When Jacob awoke from his sleep, he thought, “Surely the Lord is in this place, and I was not aware of it.” He was afraid and said, “How awesome is this place! This is none other than the house of God; this is the gate of heaven.” Genesis 28:16–17 (TNIV)
Christian mystics may use the term as a way to describe the moments, not the locations, where God seems to break into our world. Or we break into His world, though I’m not sure how that works. “Break into” is probably a misnomer; I’m fairly sure heaven is unguarded. For one, why? That’s probably akin to visiting the sun; let’s just slip past those pesky solar flares and drop our landing gear.Lately I’ve been using the phrase “storming heaven”. I’m not sure where I got that; maybe it’s leftover language from my ancient Pentecostal days. I know I have a book in my library by Jay Stevens with the same name, but it’s a history of LSD from Huxley to Kerouac to Leary. Uh, not exactly charismatic stuff.
But I think the term squares with an account in Acts. Peter and John bring a healing touch to a physically handicapped forty-something man who panhandled each day by one of the temple entrances. Remarkably, he’s instantly healed. Peter explains what just happened to all the Jews gathered as a result and basically says: “Change the way you think about everything. Anyone who doesn’t listen to Messiah Jesus will be cut off.”
We would assume that’s not the way to win friends, but the church grew to five-thousand men.
And they dragged Peter and John off to jail. The next day they stood before the high priest and the ruling leaders. It’s easy to gloss over this and not realize how terrifying that would have been; the next step could be execution. Imagine being dragged as a terrorist before the religious equivalent of Dick Cheney. After being interrogated, it reads that Peter was filled with the Holy Spirit and then threw a roundhouse sermon on Psalm 118 about “rejecting the cornerstone”.
They couldn’t figure out how to punish Peter and John because all the people were still seriously praising God for what they had seen, so they let them go. They got back with their friends, explained what happened, and a spontaneous prayer meeting broke out. They finished praying with this: “…And now, O Lord, hear their threats, and give your servants great boldness in their preaching. Send your healing power; may miraculous signs and wonders be done through the name of your holy servant Jesus.” (Acts 4:29, 30 NLT)
Sounds to me like they stormed heaven and were asking for two things: boldness in talking about Jesus and supernatural evidence to be manifested in His name. They all got filled with the Spirit and then the house physically shook. Now that’s a thin place.
I think that’s what I want to see. I want God to fill us. I don’t want to prescribe how that should look like in a corporate setting. I’m suspect of “charismatic promptings and instruction”. Been there. Seems to me the disciples had no clue what this corporate mysterious “filling of the Holy Spirit” should look like. Did they expect the house to shake? They just wanted boldness and evidence.
Somehow I think that’s the right approach.
Only one catch: perhaps as often as not, it’s somewhat dependent on the level of our desperation. Maybe the thin places are as narrow as our hunger.
Come, Holy Spirit.
I remember when I first started having dreams where they came true in real life, de sha vue. Then when I told my mother in law at the time (these people were baptists) that it was from the devil or not from God.
ReplyDeleteI remember being in the old building vineyard and this evangalist or prophet came and caused this outpouring to flow in the audience. Personally I had the tingling feeling from my head to my feet in a wave. Then Steve got up after it was over said I do not think this was from God or from that enemy.
I remember being on the prayer team and being told that praying in tongues is not appropiate behavior for prayer team members. I remember this God filled guy who left because of this.
So who is to judge what the Holy Spirit moving in a church? Is it you? Is it me? Who am to tell someone their dreams are from God and speaking in tongues is tabo or what I feel is from the enemy?
BTW, Have you looked at that video on Lonnie Frisbee? If you look up the history of the Vineyard it was founded on Signs and Wonders. Why are church leaders discounting any move of the Holy Spirit when it does not fit their idea?
There is a reason God said he takes the foolish of this world and uses them more than the put together people of this world. I think its called arrogance and pride, "I know you and you don't idea", "I know what the Holy Spirit should look like so we are not doing that old pentacostal stuff", "we are not speaking in tongues in the service, especially not the prayer team", and btw "that Lonnie guy was not a founder".
I like this idea of "thin places." But is it thin places or "thin moments?" I kind of think the latter b/c life happenings often cause us to pay attention to the supernatural a little more. For example, we just lost a very good friend to cancer, and in the weeks leading up to Spencer's crossing over, many people around him witnessed some pretty "super-naturally" things. Some could be explained away, I guess, but just the shear amount of them is hard to explain.
ReplyDeleteThe moments of his passing made the veil a little thin for those he left behind, maybe.