For much of my life I wanted to be the other guy. You know, the popular one who seemed blessed with every talent in God's great creation. The handsome guy, with the great charm and above average intelligence; the one everyone seemed to talk about and lift up and turn to when there was a problem. I'm not that guy because that was not the Spirit's purpose for me. It took me a while to accept that but once I did I started to discover the great things the Spirit had intended for me.
There seems to be a great imbalance in the Church where certain manifestations of the Spirit are held up and others are completely ignored. In fact. it is more the talents of the flesh that have the spotlight than the manifestations of the Spirit. How much emphasis does your church put on music, musicians and singers? How much emphasis does it put on healing and evangelism? We have music classes but how much training is being done in the Spirit? We have it so backwards.
The Church has been born with diversity in mind, in fact it cannot even do what she is suppose to do without that diversity. The Word asks these questions:
If the whole body were an eye, where would the sense of hearing be? If the whole body were an ear, where would the sense of smell be? (1 Corinthians 12:17)
I believe that is why the Church seems to be stumbling right now and why so many of our young people are becoming tired of it. We have buried more than half the Body out of fear and shame. We have tried to get rid of the diversity by saying that many of the gifts, offices, and miracles are no longer for this age. That's a bold faced lie that does not hold up under the Word of God:
But in fact God has placed the parts in the body, every one of them, just as he wanted them to be. If they were all one part, where would the body be? (1 Corinthians 12:18-19)
Man has tried to redesign the Church to make her more presentable, more professional, less odd to the world, but she is not the Church God created and breathed life into with the Holy Spirit. To the world she may look acceptable but spiritually she is a Body that is missing a lot of body parts. We need to get back on our knees, humble ourselves before our God and seek that anointing again where we operate in the Spirit and not in the flesh.
Immaturity will cause us to set our gifts aside out of envy for another person's but maturity praises our God for permitting us to be part of this incredible Body. It is amazing what begins to happen when we embrace what the Spirit has given to us, our purpose and placement in the Body of Christ. We need to accept that we and the Church are supernatural, empowered by the Holy Spirit and must walk and operate in the Spirit of God. We have the manifestation of the Spirit as decided by the Spirit for the purpose of the common good. We need to ask him to open our eyes to what that is exactly and then operate according to it. We need to stop denying it and embrace it in love and trust because we are a vital part of the Body of Christ. Regardless of our age we must take our place in order for the Church to function properly. And unity must always be our desire:
As it is, there are many parts, but one body. (1 Corinthians 12:20)
It is vital that our youth and young adults see this in action so that they see the hand of God moving in their generation. We can't allow the Church to become an obsolete institution of a by-gone era simply because we have denied the Spirit. She is the radiant Bride of Christ, very much alive and needing all her parts to function with power so that Jesus will be glorified through her. Wake up people! There is abundant life found in living by the Spirit of God. We are not mere creatures of the flesh, we are the supernatural children of God who are here to glorify the Name. Be glorified through us Jesus!
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