The Bible records mans three fold being, "Now may the
God of peace Himself sanctify you completely; and may your whole spirit,
soul, and body be preserved blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus
Christ." (1 Thessalonians 5:23) To fully develop man would be to
educate him in all three of these realms. To train only the physical is
to make him an athlete. To train only the intellectual would make him an
anarchist. To train only the spiritual would make him a fanatic. Adam
was created complete in all three of these areas. Though the fall of man
came, it did not change God's design for man. Through Christ, God has
restored man and once again man is complete (John 1:16; Colossians 1:9,
2:10). So, Gods plan for man through Christ, is that he be developed in
all three areas; yet, the area that man is least developed is the very
area in which he was created in the image and likeness of God, his
spirit.
Man's spirit is the only part of him that is capable of knowing and
communing intelligently with God. It was God's plan that man should be
His companion (Psalm 8:3-8), so his spiritual faculties were originally
attuned to interact with God. (Genesis 1:26-27, 3:8) Through the Fall,
man was alienated from God and his spiritual faculties were impaired;
yet, through Christ, this lost fellowship is restored and once again
mans spirit is capable of functioning in both the natural and supernatural realm.
The supernatural realm is really the realm of the believer. No one knows
how much the soul and spirit can be developed and even within
Christendom, we have been slow to come to the realization that man is
spirit and his spirit is his basic nature. We have sought to educate him
along intellectual lines,
utterly ignoring the spiritual. Thus man has lost his sense of
relationship and responsibility toward God and man. By ignoring the
spiritual side of man, we inadvertently have magnified the intellectual
and physical parts of man, which has left him craving the supernatural of
God, yet, not having the ability to release it in his daily life.
Whether most want to admit it or not, man has a love for the miraculous
because it is in his DNA. He was created in the image and likeness of
God.
The intellect of every believer is ever conscious of the supernatural
forces that operate around him, but due to the lack of spiritual
development in most, he cannot understand or interpret them. This is
perhaps the main reason why believers long to not only experience the
supernatural, but to perform miracles. The curiosity for the miraculous
is deep-seated in every believer because he has been born again by a
miracle-working God. It has been a scheme of Satan that has blinded us
and has kept us from finding the door that will lead us back to our lost
inheritance in Christ. Although believers are to operate in the
miraculous, many questions arise concerning their validity for today,
such as, "Are these things for today? Did miracles end with the death of
the disciples in the early church? Are the so-called miracles that men
claim to perform today fraudulent, psychic or works of Satan to deceive
many?
Unfortunately, there has come a falling away on the part of most sectors
of the church concerning the miraculous. In one area, modernism has
dominated the church bringing the denial of the supernatural element
in Christianity. This in turn has made Christianity simply an ethical
religion. There are also those who declare that miracles ceased with the
death of the apostles; that Christianity does not need the miraculous
today to convince men of the Deity of Jesus. This in turn has placed
Christianity among the other powerless world religions. Then we have a
third group who claim miracles are still being performed; that the sick
are healed, that prayers are answered, and that God is a living reality
in the daily life of the believer. This third group of people have it
correct. They know that man needs a miraculous touch now more than ever.
The miraculous was the very thing that God used to bring His people
Israel back to Himself; the very thing that drew heathen kings to
acknowledge that the Lord is God; the very thing that drew people to
Jesus the Savior through the early church as well as turning the world
upside down; it is the very thing that is needed today to save our land
and nation. The entire church must return to the God of Miracles and
believe that He will once again reveal Himself and His Christ to all men
through miracles, signs and wonders. These are the very things revealed
in scripture that opened the door many times to the preaching of the
Gospel and the saving of souls.
The Apostle Paul tells us, "For I will not dare to
speak of any of those things which Christ has not accomplished through
me, in word and deed, to make the Gentiles obedient in
mighty signs and wonders, by the power of the Spirit of God, so that
from Jerusalem and round about to Illyricum I have fully preached the
gospel of Christ." (Romans 15:18-19) Paul shows us that the preaching of the gospel is not complete without "mighty signs and wonders by the power of the Spirit of God." This he tells us is the full gospel! God desires to intervene "now" in
the affairs of man. So, let us stand against all doubt, fear, unbelief
and intellectual reasoning that so easily ensnares and robs us of the
miracles that God has for us and the lost world around us. "Let God
Arise" and we will see the salvation of the Lord like never before!
Monday, January 9, 2023
It's Supernatural
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