Those Who Seek Him Find Him

An often quoted and well known promise taught in Scripture is that those who seek God find Him. Sometimes the phrase "with all your hearts" is added to the seeking side of the statement.

This Is a Conditional Statement

One of the places we find this promise is found in 2Chronicles 15:2: "If you seek Him, He will be found by you." Now, that is a conditional statement right?: If A, then B (as a logician would put it). If the condition in the "if" clause is met, the result in the "then" will occur. For example, if you drop a bowling ball on your toe, then it will hurt. In this case the "if" clause is about dropping a bowling ball on your toe. If that condition is met, then the result will occur: "it will hurt."

Okay, silly example, but you get the point. In the same way that gravity guarantees the outcome in the conditional statement about the bowling ball and the toe, God guarantees the outcome in the conditional statement about seeking Him; namely, that we would find Him. I trust we would agree with that.

Let's also be clear that God is sometimes found by those who aren't seeking Him at all! One obvious example is Paul on the road to Damascus. Sometimes God may simply surprise us and 'show up' when we're not expecting (looking for) Him at all. These are delightful surprises! And I trust that we understand that when this happens, it does not negate the conditional statement any more than my toe hurting, when a bowling ball was not involved negates that other statement.

As an aside, We have another promise that if we confess, He forgives (1John 1:9). This is a promise. But it does not mean that He only forgives, if we confess, anymore than my toe would only hurt, if I dropped a bowling ball on it! God, in His grace through Jesus, forgives us completely, even of sins we are not aware of, or forget we even committed. Who could ever be sure you didn't miss one! Thank God for His grace! Amen?

So, What Is the Promise?

Let me begin to answer this question, by saying what is not being promised here. We are not promised that if we seek Him, we will find information about Him (though we will). We are not promised that if we seek Him, we will find salvation (though that's likely). We are not promised that if we seek Him, we will find some vague, spiritual experience (as if that would mean something). We are not promised that if we seek Him, we will find an assurance of His love (though we will). We are not promised that if we seek Him, we will find some sort of personal, ethical and spiritual transformation (though that's very probable too).

What we are promised is that if we seek Him, we will find Him. That is, if we seek God, we will find God Himself. We are promised a direct experience and encounter with the living God!

Don't ever believe anyone who tells you that experience isn't important, or doesn't matter in the Christian life. The Bible promises us many experiences, including this one; An experience of God Himself, if we go looking for Him.

We Only Seek What We Expect to Find

I have not spent any time today looking for uranium deposits in the bottom of my shoes. I don't expect to find uranium there, or anywhere around here. It's possible I might find uranium someday, but to find it would require a Geiger-counter, or something like that, since I wouldn't know how to find it any other way.

I did not go looking for gold to fall from the sky in the last rain storm either. Theoretically, it may be possible (if there were a massive volcanic eruption nearby, and other unlikely circumstances conspired together in exactly the right way), but I doubt it. I probably won't go looking after the next rainfall either.

If we don't expect to find God, we won't go looking for Him. If all we expect to find is information about Him (from the Bible, for instance), or salvation, or some vague, spiritual experience, or some assurance of His love, or some sort of ethical and spiritual transformation, that's what we can expect to find. If we somehow believe that it is as likely to find God Himself as it is to find uranium in my shoes, or gold falling from the sky, then we wouldn't consider looking for Him - even if we used the words that suggested that we were seeking Him.

In the same way, if we only believe that we can experience God after we die, or after the Lord returns, we won't look for Him before then, nor expect to find Him while we're still breathing. Is it possible to find God? Is it possible that God Himself could be found by us, if we go looking for Him? Is it possible to find Him before we get to heaven?

Want to know the Bible's answer to that question? The answer is "Yes!" In fact, in 2Chronicles 15:15 we read this about the people of Judah: "They sought God eagerly, and He was found by them." In fact, in the Hebrew language "was found" is in the imperfect tense, meaning that this was not a one-time event. It kept on happening. They kept on finding Him!

Not Like Instant Coffee in the Microwave

One final note about this promise, we are not promised that we will find Him as soon as we begin seeking. In our culture, we don't like to wait. We tap our toes impatiently waiting for the microwave to heat up our instant coffee! We get frustrated at the grocery store, if the line is longer than 3 people. And on and on. We don't like to wait. We want and expect instant answers, instant results.

But seeking is an action that takes time. It is not "glance for Him, and there He'll be" (though sometimes it really can be that easy!). That's not the promise. To seek something or someone is to go searching, like the shepherd for the lost sheep (Luke 15:4), or the woman for the lost coin (Luke 15:8). It takes both time and effort. There is a period of time between beginning to search and finding (usually).

Maybe some give up, or change their theology, because they sought God for a day, a week, or a season, didn't find Him, and concluded He can't be found - at least not in this life. There are those who have searched for lost loved ones for years, and didn't give up and eventually found them. If the promise is sure (and I believe it is), and doesn't require us to reinterpret what it says to fit our experience so far (and I don't believe it does), then one thing we can be sure of: if we keep seeking, we will surely find Him. If it takes minutes, hours, days, or years, if we seek Him, we will find Him.

What Do We Expect to See?

Maybe our Father in heaven does like to play "hide-and-seek" with His children. Sometimes I really think He does. God wants us to find Him in places we haven't thought to look before.

But for those who have never found Him, is that a satisfying answer? Probably not. For those who have not yet found God Himself--had a direct experience of Him--God wants to be found. In this case, we can only find Him, if we take off whatever blinders, or filters we have. If we believe a lie about Who God is, or how He may be found, or what it would be like to find Him, etc., we don't know it's a lie, until the lie is exposed as a lie. Those lies will blind us to what is right in front of us, or filter out those things that would expose the lie as a lie. 

I'm convinced many people don't find God, because they don't see Him when He actually is present. 

I remember driving down a road in the Dominican Republic that I had driven on dozens of times before. But on this day, a tree was in full bloom, with brilliant red flowers. It was a very large tree. I had driven that road many times, but had never noticed something that was always there. One day I didn't see it, the next I did. After I saw it, I wondered how I had ever missed such a large tree - especially because it was in the middle of a field with nothing else around it. Once I saw it, I noticed it every time I drove that road.

In the same way, many people don't see God when He is present, even if they want to, because they aren't looking for Him the way He actually comes. He doesn't always come with brilliant red flowers, like that tree. He sometimes comes in the way Elijah recognized Him: as a gentle as a whisper (1Kings 19:12). He may come with a smile to those who expect Him to be stern. He may come with a laugh for those who expect Him to be angry. He may come with open arms, to those who expect Him to comes with arms folded and toe tapping impatiently. He may come as a dad, to those looking for regal, kingly, awesome, breath-taking brilliance.

