“The kingdom of God is not in word, but in power” (1 Corinthians 4:20).
We are not living in the fullness and experiential kingdom of God if we only have the Word, but no demonstration of the Word through the power of the Spirit. Jesus demonstrated the power of the Holy Spirit when He taught about the kingdom of God and the Gospel.
In the early church recorded in Acts, we see a respectful and reverential fear of the power demonstrated through the apostles and early believers. Ananias and Saphira were struck dead for not telling the whole truth about their donation to the Church for the needs of the people.
For many centuries we have seen little if any of such powerful presence of the Holy Spirit in the Church. We have seen intermittent revivals for short periods of time, but in general, the Church has lacked the power to bring conviction of sin to communities that would bring enduring godly change.
Why is this? It could be a plethora of different reasons, but at the core, it would have to be a lack of passionate and consistent seeking of the Lord in holiness and prayer. In Luke 18:1 we read of a parable Jesus told to illustrate the plan of God for believers to pray without fainting or getting discouraged. At the end of the parable, we read these challenging words, “Nevertheless, when the Son of Man comes, will He find faith on the earth?”
The positive message of this is that if we do pray with the kind of persistent faith God is looking for, then we will receive our answers. The negative message is self-evident! We will not receive.
If the kingdom of God is within us, then kingdom power should be demonstrated through our ministry (Luke 17:21).
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Rod Butterworth
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