Series: The 4 P’s to the presence and the power of God:
Introduction: Over the next several weeks we are going to focus on Bible centered spirituality. In our society today we have many seekers searching for true spirituality for their lives. They will tell you that they are looking for meaning in life and for complete wholeness in their lives.
You yourself today could be asking what is “Spirituality”? This question came up this week at school when were discussing different ways that we cope with life and stress. We came onto the section that had asked the students to evaluate which ways they handle stress. It could have been physical – by doing exercise, or aesthetic like listening to music, or communication talking to others or using substances like drugs or alcohol. There where other categories but one came up titled “spiritual”. This self-awareness-test acknowledged that for some people they use a spiritual coping technique to reduce their stress and cope with stress. All the students in the class where rated on which categories they used most to deal with stress. This one ranked low for all of them. The teacher leading asked if this was scored “high” for anyone and off course I said, “Yes”.
One of the students said he did not understand “This spiritual thing.” he said “I don’t get it.” I went to the board to explain how individuals have 3 dimensions to their makeup. One is physical (your body), one is the soul (intellectual/ emotional) and one is spiritual (conscience, spirit awareness).
He said he still did not understand. So one of the other teachers explained that the spiritual side was a person’s recognition of a “Higher Power” that helps them deal with stress and that their belief helps them overcome things like “Alcoholism”. I added that it was the spiritual side that helped me to be delivered from alcohol and the destructive lifestyle I was living as a teenager. I explained to them how when I discovered I had a spiritual side (And Jesus cared about it) it changed my life.
We then discussed how many recent reports have shown that a person who has a strong spiritual side is more healthy and whole than a person who ignores their spiritual side: Some of these studies are noted by Gary Collins in his book the “The Soul Search” and reveal the following: He says,”… religion is good for your health.”
· A Dartmouth Medical School research team studied patients preparing for elective heart surgery. Nonreligious people were three times more likely to die within six months than patients who found strength and comfort in their religious beliefs. Of the thirty-seven patients who called themselves “deeply religious, “ none died.
· Family medicine researchers in North Carolina discovered fewer medical complications for maternity patients and their newborns if the mothers had religious affiliation.
· One study of thirty female patients recovering from hip fractures found that those who regarded God as a source of strength and comfort and who normally attended religious services were able to walk farther upon discharge and had less depression than patients who had few religious beliefs.
· A thirty-year study on blood pressure showed that church-goers had lower blood pressure even when the statistics were adjusted to account for smoking and other risk factors.
· A national Institute of Aging survey of four thousand randomly selected elderly people living at home found that the people who attended religious services were less depressed and physically healthier than those who worshipped at home or watched religious services on television. It is possible of course, that the people who went to church were less depressed because they were healthier and better able to get out, the researcher (A Duke University psychiatrists) concluded that participating in religious services, praying together in community of believers, and using, Scripture reading as a comforting and coping device all had a positive impact on physical health-more positive than “do it yourself at home” or television religion (78,79).
· Spirituality is also makes a difference in kids education: Rev Magazine notes, “Church attendance makes a difference in school performance for ,kids in low-class neighborhoods, according to the national Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health. In fact, the poorer the neighborhood, the stronger the link between kids going to worship services and doing well at school, in part because of the strong sense of community in these neighborhoods. The percentage of kids in low poverty neighborhoods who say that religion is very important to them is 36%, compared to 57% in high-poverty neighborhoods.”
o JL Rivera noted the same with his former inner city church.
Collins notes, “True spirituality penetrates every part of life-our careers, relationships, lifestyles, sexuality, emotions, thinking, hopes, and plans for the future. The spiritual is not an isolated segment of life that can be pushed to one day or one hour of the week and otherwise ignored or accessed whenever we need a spiritual fix. Spirituality is not something we possess, like a book or techniques or a set of rules that we can apply to ourselves to make us spiritual” (90).
Some have defined spirituality as “the human response to a mysterious, transcendent Other who for unknown reasons cares enough about us to initiate a relationship with us.” Others say spirituality, “is the way in which people seek, make, celebrate, and apply meaning to their lives.” Mulholand stated,” The spiritual journey is an ongoing experience of being shaped by God toward wholeness. He notes, “It is a move against the grain of our do-it-yourself culture and our powerful need to be in control of our existence (91).” I like this definition of spirituality.
I know spirituality is about having a personal intimate relationship with God. Most of you would agree with this. To be spiritually whole in this life we must practice the presence of God in our daily lives. Practice makes perfect. To practice doing something over and over makes you more proficient in it. Musicians practice to become better at playing their musical instruments. Athletes practice to become better athletes and the same principle applies to Biblical spirituality. Practicing spiritual exercises over and over makes one more spiritual (more God conscious!).
So our focus the next few weeks is on learning to practice the presence of God so we can experience a deeper presence of God. When we experience the presence of God then we encounter the power of God. For this to happen we must practice living the 4 P’s to the presence and power of God.
Thesis: The 4 P’s to the presence and power of God are to be balanced against the cross. When we keep them in proper balance they produce a Spiritually Balanced Life. This spiritually balanced life then creates wholeness within the life of the individual. Wholeness means they feel complete, content and confident in their relationship to the Lord and their earthly existence.