If we seek Him, we will find Him, but we may need to have the eyes of our hearts enlightened (Ephesians 1:18) in order to be able to see Him and all He has for us. In our seeking, we should also pray for eyes to see, what we cannot yet see. And we should pray believing that Jesus still opens the eyes of the blind.

David Anointed -- Yet Waiting

David: a Lesson in Preparation and Struggle

The Man of God's Choosing

David is anointed king in place of Saul in 1Samuel 16:13. He is chosen because God had rejected Saul as king and had chosen a man after his own heart and appointed him leader of his people (from 1Samuel 13:14). Saul had failed many tests of faithfulness to God, the failure in 1Samuel 13 is just one of many. The final straw comes in 1Samuel 15, when Samuel fails to carry out God's explicit instructions because (as he says) I was afraid of the people and so I gave in to them (from 1Samuel 15:24). There's another lesson about there, but I'll pass that one by for now and return to David.

David is the man God chooses (1Samuel 16:1, 12), in fulfillment of Samuel's statement that God would choose a man after his own heart (1Sam 16:13, see also Acts 13:22). There's an interesting question here: what does it mean that David is a man after God's own heart? There are two possibilities:* 1) God chooses David because God is in David's heart. 2) God chooses David because David is in God's heart.

It is very, very difficult to decide on one interpretation to the exclusion of the other. There is a hint in 1Samuel 16:7, when God says to Samuel Man looks at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart. And certainly David exhibited over and over again, his devotion to the Lord the rest of his life. On the other hand David, at times, really, really messes up, even to the point of getting another man's wife pregnant and then killing him to cover it up (2Samuel 11).

Maybe the answer is both. David is in God's heart and God is in David's. God both knows David's character, and God, by the power of His Spirit shapes his character. It's the old Calvinist/Arminian debate all over again: Does God choose us because we choose Him, or do we choose Him because He first chose us? Why don't we answer the mystery by simply saying "Yes." (I better stop there, before I get in some real trouble with my Calvinist friends - and my Arminian friends!)

David is just a boy when Samuel anoints him and he is empowered by the Spirit - probably about 14 or 15 years old (a guess based on other chronologies in 1Samuel). Unlike Joshua, also empowered by the Spirit to lead following Moses (Deut. 34:9), David has no prior experience leading anything but sheep (as far as we know). David was not commander of the army, as Joshua was. He was not an aid to any leader, as Joshua was with Moses. As far as we know, unlike Joshua, he did not spend extended time at the tent of meeting (the Tabernacle). He's just a shepherd boy who really hasn't done anything to earn this. He is unqualified to lead.

Yet God tells Samuel to anoint him anyway, and when he does from that day on the Spirit of the LORD came upon David in power (from 1Sam 16:13). This coming in power can mean that the Spirit came on David in a way that was powerful enough for others to notice. In fact, this would be a reasonable assumption, since someone would have had to have noticed that it was on this day that this all began for David. But it probably means something more like that the Spirit came and empowered David. Whenever the Spirit comes upon someone in power in the Old Testament, the result is always empowered action (for example: Judges 15:14; 1Samuel 10:10; 11:6).

Empowered to Worship

So what does David do, when the Spirit comes on him in power? We don't know. What we do know is that after some intervening period, David becomes known as a skilled musician (1Samuel 16:18). It's very likely that something happened after David, perhaps still dripping with the oil of his anointing, went back to tend the sheep.

At some point in David's life, he begins to write the Psalms we have in our Bible. Though I can't point to a specific Scripture reference that ties this together with the empowerment by the Spirit that happened when Samuel anointed him, the recognition of his musical gifting in the verses immediately following this event strongly suggest it.

David, who may have played the harp long before Samuel ever shows up on the scene, and perhaps even composed some songs of praise to the Lord, as he played and sang on the hillsides with the sheep, becomes known by at least one person living 8 to 9 miles away (the rough distance from Bethlehem to Gibeah) as a musician worthy to play in the king's court.

What I do know is this: anointed worshipers are recognized as gifted by others. Even if they are only or merely attracted to the music. There's something special that happens when the Spirit inspires someone as they compose and sing praise to God. I believe the human spirit recognizes something there that resonates inside - at least that's been my experience.

Regardless of that one of Saul's servants says this about David: the Lord is with him (1Sam 16:18). Besides knowing how to play the harp, being brave, tactful, and good-looking, the servant recognizes that the Lord is with him. Already, David is known for God's presence in his life. For now (at least) Saul likes him very much (1Sam 16:21).

The wonderful thing about what happens next is that we find out that David's music has spiritual power. Whenever Saul was tormented by an evil spirit David played his harp and the evil spirit would leave Saul (1Sam 16:23). This is remarkable! As far as I know, this is the only time an evil spirit is cast out in the Old Testament and it happens by David playing his harp (and singing?). Later (probably) David would write in Psalm 8:2 From the lips of children and infants you have ordained praise because of your enemies, to silence the foe and the avenger. Praise is a powerful spiritual force!

Empowered to Rule

The most obvious and explicit result of David's anointing is that he is anointed to be king. This is why Samuel went to him in the first place.

So David receives his anointing by Samuel, the Spirit comes upon him in power and . . . And what? David isn't king. At least not yet. There is a long period of waiting between his anointing and being released into the purpose of his anointing. For David it's 14-15 years.

What he will not do is use his anointing as an reason to usurp the throne. He refuses to understand his own anointing apart from Saul's anointing. Saul was anointed king. And even though God had already said that he would take the kingdom of Israel from him, David did not understand that to mean it was David's job to make that happen.

Let me speak to my charismatic and Pentecostal friends here for a moment. When God gives His anointing and empowers by the Spirit, He may not be in the same breath releasing us into the ministry He anoints and empowers us for. It may take a long, long time for the purpose of our anointing to be realized. It is not our job to rush God, or rush circumstances, in order to help God's anointing along (I'm not talking about not doing something God clearly tells you to do, that is confirmed by other Spirit-filled believers.)  

Further (still speaking to my charismatic and Pentecostal friends), your anointing doesn't negate nor usurp anyone else's anointing - even if God has clearly said they have disqualified themselves! Honor the anointing, even if the person holding it isn't worthy of it. This is what David did, over and over again with Saul - even when Saul was actively trying to kill him. Don't usurp authority. Don't. Just don't.

David's anointing and empowerment here seems to be in large part preparatory. As I said before, as far as we know, unlike Joshua, David had no experience leading anything but sheep. God would not thrust him into a position he was unprepared for. His character would be shaped and strengthened through the next 14-15 years.

