Your God is too small

I started this discussion in the lounge, perhaps it should be here. My question was why is God not moving like He did in the days of old? Has is power waned? I mean we have so much in terms of resources to teach people about Him and so on that it's ridiculous and it's crazy how much we know of Him. We look with wonder and awe at the experiences that people like Saul (paul), Moses, Joseph Abraham etc had. Should we not be having similar experiences or even greater experiences now that we have access to God through Christ? Should the church not be a more powewrful entity in this world? I mean back in the days of the inception of the church they were hunted down like dogs and many were killed yet today the world could care less about what we are doing. WHERE HAS ALL THE FIRE GONE???!!!!

Brother these are some great questions and I appreciate your heart. I have been asking myself these same questions of late over and over again. There is something in me that is seeming to say that something "radical" and "extreme" needs to happen in our lifes. We will not get back to that place without "suffereth violence" to our flesh, world and devil. Without a vision a people perish, so it's great the Lord is giving you this heart to seek these things and have an experience of true communion and relationship with the Lord as the early church had.you know bro, I think we have gotten too comfortable and we need a kick in our complacency. I mean we are content to say as a generation that we have so much information on God and we can do this and that and the other thing. We have so much and yet we do so little. We should be the generation that should be doing much much more than the apostles ever did because not only do we have the holy spirit, but we also can be inspired by the work they did, it should remind us that God will see His work done. We have become so used to to hearing of God's providence in the flesh so we can live on earth that when someone comes with a testimony of what he has witnessed the Lord doing in SPIRIT, we write it off as lunacy. Of course it is good for us to hear of such but that is milk and we need to be eating MEAT. We need to be sinking our teeth into the very meat of what God has for us in SPIRIT.It's as if we are limiting God to provisions for the flesh."These men did not make 'acts of faith,' they believed; they did not 'say their prayers,' they really prayed. They did not hold conferences on psychosomatic medicine, they simply healed the sick. But if they were uncomplicated and naive by modern standards, we have ruefully to admit that they were open on the God-ward side in a way that is almost unknown today. "I think the above statement just sums it all up, our brains have replaced God. Everything must be explained away or rationalized and anything outside the realm of what is percieved to be ok is lunacy ( I think I like that word)God is so much more dynamic than we think He is. If only we would reach for Him in spirit and not in our heads. I believe God is wanting to refine and purify us to put us into the place where we can once again be fruitful as the early Church was. It is not complicated, we need to have our mind renewed and get back to the simplicity that is in ChristNow this refining will not be a picnic...it will be by fire and lots of so called "Christians" simply won't be able to hack it and will fall by the wayside. We need to hold on tightly to God, this boat is abot to get rocked in a way that is unprecedented.Matthew 17:17 (NKJV) - Then Jesus answered and said, "O faithless and peverse generation, how long shall I be with you? How long shall I bear with you? Bring him here to me."Faithless we are and perverse too contrary to the belief of some that the above passage pertained only to the people of that time.Are we allowing the spiritual realities and eternal destinies of people to guard and guide our Christian walk? or are we being faithless and unbelieving towards these things?I think the latter because we are so far gone from worshipping God in spirit and in truth that the very mention of spirit ruffles feathers. I mean it's become uncomfortable to worship God in such a manner because it is not the norm any more.However this will soon go with the refining of the church.thanks for your response bro, I've just been feeling urged to speak on these things.

Not to question you that much brother but what are you doing about it?For right now I'm being led to put this out there. Much of what God has me doing is in private. If you are interested shoot me an email and I will tell you about it. But your question brings about a most excellent point. We have a knack for identifying problems but a reluctance to do anything about them. We tend to not to want to get involved in anything that may get our hands dirty...What do you exactly mean by this? as in more spirit led services and contemprary worship?Well I think that our worship of God should be in spirit and truth and that the spirit rather than tradition should dictate how the service goes. The rigidity of the church structure as it is doesn't allow free movement of the spirit that well. It seems that we must have a certain order to things and the spirit may behave in a chaotic manor. Contemporary services are all good as long as it is the spirit leading them, in this case the certainly we should have more of them. Of course there is the "we've always done it this way and never done that before" syndrome to deal with.God will soon send out His prophets in an unprecedented way and we need to be able to recognize the spirit which will bring them forth lest we reject them and the messages they carry.

I don't necessarily agree with this. There have been powerful revivals sent to places where there was a very strong ridigity in worship and form of service. One that comes to mind is Jonathan Edwards and the revival movement through Him and Duncan Campbell in the hebrides. I think the emphasis needs to be in the hearts of men. If everyone was revived personally then the worship will be in spirit and truth no matter how the outward form of service or church is like.GregI meant to say tradition in the sense that one sticks to tradition because one feels it pleases God rather than being lead to do so by the spirit. you spoke the words I left out.Very true there are people being raised up to bring a message to the Church but in this dispensation the Holy Spirit individually is speaking to hearts in a most powerful way. I think we need to be weary of hearing from men because in the last times there will be many false teachers and prophets:We should be on guard but not synical. We should test spiritual things in the spirit rather than try to rationalize them with our minds because that sets us up for failiure. In the spirit, the testimonies of men can be verified or refuted. We tend to let our minds get in the way in this department I think. Many of the lifes of men of God that have passed on are still speaking to the church, even some speakers on this site. I think A.W. Tozer, Leonard Ravenhill and some others on this site have a message that we need to still take heed. I would guess that most of the people God raises up will be re-telling the same message they did about 40 years ago, because we still haven't moved on as a church and experienced revival. They needed revival badly when Tozer was alive how much more now do we need revival!I think you hit it there. There are some messages from past messengers from God which we need to heed more than ever. We are in desperate need of a revival, but how desperately do we want it though?

The question is not 'where is the Lord God of Elijah?' but rather 'where are the Elijahs of God?' " Leonard RavenhillI think after reading about the life of Elijah, noone is particularly keen to live like that, save for the chariot of fire bit.

My two cents worth...The only hope I know for a bigger God in my life is to pray for it. Because He promised to give the Holy Spirit to those who asked.Sometimes I ask why God entrusted something so precious as the gospel to man. I just have to look at myself.I wish I could burn for 24/7 for just 30 days. That I could be consumed with the knowledge that those around me are lost. That I would be consumed with the knowledge that my Creator became my Savior. and through that, somehow eternity would be branded into my soul.My logic is, if I can't set myself on fire then by His mercy, He must.I don't understand much about prayer, but I believe revival will come by prayer alone.I believe only the Holy Spirit can provide men with swords in their mouths. Only He can send a fire that will burn the dross in the body of Christ and pierce lukewarm hearts.

I don't understand much about prayer, but I believe revival will come by prayer alone.We should be sincere in our prayers and be sure that they line up with what He wills for us to pray for.