Text:
James 1:4
“Perseverance must finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything.”
Isaiah 6:1-8
1In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord seated on a throne, high and exalted, and the train of his robe filled the temple. 2Above him were seraphs, each with six wings: With two wings they covered their faces, with two they covered their feet, and with two they were flying. 3And they were calling to one another:
“Holy, holy, holy is the LORD Almighty;
the whole earth is full of his glory.”
4At the sound of their voices the doorposts and thresholds shook and the temple was filled with smoke.
5“Woe to me!” I cried. “I am ruined! For I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips, and my eyes have seen the King, the LORD Almighty.”
6Then one of the seraphs flew to me with a live coal in his hand, which he had taken with tongs from the altar. 7With it he touched my mouth and said, “See, this has touched your lips; your guilt is taken away and your sin atoned for.”
8Then I heard the voice of the Lord saying, “Whom shall I send? And who will go for us?”
And I said, “Here am I. Send me!”
The vision of Isaiah happened as a result of prayer – his prayer opened the door to see a glimpse of heaven and he saw and experienced the presence of the Lord. God’s presence brought wisdom and spiritual insight to Isaiah. His habit of prayer brought God’s presence and God’s power, which came through Isaiah answering God’s question “Who will go?” Isaiah responded, I will! Then God’s power touched him to go spread His words to the nation. This is true spirituality and God’s still asking for people to go. The question is also directed your way, “Will you say, yes!”
T.S.- Let’s look at the handout on the 4 P’s to a balanced spiritual life and to experiencing wholeness in this earthly life
I. Lets focus on the top ½ of the formula to true spiritual wholeness in life.
a. (See handout and overhead of “The 4 P’s”) explain the handout.
i. The steps to experiencing the presence and power of God always begin with prayer and presses toward praise. This top ½ of the diagram reveals that in times of prayer and meditation we discover and receive divine insights.
1. These divine insights give us wisdom from God. These insights and encounters with the Lord give us wisdom which then propels us into the 2nd 1/4 of our chart Praise. Praise is using the wisdom and Godly insights received in prayer and reflection.
2. I have discovered over the last few years that those who have a strong prayer life always have a strong appetite for vibrant, reverent praise and worship. Worship is enhanced by our time spent in prayer.
3. The key to true spirituality is found in following formula:
a. No Prayer – No presence – No Power of God
b. No Praise – No presence – No power of God
c. No Preaching – No power – No presence of God
d. No Participation – No Power – No presence of God
ii. There is a strong connection between prayer and praise. Prayer gives us wisdom and Praise is putting that wisdom into action. One goes from spiritual insight to spiritual experiences in God’s presence.
1. When we balance these two spiritual disciplines. The more we practice prayer the more meaningful praise and worship becomes. In essence we need to practice entering into the presence of God through the avenues of Prayer and praise. It is through these two acts that we experience the presence of God and the Power of God.
iii. Let me show you a real life story of how this practicing the presence of God through Prayer and meditation brought the power of God.
1. The result of prayer lead to wisdom and wisdom gave birth to praise throughout this land because God showed up and changed lives.
a. Video from Transformations II -- “ Wales/Scotland”
i. This revival was birthed through practicing the presence of God in prayer.
ii. The result of the prayer times – was God’s wisdom came down people became aware and concerned about eternity. This wisdom lead to church services every night where people came and got saved. The bars closed down because no one was coming. They all where going to the revival meetings to experience the power of God.
iii. People got saved every night.
iv. The talk of the towns was not about what someone did to another but what God was doing at the revival meetings.
v. They gathered and worshipped and praised God and a nation was transformed.
vi. Spirituality became the dominant focus of peoples lives and it made a tremendous difference in people’s lives.
T.S.- When we spiritually focused on Christ this will always bring a balanced spiritual life and a whole life filled with contentment, completeness, and confidence in God.
II. Spirituality and wholeness in life start with Prayer and drive us to worship God.
a. It is through this discipline that true healing and wholeness starts and emerges.
i. In the healing and helping fields of today there is a new approach resurrected from the past by Saint Benedict a 16th century monk whose approach to spiritual wholeness consists of the following:
1. It involves Prayer/meditation – which gives spiritual direction, a little of direction is done by the journaling in their prayer time. Listen to this recent article.