David, empowered by the Spirit becomes a not only a worshiper but also a warrior. He will soon accept Goliath's challenge to a duel - and defeat him. He will lead Saul's army until Saul becomes jealous of him. Then he will lead an army of no-accounts and social rejects and make them into a mighty force for Israel's good. He is going to have a life of struggle and hardship.

Even after he becomes king, he will struggle. During almost his entire reign he'll be in conflict with someone. If it's not the Philistines or other Canaanite people, it's other Israelites, or even his own son, God anointed him and empowered him to be king, but he had to fight his whole life to have what God gave him. 

Chosen to Be the Forebear of Jesus

Among the things God chose him for was probably the most important thing imaginable, and David probably had no idea what it meant.

David, now established in Jerusalem, with a palace of his own, is offended by the fact that he is living in a beautiful palace, while God's presence is still in a tent. He seems offended by the honor gap between what he has and what God has. He decides to do something about it: build a palace for the true king of Israel (the Hebrew word for palace is the same as the word used for temple).

God has another idea:

The Lord declares to you that the Lord himself will establish a house for you: When your days are over and you rest with your fathers, I will raise up your offspring to succeed you, who will come from your own body, and I will establish his kingdom. He is the one who will build a house for my Name, and I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever. (2Sam. 7:11b–13)

David wasn't the man to build the temple. It wasn't his anointing. His offspring would to that. His immediate offspring was Solomon. But it's Jesus who is the ultimate fulfillment of God's promise to him.

David's anointing went far beyond his imagination, far beyond his lifetime. His anointing was ultimately inherited by Jesus, the anointed one. And, by the way, the Hebrew word for anointed one is Messiah.

___________________________
* Though we could easily and rightly say that David was after God's heart, in the sense of pursuing or seeking God, this phrase, in the original language, can't be translated that way.

Lessons from the story of Samson

Today, I'm going to expand on a previous Facebook post in which I wrote this:

The story of Samson teaches at least these four lessons:
1)     God protects and rescues the undeserving.
2)     God uses people for His purposes, even if they are moral failures.
3)     Just because God protects, rescues or uses you in mighty and powerful ways, this does not mean He approves of your lifestyle.
4)     Even after our greatest failure, God is not finished with us. 

I'll take them one by one:

God Protects and Rescues the Undeserving

Israel had walked away from God (Judges 2:10-11)

After that whole generation had been gathered to their fathers, another generation grew up, who knew neither the Lord nor what he had done for Israel. Then the Israelites did evil in the eyes of the Lord and served the Baals.

As Israel was adjusting from the life of nomads to the life of a landed people, they were surrounded by a world of people experienced successful agricultural practices and technologies. That world had a powerful affect on them (as ours does on us). Without their own experience of God and His power, they drifted into the atmosphere that surrounded them.

But let's face it: it's hard to live on inherited testimony. It's hard to remain faithful to a God, Who, in our experience, seems absent, and distant; Who only exists in the memory of those who have since died.

God handed them over to the people they admired and the protection of gods they followed (Judges 2:14):

In his anger against Israel the Lord handed them over to raiders who plundered them. He sold them to their enemies all around, whom they were no longer able to resist.

They forsook Him and He let them go. But He did not forsake them. When they turned back and cried out to Him He sent deliverers (Judges 2:16):

Then the Lord raised up judges, who saved them out of the hands of these raiders.

They weren't judges in the way we think of them in court rooms where "all rise" when the enter the room. They were leaders sent to administer God's justice on the oppressors of His people.

They didn't deserve to be rescued. They deserved the consequences of their own unfaithfulness. But God in His mercy, and faithfulness to His promises to their forebears, rescued them anyway.

The next time you see a drug addict, a street punk, a thief, murderer, or sex criminal, remember God rescues the undeserving. The next time you look in the mirror and remember something terrible you did, perhaps even hurting someone beyond what anyone (even you) could ever accept, remember: God rescues the undeserving.

God Uses People for His Purposes, Even if They Are Moral Failures.

Samson is known for two things (outside of children's Sunday School lessons, at least!): his physical strength and his moral weakness.

The first thing we are told Samson did after the Spirit began to stir in him (Judges 13:25), is marry to a foreign woman (or at least try to) - a direct and flagrant violation of the law of Moses (Deut. 7:3). How could God possibly be in this!

Yet God was in this. Let the moralists beware! What we read next in the book of Judges, when Samson's parents object to his choice, is not an endorsement of Samson's parents' correctness, but something unexpected (Judges 14:4):

(His parents did not know that this was from the Lord, who was seeking an occasion to confront the Philistines; for at that time they were ruling over Israel.)

God is actually using Samson's weakness for women to accomplish His purposes through Samson. This will not be the last time. In chapter 16, Samson spends half the night with a prostitute, before walking off with the city gate. Then he'll get in real trouble with another foreign woman: Delilah (more on her later).

Though Samson was a moral failure in many ways, God still used him. He still empowered him by His Spirit. God still worked through him, sometimes in spite of, and sometimes because of his moral weakness.

This should set aside every argument that would dismiss the ministry, or writings of any small church pastor, to big-time Christian 'celebrity' who has fallen into sin, or been discovered to have been living a life of sin. God did work through Samson while he was morally weak, while he was living a sinful life. God works through people, despite our moral objections that they should be disqualified from such a distinction. (Thankfully, God does not work only through the qualified.)

Let me suggest that the same could be said of people with bad theology. Just because I believe that someone's theology in a certain area is bad, doesn't mean that God won't use them, or isn't using them. This goes for evangelism, as well as "power ministry." I have some real problems with the theology of some of the people I see on TV, or read about. But that does not give me license to dismiss their ministry, nor the fact that God is working through them. (Just to be clear: I'm not talking about the kind of theological error that puts someone outside the Christian faith.)

Just Because God Protects, Rescues or Uses You in Mighty and Powerful Ways, This Does Not Mean He Approves of Your Lifestyle.

This is the corollary to the previous lesson. If God can (and does) use moral failures, even while they are failing morally, the fact that God is in your life doing great things does not mean He approves of your lifestyle (or your theology!). 

The assumption that God only works through the worthy, relates to those doing ministry as well as those receiving it. So if I have a greedy streak in me, or have a habit of gossip, or tend to be judgmental, or have an addiction to alcohol, or porn, or engage in domestic violence, or like to read certain kinds of literature or watch certain kinds of movies or TV programs, but despite that, God uses me to bring others to Christ, or to heal the sick, cast out demons, cleans the lepers and raise the dead, this doesn't mean God approves of everything in my heart. [Sorry for the really, really long sentence there!]

