NOT JUST FOR SUNDAYS: EXPERIENCING THE POWER & PRESENCE OF THE HOLY SPIRIT

PART 2, MY PRESENCE WILL GO WITH YOU

In a nutshell: Christianity is not just a set of beliefs, or even simply a way of living: Faith in Jesus means coming into the presence of God. God’s covenant promise to his people has always been that he will be with them. We experience this through God’s empowering presence, his Holy Spirit: By the Spirit we come into an understanding of what it means to be part of the people of God.

The Presence is the Thing
How do we explain what church is to those who have no experience of it? One pithy description should be this: “We are a people shaped by the presence of God.” The presence is the thing!

The story of the Bible is the story of God making himself present by His Spirit. Right from the beginning this is how it was:

Genesis 1:2 the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters

Man came alive when God breathed his spirit into him; God walked with Man in Eden – he was present with them. The Fall led to separation from the presence of God, but God has always reached out to people who he wants to draw into his presence. We see this with Abraham who walked with God, and to whom God made a promise of a people who would be God’s and know God.

The presence is the thing!

One of the places we see this most clearly is in Exodus 33:12-17

Moses’ plea to God is: I want to know favour.

In response Yahweh promises: My presence will go with you.

Moses then makes a second plea: If your presence isn’t with us I’d rather not go!

The reason Moses says this is because he has had a revelation, that it is only the presence of God that makes Israel different. Without God’s presence they are just another rag-tag group wandering in the desert.

Now, the claim of the church, is that God’s promise to Abraham and to Moses is completed in us. We have received this favour from God.

What an audacious thing to claim!

Yahweh’s Presence in Israel’s history
When Moses led the people of Israel through the wilderness, God went before them in a pillar of smoke and fire. Yahweh also made himself present to Israel through the Law. His presence was then represented amongst the people by the Tabernacle and Ark of the Covenant, which was made by an individual who was filled with the Spirit (Exodus 35:30-33).

Later in Israel’s history the Ark was placed in the Temple and that came to be the place where God was seen to be present (2 Chronicles 7:1-3).

And at times there were specially favoured individuals who knew the Spirit in a more personal way: Bezalel, Joshua, Gideon, Samson, Saul, David, Elijah, Daniel…

All these signs of the Presence made Israel distinct, BUT, the prophets saw something more to come. They saw all these things as signs, not completion. They saw a day when the Spirit would actually indwell his people (Jeremiah 31:31-33; Ezekiel 36:26-27; 37:14).

The Presence is the thing!

Jesus: The Anointed Anointer
Jesus came to complete all the promises that had been made to Abraham and Moses and the prophets. He came in order that the Spirit might be poured out on the church (Acts 1:4-5; 2:1-4).

From this point on the presence of the Spirit has been the essential, defining characteristic of the church of Jesus Christ.

What the Presence of the Spirit Means
1. Means we have free access to God
Before Jesus caused the Spirit to be poured out, being part of God’s people meant being identified as Jewish – which meant observance of the Law; circumcision; and Temple worship.

Now the identity marker of the people of God is the Spirit – all ethnic, social, and gender barriers have been demolished.

2. Means that God dwells among us
1 Corinthians 3:16 Do you not know that you are God’s temple and that God’s Spirit dwells in you?
Ephesians 2:22 In him you also are being built together into a dwelling place for God by the Spirit.

Once the people of God had the ark and temple in their midst. Now the Spirit is present in the midst of God’s people.

3. Means we are able to please God
The promises of “hearts of flesh” and “a new spirit” have now been fulfilled.

2 Corinthians 3:3 And you show that you are a letter from Christ delivered by us, written not with ink but with the Spirit of the living God, not on tablets of stone but on tablets of human hearts.

Paul was writing to non-Jews who had been transformed by the power of the Spirit. We now please God not by following the Law but the Spirit:

Romans 8:3-4 God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do. By sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, he condemned sin in the flesh, in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.

It is the Spirit who makes us alive:

2 Corinthians 3:6 For the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life

Jesus has made relationship with God possible through his death and resurrection, and it is the Spirit who makes this a fulfilled reality in us.

4. Means the Spirit is not an impersonal power
The Spirit is not merely a “force” or “influence.” He is the fulfilment of God’s promise to presence himself amongst his people.

The Bible describes many personal characteristics of the Spirit:
• Grieves over human sin (Ephesians 4:30)
• Persuades and convicts (John 14-16)
• Testifies (John 16:12-15)
• He is self-effacing, drawing attention to the Son (John 16:12-15)
• Intercedes with groanings (Romans 8:26-7)
• Has a mind (Romans 8:27)
• Calls out, “Abba, Father” (Galatians 4:6)
• Speaks (Mark 13:11)
• Creates (Genesis 1:2; Luke 1:35)
• Instructs evangelists (Acts 8:29, 39)
• Can be blasphemed (Mark 3:28-29)
• Lying to him is lying to God (Acts 5:3-4)
• He creates the confession that Jesus is Lord (1 Corinthians 12:3)

Water Baptism is a Sign of the Presence
Baptism is the response of faith. When we read through the book of Acts we see that whenever people came to faith in Jesus the first thing they did was get baptised. Baptism is how we demonstrate we are entering into Christ’s death and resurrection. Baptism is the means be which we enter into the people of God – a people of the Presence.


Application Questions
• How would you explain your church to someone who doesn’t know it?
• Why is it so crucial that we know the presence of God among us?
• How does the presence of God make the church different from any other club or association?
• How should being a member of the people of the presence affect the way we live?