both Chris and I agreed that we felt the challenge was ignored. But Rob said in his sermon that the generation repented and still tried to go in but God "was not with them" and the enemies defeated them!

May His Presence be our continual identity - so much so that the heathen - the Philistines if you will - know that something is different about us even without us having to hand out tracts!

2 comments:

Chris Welch - 07000INTUNE said...

Probably the main thing that freaks me out about Zerubbabel group...is that they are soooo into Norman's teaching that they confuse the "everywhere" Presence of God...and Christ in me as me

with that something else that happens both individually and corporately.
Corporately Jesus calls it...when 2 or 3 gather in My Name there am I in the midst.
I call it the manifest Presence of God as you found it manifesting in the Holy of Holies as the glory cloud which descended between the golden cherubim on the Mercy Seat.

It is just as wrong for Zerubbabel to ignore this as it is for cessationists to say " I am baptized in the Spirit...because I am born again and it says I am baptised in the Spirit in the scriptures."
People who are baptised in the Spirit are able to do stuff!They manifest stuff. Stuff that they never manifested before the experience. Even John G Lake , who had broken into an anointing for healing long before he was actually fully baptized in the Spirit....even he noticed a major major change in what happened after in his ministry.
In my own life, a group of us started turning our school upside down that summer term. It never happened before the Holy Spirit teaching day of April 6th 1972. Another manifestation for me was I discovered I was a musician. Songs started pouring out. That never happened before this at all. So it is necessary that we don't confuse doctrine with God actually coming in Person.
I'm riveted by the Arthur Blessitt book which has loads of instances of God's Presence coming down as He simply obeys the Lord carrying the Cross around. There is a particular chapter describing some of the greatest manifestations over 38 years.
The revelation 3 prophecy I have just posted on my blog is a special Word for those of our generation. It was not for a local church...it was for those who'd come from all round Britain and Europe to be there. (Because of Florida..we didn't have many visitors from USA) I am sure it is also for those who "make it theirs also". So reach up and grab it. It will change your life.
It is interesting how much has come to the fore about relating with the Father since.

lydia said...

Wow Chris thanks for sharing that!! And Amen Dan to this post!
I am often thrown and confused by the fact that I have God's presence within me, but yet I can sense His Presence upon me. Why both? Not complaining that's for sure. But some think shouldn't it be enough, shouldn't we be satisfied because He now dwells within us? His Presence is always with us in that sense and He is omnipresent. Why should we long for Him to come on upon us or rather why should we seek His tangible Presence?
I honestly can't explain all of this! But I know both to be true, I can have both, one is permanent, the other is not. But I am grateful He dwells in me and grateful I can actually sense His tangibility, or stand in the cloud of His glory, where two or three gather! It's simply awesome to me!! Invigorating and empowering and I have seen things happen in me that I never saw in my life prior to experiencing His glory like I have now, just like you also shared Chris.............anyway, I am grateful to you guys for talking about this here, I have been wanting to talk about this more and understand this aspect of God's presence more deeply, this is good stuff Dan, thanks................now I am going to go finish that book Chris, you have piqued my interest even more!!

Peace to you!!