You and I are not exempt from self-deception. One kind of deception is self-justified sinfulness (who's it going to hurt? what's the big deal? I'm no worse than..., etc.). One of those self-deceptions is right here: if God is using me anyway, it must be okay - at least for me, for now. The devil could be a million miles away, and we could still fall for that one. Our "flesh" doesn't like to submit to God. It will come up with all sorts of excuses to delay or refuse such submission. 

Nor does His work in you or through you means He approves of your theology (understanding of Who God is, and how He works in this world). You could be dead wrong about baptism, or spiritual gifts, or the place of women in church and home, or the church's response to homosexuals, or whether God saves primarily by His choice (Calvinism), or ours (Arminianism). Samson took full credit for killing the 1000 Philistines with the jawbone of a donkey (Judges 15:16), when it was God Who empowered him to do it (Judges 15:14). That's bad theology (and hubris).

When God works in us and through us it is because He is gracious, not because we are deserving. It may have more to do with God's desire to bless others, than anything to do with us.

Even After Our Greatest Failure, God Is Not Finished With Us. 

Samson failed with Delilah. He stupidly disclosed the secret of his strength and suffered a terrible and humiliating defeat. The consequences of all of his dalliances finally caught up with him. On the one hand we feel for him, on the other we shake our heads and wonder why something like this didn't happen sooner. He gets what he deserves: he's taken out; no longer Israel's leader/judge. It's about time.

How many thousands of times since Samson have church or other leaders fallen into sin, or been discovered to have been living a life of sin? How many times has that been the end of their leadership? In the church, especially, we have been quick to judge the sin, but slow to restore the sinner - especially when the sinners are leaders. They have disqualified themselves.

At least, we do that for certain sins. Sins like arrogance, judgmentalism, even greed, go unchecked. But if the leader is found in some sexual sin (as was Samson), then the door becomes forever closed. Even spousal abuse can be forgiven, and a man restored to leadership, after some counselling. But if he is discovered having slept with a woman other than his wife, he cannot.

There is some truth here, in that it takes a lot of time and effort to rebuild trust in a leader, once that trust is broken. I will not dispute that, nor suggest that the process be short-circuited in any way. Doing so would be another violation of trust!

However, permanent disqualification does not seem to be God's response, neither to Samson, nor David, nor Peter. Genuine sorrow for sin, true repentance, and authentic dependence on God's mercy seem to be enough for God to restore someone to their calling.

If you have sinned (ever), then genuine sorrow for sin, true repentance and authentic dependence on God's mercy is what you need to be restored. The same is true for your sister or brother who has sinned publicly, perhaps as a leader. The same is true for you, if you were the one who sinned publicly, or whose private sin became publicly known. Such have not permanently disqualified themselves/ourselves.

The God of grace still has grace greater than our sin.

It takes a transformed life to transform lives.

I haven't written in a while and wanted to take up this blog again. 

It takes a transformed life to transform lives.

The trouble with the status quo (a critique):

We (in the church) spend a great deal of effort on education, training, giving/receiving advice, studying the Bible, etc., that refine our thinking, but don't transform our lives. We worship and pray, but require that in doing so we are not made 'uncomfortable,' rather than demand that God's presence be made manifest. In our lives, if not our theology, we expect God to make our lives easier, rather than  expect that God wants to give us a much, much better life.

I'm speaking from within my own tradition (exaggerating things a bit to make a point), though I've seen the same tendencies among other theological and ecclesiastical traditions.

Where we put our efforts and our dollars demonstrate what we value - or at the very least distract us from our core values. We value the well-studied mind, the well-read man or woman, the one with extensive Bible knowledge. We love to learn stuff: specifically information. It is, at best, interesting. Jewels and nuggest of knowledge tantalize our minds like fine chocolate tantalizes the palate. In the end we divide over subtleties of theological thought, while remaining just as sinful, selfish, and unforgiving as we were before we were so richly informed.

Sometimes, as in the case of the so-called 'worship wars' we demonstrate quite clearly and forcefully that we're not interested in worship - at least not the worship of God. We're interested in our way of singing songs, our preferences for our order of service, our religious traditions, etc. - all arguments couched in theological jargon, but ultimately boiling down to: de gustibus no disputatum est (a Latin saying that roughly means: "when it comes to matters of personal taste, no argument persuades").

In everything from "health and wealth" gospel preaching, to praying for parking spaces, my team to win, and for my stock to come through, our prayers are not merely self-centered, but self-protecting. We want God to help us live our lives and it never occurs to us that God wants us to live the life He has for us. To be crude, we see God as our enabler, in the sense that an addict finds someone to enable him/her to continue to live a destructive life that is doomed to destruction.

Who wants a religion that is merely a mental construct? Who wants a religion of personal preferences? Who wants a god who endorses and encourages a life of emptiness?

If all we have are programs, all we'll get are people who are programmed (to say the right words, do the right things, not do the wrong things, etc.), but ultimately the same as they were before the program started - only more so.

Is it any wonder so many leave the church disillusioned? Is it any wonder so few want in?

The Gospel (a few thoughts):

The Gospel of Jesus is so much more than what an observation of many churches would tend to suggest. The Good News is so much more than merely getting our sins forgiven, and our "Get Out of Hell Free" card. The Gospel is ultimately about reconciliation with God Himself. It's far more than a mere forensic transaction. It is that. I'm not arguing against substitutionary atonement. What I'm suggesting is that the purpose of the atonement is also the Gospel. The word "atonement" means literally "at one-ment." The atonement both forgives and reconciles. The purpose of the atonement is reconciliation with God Himself - that's the Gospel!

But wait there's more!

The Gospel includes and must include the Kingdom of God, which according to Jesus is "within reach" (or "at hand"). This Kingdom is "of God" or "of Heaven." In the Gospels (Matthew, Mark, Luke, John), when the Kingdom comes, healing, deliverance, resurrection comes. This is because in both God and Heaven there is no illness, demonization, nor death.

The Gospel includes the presence of the Spirit within us and upon us. The Spirit dwells within us to transform us into the people God dreams for us to be. The Spirit also comes upon us to empower us to do God's work in this world. The Spirit gives gifts to help us do God's work as a church, and gives them to us in such a way that we need each other to get it done! What a marvel! A Spirit-less Christianity is no Christianity at all. And a Spirit-filled and empowered believer is unstoppable.

The Manifest Presence

What if the great concern and primary project of the Church became seeking, hosting and cultivating the manifest presence of God? (If you haven't heard the term "manifest presence" let me explain: the very presence of God felt, sensed, experienced.)