a. In the Stillness by Dan Kimball – “The church parking lot was so packed that we had to leave our rental car on a patch of trampled grass beside the sanctuary. It was 9:30 pm, and Compline was just about to start. We’d heard that this service was drawing in lots of younger people, and we wanted to see for ourselves what dynamic speaker or hot new worship team was causing such a stir. The church was very old and gothic, and we pulled open heavy wooden doors to find about 250 people of all ages gathered inside. No cushioned theater seating here-just hard metal folding chairs. Several people sat on the cold concrete stone floor. No power point or video clips captured our attention, and no drama sketch presented the evening’s theme. Instead, the stained glass and architecture of the building spoke of God’s transcendence and holiness. No Delirious? Or Matt Redman songs launched us into worship. The entire service consisted of about five or six cantors dressed in robes, singing softly from the front. As I looked around, I could see that the crowd was mainly College students and teenagers. But when the silence fell between the songs, I could hear no restless teenager chatting in the back row. Instead, people closed their eyes and sat still. There was no rush, no hurried announcements, no clever transitions carefully thought through by the programming team. On the contrary, the experience was rather slow, silent, and contemplative. No teaching, no preaching, no how to. Just quiet worship. As we spilled out into the dark night with the rest of the crowd, I felt that maybe something was happening here with the emerging culture, and we should take not. We put so much effort into designing contemporary church services that are peppy, upbeat, and cued down to the minute, but I’d just seen a large group of young people drawn to something quite the opposite. Perhaps we should consider that there’s a rising longing to seek God in the simplicity and stillness of a meditative church experience” (80).
b. Mike Bickle said, “At one time, I thought that being anointed in ministry would keep a person’s heart encouraged in God. Now I’ve learned this is simply not true! A deeply satisfied soul, a personal sense of meaning and significance and a rich treasure store of divine pleasure can only come through the intimate knowledge of God himself” (2).
2. It involves Praise/worship – where we take the spiritual direction from God received in prayer and put it into action by first worshipping Him.
a. Praise comes from a heart that is in love with Jesus.
b. A few weeks ago we talked about what genuine worship was and is.
c. It’s a heart that knows what’s important to God.
d. Susan Nikaido states, “Knowing what matters to God provides a plumb line for our lives. When we identify His purposes and make them our own, we can be sure that our lives will count for eternity” (Discipleship Journal, 35).
e. God wants us to praise Him and enjoy His presence.
f. Mike Bickle adds, “When I enjoy the Lord, I obey more, serve him with greater perseverance and endure hardships with greater patience. In other words, I am renewed in my spirit and in my spiritual identity. Things that were once difficult for me now flow freely” (4).
3. It involves Preaching/teaching times – Lectures which train us in the knowledge of God and to what he desires us to look like and act like as a Christian.
a. It’s not just even lectures but times of Study in God’s Word. These are times when the Holy Spirit preaches to us and teaches us about God’s desires for our lives.
b. Preaching and teaching is God’s method to get his message out clearly and precisely to His people.
c. The Hebrew word for, “teaching” and “learning” have the same root word and are interlinked with each other. When you preach and teach there is learning going on. When learning is going on there is teaching and preaching happening.
4. Participation/serving- is the next area, which leads to spiritual wholeness.
a. He did this with group therapy times.
b. Support groups are designed to serve each other in the group. But it takes participation to take the knowledge that we learn from the head and to put it into action.
b. Which amazingly fits what we have in front of us today in the formula you are looking at for Spiritual wholeness in your life. I did not know about Saint Benedicts approach to spiritual wholeness and spirituality until I was almost down with my sermon.
1. Spiritual wholeness, a balanced life can only come from practicing and experiencing the presence of God.
a. But it happens as a result of doing the 4 P’s and keeping them in proper balance.
b. When we experience God Like Isaiah we then experience the power of God as it touches our lives. God will impact our lives for the purpose to touch other lives.
i. This is always his plan-we have to pass it on to others!
c. True spirituality can only be found in Jesus Christ!
i. The other spiritual deceptions out there will only leave you hopeless and helpless.
ii. My desire and your desire (I believe) is to find true spirituality that will make a difference. That is found in only one person, “Jesus Christ!”
Conclusion:
Galatians 2:20 “I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me …”
Oswald Chambers Nov. 3 Devotional stated this to me:
“These words mean the breaking and collapse of my independence brought about by my own hands, and the surrendering of my life to the supremacy of the Lord Jesus. No one can do this for me, I must do it myself. God may bring me up to this point three hundred and sixty-five times a year, but He cannot push me through it. It means breaking the hard outer layer of my individual independence from God, and the liberating of myself and my nature into oneness with Him; not following my own ideas, but choosing absolute loyalty to Jesus. Once I am at that point, there is no possibility of misunderstanding. Very few of us know anything about loyalty to Christ or understand what He meant when He said, “… for My sake” (Matthew 5:11). That is what makes a strong saint…Will we allow Him to help Himself to us, or are we more concerned with our own ideas of what we are going to be?”
Do want to be completely whole inside? Do you want a balanced spiritually whole life? Do you want to experience God’s presence? Do want to receive God’s touch of power? Then chose to allow your self to die to Christ and be resurrected by his presence and power.
For you to start this spiritual journey to Christ you must first choose to prayer. Pray right now and ask Christ to become the Lord of your life and to forgive you of your sin. He will. But you have to take the first step and invite him in. Once you do this you will be on your spiritual journey and will start receiving wisdom from God. My fellow seeker allow his presence to come to you. I can also promise you that when you experience His presence then you will receive His power. This power will change you, deliver you, excite you, and transform you.
Remember:
No Prayer – No presence – No Power of God
No Praise – No presence – No power of God
No Preaching – No power – No presence of God
No Participation – No Power – No presence of God
Closing Song: We are going to practice the presence of God this morning by taking some time to pray and meditate on the Lord.