Let's stop making "experience" a bad word, and make it an expectation. A gospel that has no experience in it is not the Gospel, it's no more than words and ideas (and who needs more of that!). The message of Scripture is clear: those who seek Him find Him (not merely truths about Him). How do you find something without seeing it, touching it, or experiencing it in some way. If we found God, how would we know, if there was no experience associated with it. 

One thing we Reformed can learn from charismatic and Pentecostal circles is that the manifest presence of God is often the center, focus and purpose of everything.* Often in Reformed circles, it's not that we're opposed to such a thing, we just think it's exceptional, rare - wonderful but not something to count on regularly. But if the Greek word for know (ginosko) means what the lexicons say it means, then we should expect that the "knowledge of the Lord" would be much more than knowledge (or opinions!) about the Lord. [For Spanish speakers conocer has it's etymology in the Greek word ginosko - if that helps.] No, we should expect to know and experience Him often, daily, whenever we turn our hearts toward Him.

The Apostles devoted themselves to prayer and the ministry of the word (Acts 6:4). Prayer is (most broadly speaking) encounter with God, and it is the prerequisite for ministering God's word (IMHO). Those who have the title "Minister of the Word" (the official name for what we call "Pastor" in my denomination), must then also be those who seek God through prayer. What would happen if in our preparation for Sunday's service(s), we spent more time with God (in prayer) than with commentaries?

We owe them (church and world) an encounter with God

What we all need is God Himself. What we settle for are imitations or substitutes. My theological training seemed to me to be primarily interested in communicating theological truth. That's a substitute for an encounter with God, or (at best) treading the spiritual waters until the encounter with God comes. It's something to do, along with singing some songs, while we're "Waiting for Godot." Though Moses would not go without the Presence of God (Exodus 33:15,ff), too often we do.

Instead of that spiritual poverty, where God is beyond experience, Jesus teaches the Kingdom of God is within reach. God in fact is present everywhere. We know this and believe this. It is also possible to actually experience this--experience Him. How wonderful, sweet, precious, beautiful, amazing, and more! 

John says whoever doesn't love doesn't know God, because God is love (1Jn 4:8). That's not about having an intellectual apprehension of God's love, but a transforming experience of it. Having encountered a loving God, we become loving. 

It is impossible to have an experience of God and remain unchanged. God's manifest presence transforms us.

The objection I most often hear about Christianity is not that it's not true, but that it doesn't make any difference. Christians look and act like everyone else. Sadly, this is often both a valid observation, and conclusion!

The solution is, I'm convinced, to seek, host, and cultivate experiences of God's presence. This transforms people in ways mere teaching can rarely do. While teaching can correct, guide, point, suggest, open and close doors, it cannot transform. Only God can do that. He can do it in subtle and long ways through the sanctifying work of the Spirit, but He can and does do it in powerful and sometimes instantaneous ways through a direct encounter with Him.

Seek the Lord while He may be found, the Bible says (Isaiah 55:6). To seek means to go looking, often in places you haven't yet looked. (It's sort of crazy to keep looking for something in the same places you haven't found it!) Look through soaking or listening prayer, with other seekers, in other churches/denominations, among Christian people you disagree with about other things. "Seek" means "go looking" (not wait), so go somewhere!

He promised that whoever seeks Him finds Him (Deut. 4:29; Jer.29:13; Matt. 7:7-8, e.g.), so keep seeking until you do, because He has already promised us success!

It's the transformed life that is the best agent of transformation for others.

If God doesn't make us better people, if He has no positive influence on who we are, then Christianity has no more power than pop psychology.

If, however, God gives hope to the hopeless, rescues slaves from their masters, sets people free, makes the unloving love, the unforgiving forgive, heals the hurting and broken, restores relationships, makes us joyful, happy, expecting good (even when things don't look good), if He makes the selfish selfless, the greedy generous, the anxious peaceful, then God is good and others will want what we have.

If you and I are examples of what God does, we become magnets for those seeking what we have. Let our lives be sign-posts of God's transforming power. As we ourselves are transformed into the likeness of Jesus (cf., Rom. 8:29), we become better agents of God's offer of reconciling and transforming love to those around us.

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*Yes, I know Pentecostals and charistmatics get distracted too, and not all those who call themselves charismatic or Pentecostal pursue this equally. In fact, some who are Pentecostal in name, are 'uncomfortable' with 'that sort of thing,' and some charismatics will cut off part of a program when God's manifest presence is there, to get on with the 'order of the day.'

The Charismatic in Covenant Community

The Relationship between Empowerment Ministry and the Church

I've been thinking about this for a while and I think it applies to more than simply charismatics, but I'm going for it any way.

There is something the Reformed community has that I believe would be a huge help to the charismatic community and that is the role of the Christian community in discernment, oversight and submission. I'm giving this suggestion as one who grew up Reformed and considers himself both Reformed and charismatic, and having spent time with charismatics, Pentecostals, Third Wave, and others.

One more note before going on: by "covenant community" I mean a group of believers who are committed to following the Lord and to loving and serving each other. This is a much more than agreeing to meet together regularly. These are the people who agree to stick with each other and work out whatever issues may come up (within the reasonable limits, of course). 

Covenant Community and Empowerment Ministry

There's a tendency in American churches (especially?) to make the individual the center of gravity for all things spiritual. That's not all bad, as in the past the significance of individual decision and obedience has not always been emphasized. This is especially true, I believe, in Reformed and Lutheran circles where membership in the local church was treated fairly synonymously with being saved. Thankfully, this is no longer the case, although sometimes we Reformed folks will say "So-and-so is going to church now," by which we mean "So-and-so is saved."

Yet, belonging to a believing covenant community (a local church), is also extremely important, if not essential to the Christian life (for now I'll ignore the exceptions of people isolated from the possibility of being a part of a local church for whatever reason). By using the term "covenant community" I am intentionally avoiding the idea of "going to church." We don't "go to church" we are a member of a church. Church is not an event on Sunday mornings, but a community of believers committed to loving and serving each other, as well as joining together to extend the Kingdom of God.

Among charismatics (including Pentecostals, etc.), there is a tendency to individualize empowerment ministry to such a degree that the covenant community seems almost an afterthought, or perhaps simply a place to get your "spiritual batteries" charged for another week of empowerment ministry. Like many evangelicals there are charismatics who "go to church" to "get their [spiritual] needs met." This is odd. It's odd because somehow we've come to believe that the church exists for the members. In one sense it does, but in a more important sense it exists for the Kingdom of God. Like Jesus, we should come "not to be served but to serve" (Mark 10:45). The idea that we go to something called a "Worship Service" in order to get our needs met seems the height of self-idolatry, when you stop and think about it.

Okay, calm down, Rich. [takes deep breath] Back to the point.

Ministry, all ministry, belongs to the Church, not the individual. This is a basic principle of Reformed church polity (the way we organize ourselves). Individuals are called to ministry, but their ministry has its roots in the church. Ephesians 4:11-13, states quite explicitly that the purpose of calling (particularly the callings to spiritual authority) is for the body: "so that the body of Christ may be built up." But notice that Paul in verse 13 and 14, says "we." These ministries (apostle, prophet, etc.) do not exist so that "they" may reach unity in the faith, or so that "they" will no longer be infants, tossed by waves, but so that we won't (including apostles, prophets, etc., even the apostle Paul!).

We need each other. And just as important, God's design for us is that we work together, each contributing a part of the whole.

This is also seen in Romans 12:4-5 and 1Corinthians 12:7, in the context of discussions on spiritual gifts. The gifts exist for the sake of the body, and no one exists in isolation from, or in a relationship of spiritual superiority to the church. We're all in this together, even if some have a different spiritual authority than others. In that context we are to recognize that we are a part of a whole, not something complete apart from others.

In Ephesians 5:18-21, we are told to be filled with the Spirit. In the Greek text, there are three participles that follow the command to be filled. They are treated (properly) as imperatives (commands) in most English translations, but in so doing we can miss the connection between these three and the first. Being filled with the Spirit includes: 1) speaking to one another with psalms, hymns and spiritual songs... (v.19); 2) always giving thanks to God the Father... (v.20) and 3) submitting to one another out of reverence for Christ (v.21). (The participles, usually translated as commands, are underlined.)

In Ephesians 5:21, we see that part of what it means to be filled with the Spirit is that we submit to one another. We do this out of reverence for Christ, who submitted Himself to the Father, but also to His disciples, even washing their feet. As we submit to each other, we approach each other out of a position of humility with a willingness to hear correction, suggestion, encouragement, etc. We agree to adjust something in ourselves for the sake of, or in response to the others. In so doing we don't turn over responsibility to each other, but we do share responsibility with each other. This doesn't mean that just the regular members do this, and that the leaders don't. No, everyone in the Spirit-filled community submits to everyone else in the Spirit-filled community.

I know this may be confusing for some, especially the idea that people don't have spiritual authority over others, especially with some of the teaching about having a spiritual 'covering' (meaning some individual with some authoritative office). I'm not rejecting all that teaching, but suggesting that our submission must go beyond yielding it to certain individuals. Instead, we submit to one another, that is, to the covenant community.

To this I'd like to add one more thought, and that's in the area of discernment. In 1Corinthians 14:29, we read that only a certain number of prophets should speak (in a public gathering? worship service?), and that the others should weigh carefully what is said. This implies that the discernment process is shared by the whole group. Although some suggest it's only the other prophets that do the discerning, there's nothing in the text itself that would require such a limitation.

Related to this is the basic process for discerning a calling in Reformed circles.We recognize two parts to this process: the inner call and the external call. By the "inner call" we mean what the individual person senses as God's call. By the "external call" we mean what the Christian community senses about God's call on the person. Interestingly, often the external precedes the internal, although perhaps just as often it's the other way around. The point here is that discernment is not merely an individual thing, it's a covenant community thing.

But I think this idea of discernment of calling finds an easy application to discernment of other things: prophecies, dreams, visions, etc. I've found that sometimes God decides to distribute the interpretation to more than one person. I might have a 'picture,' someone else an interpretation of what it means, and a third person an application. Sometimes God works this through a process, where after a discussion the interpretation of a dream (for example) gets more and more refined as bits and pieces are revealed to different members of a group of people. In fact, just by my experience, I'd suggest that the exception is that one person receives a 'word' and its interpretation and application all by him/herself. And more often than not (by experience) when it's just one person doing it, it's off in either a small or a big way. (But that may be just my experience.)

Among charismatics, there is a strong tendency for an individual to have it all. They have the word, interpretation and application before coming to the meeting, or before sharing it with anyone. There is a tendency to be the one to bring healing, rather than consider that God wants to bring a part through me, a part through you, and another part through a person not even in the prayer-circle yet! (I've seen that happen too!) As I pastor people through this, I find myself saying over and over "give what you got and no more." If it doesn't make sense, don't worry about it. But it's a battle against the idea that the first one to receive is supposed to have it all before giving anything. Can I just say it? That's silly.

I think we just need to get over ourselves a bit and realize that God loves to show us how we really do need each other, and how delighted He is in distributing His grace just as he determines (1Cor. 12:11). After all, it's not about any of us becoming spiritual "lone rangers" or spiritual superheroes flying above the crowd. It's about displaying His love, power and glory in whatever way He wants to do that.

Just a final word of caution. Too often, the "lone ranger" types, those who are not a submitted member of a local covenant community end up losing their moral or spiritual bearings. They get "weird," and start to say and do stuff that's just goofy. It happens too often not to ignore. I believe we should see this as a reminder that we are not meant to go it alone. Ever. Not even a sinless Adam was whole until God created someone to meet his need for companionship.

We need each other. Let's live and minister like that's true. Besides, it's actually a lot more fun to minister as a part of a covenant community than going it alone.

How we Read the Bible: Study & Inspiration

When we read our Bibles what are we listening for?

If you hang around us Reformed types for very long, you'll soon begin to hear things like, "We need to understand this in the context of the rest of Scripture," or "We shouldn't read this story moralistically," or "Calvin has this to say about this verse..." 

If you hang around us charismatic types very long you'll soon begin to hear things like, "As I was reading this verse this morning, the Lord spoke to me about...," or "As I was praying this phrase came to mind, I found it in Scripture, where there was this prophetic word. I think what God is saying in this is...," or "This verse keeps coming back to me, but I'm not sure what it's supposed to mean."

And although it would be easy to caricature, we find these two tendencies in these two camps. By exaggerating them only slightly, we could name one the tendency toward scholarship and the other the tendency toward serendipity. I'm going to discuss those tendencies below.

Before I do, I want to say that I know Reformed types who, in addition to a keen sense of scholarship, are also quick to come to more than merely scholarly conclusions as they read the Bible. I also know of charismatics who are serious students of the Bible and are quite adept at understanding the literary, historical and cultural nuances that can inform the study of Scripture. And I know of average people in both these movements with a genuine appreciation of both of these styles, if you will, of reading Scripture. So I'm talking about tendencies, not anything more.

Why talk about this at all?

Before going on, I'd like to talk about why I think we should talk about how we read the Bible. It's my belief that both camps have something to learn from each other here. Which is to say, both the Reformed camp and the charismatic camps have some weak spots in how we read the Bible. By joining the strengths of each (and identifying and setting aside the weaknesses of each), both groups can find in Scripture reading, more than we realized that God wants us to have. Today, I'm writing to both groups.

Reformed Biblical Scholarship

Us Reformed types love to study the Bible. We do. We love to study it in every way we can think of: in all it's literary forms, as the unfolding of the redeeming work of God from beginning to end, as God's self-revelation, as the only final authority for this life and the next, and more. The inspired Word of God, breathed into its human authors by the Holy Spirit Himself.  

And when we read the Bible, we read it theocentrically: we see God as the central character in every story, the One always acting, if not in the lines, between the lines. We love to stand in awe and wonder at the way He keeps moving history and His people forward, and at the ways in which His people resist Him, reject Him, and follow other gods. Yet God's sovereignty and grace keep showing up as the Story unfolds. 

Because we see the Bible theocentrically, and as our only final authority, we don't want to miss anything. So we study it. And study it. And study it. We use all the tools we can find: lingustic, literary, cultural, historical, theological, and combine these (and perhaps other disciplines) in an attempt to tease out every nuance we can find.

But there's a down side. All of this study, all of this effort goes on and on, even when our personal and spiritual lives remain unaffected by what we're reading. Not that this always happens, but when it does, we don't always notice. It's been said, "No one can go down deeper, stay down longer and come up drier than [certain] theologians." (I'll not name the "certain" theologians in the quote as I heard it.) Sometimes Reformed Biblical scholarship can be like that. Hours of work teasing out the slightest nuance that doesn't make the slightest difference in the life of the scholar, nor the student.

I'm reminded of the story of the cartographers who spent their lives making the finest maps, but were aghast at the thought of leaving their desks to go to the places they so carefully documented: they were cartographers, not "explorers" (a word they spoke with a sense of disdain born of a sense of superiority).

Okay. Yes, that's a bit unfair to many, many Reformed scholars and pastors, who are geniuses at application. Who see not only the truths, but their value for us as people living today. 

And yet, there still often seems to be a disconnect between the truth of the inspiration of Scripture and the on-going work of the Holy Spirit to breathe these words into us anew. We do not expect that a primary source for understanding Scripture is the Spirit Who lives within us. We sort of think His work with Scripture is done, and if He is involved in some way with His Word today, it's in a mystical, hidden sense, that seems so utterly subjective as to not be available for study or even much serious comment.

Charismatic Serendipity

Charismatics aren't the only people who read the Bible for serendipitous experiences. (Serendipity refers to finding unplanned, pleasant surprises.) But charismatics often prefer to read the Bible this way. We like to read Scripture "until God says something to us." In contrast to the theocentric reading in Reformed circles, in charismatic circles the Bible is often seen primarily as God's Word to us. The reading is anthropocentric (people-centered). Charismatics don't just read the Bible in the sense that God wants to speak to people in general, nor even to the Church in particular,  but in the sense that when I read the Bible, I expect God to speak to me. 

In many respects, this is symptomatic of much of individualistic Evangelicalism in America. But in charismatic circles, there is a genuine expectation that every time I read the Bible God has something He wants to say to me, or perhaps through me to someone else. This expectation is directly related to how charismatics understand our relationship with God as being both dynamic and highly personal.

The downside, or weak side of this can be seen in the simple fact of this being so highly subjective. We humans often underestimate our capacity for self-deception. It's easy to find what we are looking for, to find the affirmation or justification we are looking for and expecting. We call it "confirmation."

I have read and been with charismatics who take this approach to such an extreme that they begin to read into the Bible what isn't there at all. One example is to interpret historical narrative as allegory. Sometimes these allegorical interpretations are still in line with Biblical Christianity, coming to the right conclusions with the faulty approach to Scripture. But to me, such an approach actually dishonors both the text and the Spirit Who inspired it to be written the way it actually is written.

I will also mention, but say little more than this: the level of Biblical illiteracy among some charismatic groups is head-shakingly appalling. The serendipitous expectation in reading Scripture moves some to a sort of Biblical laziness. Why do the "homework" of studying, when the Spirit will just tell me what He wants to say? There can even be a suspicion of serious study, when study is seen as mere "head knowledge," and what God supposedly wants is "to speak directly to our hearts."

Combining the Strengths of Both Approaches

As we begin to think about combining a theocentric approach to reading Scripture with an anthropocentric, way of approaching the reading of Scripture, and as we begin to think of combining a scholarly approach with a serendipitous one, it's my goal that we will find a mutual benefit in a cross-fertilization of theology and practices regarding Scripture.

Combining a Theocentric and Anthropocentric Reading of Scripture

First, let's acknowledge that Scripture should be seen from both a theocentric and anthropocentric perspective. It is God's self-revelation, and it is God's self-revelation to us. He tells us who He is, and He tells us in a way that invites us into a relationship. These are two poles that have tended to divide us into two camps, are really two aspects of the same reality.

The resulting practice from accepting this duality of approach is that we should find two complementary drives: to study the text and to listen personally to the text. The theocentric approach to Scripture ought to drive us to want to understand all of what God says about who He is. Both Reformed and charismatic want to know everything we can know about God. The study of Scripture as Gods self-revelation seems an obvious avenue to know God better and know Him more.

Also the idea that in Scripture God speaks to His people, should drive us to listen to not only what God has said, but what He is still saying. We should listen to Him speak not just in general, but to us personally. God wants us to not only know Him but also respond to Him in the ways He has revealed Himself. In the end, if my reading of Scripture doesn't transform me, I'm not reading it as God intended.

The two impulses are complementary, each driving the other. My study of the God of the Bible drives me (or should) to know and submit myself to Him. The Bible through which God speaks to me is worthy of careful study and attention, because it is God's Word to His people--to me.

The Inspiriation and Re-inspiriation of Scripture

Both Reformed and charismatics agree that the Scriptures were written as people were carried along by the Holy Spirit (2Peter 1:21). And we agree that All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, (2Tim. 3:16). This commonality drives us in both directions (theocentric and anthropocentric) as well. But it hopefully reminds us that the origin of Scripture is the inspiration of God through the Holy Spirit. ("Inspiration" means to breathe in; God's Spirit breathed the Scriptures into people who wrote them down.)

In one sense the Scripture is a record of what God said, how He inspired His Word into people at a certain place, at a certain time, to communicate a specific message. As our esteem for God's Spirit grows, we charismatics should become more and more interested in what God's Spirit has said in the past, and we should want to know all the circumstances involved in the message and its meaning. Likewise, we in the Reformed movement should understand that God's Word in a certain time and place was intended to move people to respond (God was not simply giving them information).

In respectfully reading the inspired Word of God, we should also take into consideration the idea of re-inspiration. That is, that the same Holy Spirit who first breathed these words into the Biblical writers, now lives within us and breathes His written Word anew into us. In this way the written Word of God becomes living and active (Heb. 4:12) in us, verses merely a static object for scholarly study. As we read Scripture we can expect that God's Word is still accomplishing the purpose for which He sent it (Isaiah 55:11).

Wrapping This Up

 There is more, much more that could be said, here. Some of this was hinted at (for example, how our differing views of how God relates to us shapes our approach to Scripture), some was not (how the Reformed movement prefers reading the Bible in community, rather than individually, and the opposite tendency among charismatics). But these basic difference will illustrate some of what we have to learn from each other. I hope it helps us sit down and start a conversation, where both sides believe we have something to contribute, and something to learn.

Is There a Second Blessing? And If So, What Is It?

What is meant by the term "Second Blessing"?

In doing a search through my digital library (I have almost 6,000 resources in my favorite Bible-study program: Logos). I find a wide variety of uses for this phrase (I get 528 results in 244 resources). Many are related to the question of the day, some are not. I find that there are three primary ways this term is used, one is in the Wesleyan Holiness tradition, another is in an elitist (super-Christian) sense, the other in a more generic sense. I'll deal with these three (preferring the latter) and then offer some personal conclusions

Weslyan Understanding of the Second Blessing

In Weslyan tradition, the "second blessing" refers to instant and entire sanctification. Here's a quote:

From Wesley, Pentecostals also inherited the idea of a crisis “second blessing” subsequent to salvation. This experience he variously called “entire sanctification,” “perfect love,” “Christian perfection,” or “heart purity.” Wesley’s colleague John Fletcher was the first to call this a “baptism in the Holy Spirit,” an experience that brought spiritual power to the recipient as well as inner cleansing. 

Vinson Synan, The Century of the Holy Spirit: 100 Years of Pentecostal and Charismatic Renewal, 1901–2001 (Nashville: Thomas Nelson Publishers, 2001), p.2

What exactly Wesley meant by this is subject to some debate (some argue that he still saw some growth in sanctification subsequent to this experience), but he did understand the concept of the "second blessing" as personal sanctification--primarily an inner working of the Spirit. That is to say, he understood this to mean that a person was not only justified before God, but through this experience was also entirely sanctified.

Much of the Pentecostal Holiness churches understand this concept in the same way. However, I'm not going to do a lot of historical and theological comparison here. I only want to acknowledge the presence of this use of this phrase ("second blessing") and what it means in these circles.

Such an understanding is quite foreign to the concept of sanctification articulated in the Reformed stream. Further, I find it to be quite removed from both experience (personally and with others) and the discussion of sanctification. If entire sanctification were available to the Corinthians, or the Galatians it would have made those books much, much shorter. Let's just leave it at that. (With apologies to those in the Holiness tradition that see how I have overly simplified their position. I hope I have not caricatured the concept of "the second blessing" though. If I have, please enlighten me.)

The Second Blessing as an Experience for the Elite

Okay, I tipped my hand on this one already. There are some (I won't name them because it's too vague to pin this one down to a particular person or movement), who have used the term "second blessing" to refer to an experience that is reserved only for a few, or that in some way creates a class of elite, super-Christians.

Sometimes those who teach this, teach it in the way the gnostics of the early centures of the New Testament Church taught things. It would sound a bit like this: "We have special knowledge, not everyone has. If you do X (set of behaviors) and don't do Y (set of behaviors), and believe Z (set of truths), you too can be super-Christians just like us."

Without going into more detail, let's just lay this one down as completely unBiblical and unChristian. Galatians 3:1-5 speaks directly to this foolishness.

A More Generic Use of the term "Second Blessing"

When I talk about a more generic use of this phrase, I mean something not necessarily technical. That is, it does not necessarily point to a specific set of experiences, nor require a certain set of truths. Let me give some examples.

If I say I was blessed with a son, and two years later had a second blessing of another son, I'm not using the phrase "second blessing" in some technical sense, but in a more generic, or conversational sense. That is, first there was this blessing and then a second one came, maybe a third one followed, etc.

I might also use the phrase "second blessing" to talk about milestones in my personal life. Receiving a college degree was a great blessing, but just as important was the second blessing of a seminary degree. Or I might say it this way, "Graduating from seminary I received the blessing of an M.Div, degree. Because of that degree, and the endorsement of the denomination, I was able to receive a second blessing of being ordained as a Minister of theWord in the CRC." In the second case, I'm claiming a subsequent blessing, that depends on a first.

Now, what about an infilling, or receiving of the Spirit, or an experience of the Spirit coming upon me (please see my previous post on that topic) that happens sometime after my conversion? What if these experiences happen more than once? Would this be a second blessing? A third?

Why not? I hope that we all understand that our Christian life is not a plateau we reach upon conversion. As we live the Christian life we grow and become more and more Christlike in word and deed, within and without. Anyone disagree with that? I hope not.

What is to prevent me from understanding this growth in terms of blessings? That is to say, suppose I understand my own spiritual growth in terms of  Divine gifts and blessings, not merely my own effort. If so, it seems perfectly natural for me to talk about progress in my spiritual life as blessings. If I would count them, I'd get far beyond the "second" blessing," wouldn't I?!

Now, let's suppose that from a completely subjective point of view I have an amazingly life-changing experience of God's power released in me that I see it as second only, in personal and spiritual results, to my own conversion. Would it be wrong to talk about such an experience as a second blessing? I don't think so. I think, it's just an acknowledgement of something secondary and subsequent to a previous blessing (in this case conversion). Does such a claim put me in an elite class of super-Christians? Not necessarily. Maybe, I see it as just coming up from sub-par to normal. Further, if I believe that the experience I had is available to any Believer who wants it, I'm not creating an elite class in the above sense, even if I am pointing toward an avenue of greater progress - which would be no different than pointing people to pray more, or read their Bibles more, or engage in private and corporate worship more.

Conclusions

When we use words and phrases, we should know what we mean by them. We should also understand that different people mean different things by using the same words. As we look at the phrase "second blessing" we should understand what is being said, and what they mean to communicate.

I believe we should also be open to profoundly life-changing experiences of God's presence and power in our life that happen both at, and subsequent to conversion. We can understand these experiences in many ways, but if they are a response to God's work in our lives, they are blessings.

I also believe that we should never interpret our own experiences to mean that through them we have somehow attained a level of spiritual maturity others, who have not had the same experience, do not have. That is the height of spiritual arrogance, and has no place in the life of a Believer, regardless of whether he/she considers him/herself Spirit-filled, or not (or whatever other self-designation you prefer).