FORGET NONE OF HIS BENEFITS, volume 8, number 15, April 9, 2009

. . . the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God, Ephesians 6:17

Word and Spirit

Paul instructs us to take up the sword of the Spirit which is the word of God. He says this within the context of spiritual warfare, of putting on the panoply of God so that we may be able to stand firm against the schemes of the devil. Revelation 1:16 describes Jesus as having a sharp two-edged sword coming from His mouth. Revelation 19:15 says that from His mouth comes a sharp sword that with it He may smite the nations, that He might rule them with a rod of iron. Hebrews 4:12 says the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, and is able to judge the thoughts and intentions of the human heart. Jesus says the Holy Spirit brings conviction of sin, righteousness, and judgment (John 16:8). When the Holy Spirit came down on the day of Pentecost, as Peter was preaching, the people were cut to the quick and said, “What shall we do?” Paul says that his preaching did not come in superiority of speech but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power (1 Corinthians 2:4-5).

The American church has never had more Bibles, more Christian literature, more Christian DVD’s and CD’s of music and sermons. We have mega-churches and mega-pastors. Recent studies have shown, however, that more people today than ever in the U.S. consider themselves to have no faith at all. Abortion continues to snuff out the life of the unborn. If the present administration has its way with health care, then it will eventually be rationed and older Americans will be deprived of medical procedures to keep them alive. Such will go to younger, “more productive, more deserving” members of society. Wholesale euthanasia is creeping at the door. Same sex marriage is pretty much an accepted lifestyle today. Drug wars are threatening our southwest borders. Amnesty of illegal aliens is again gaining steam within the populace. Your net worth is at least one-half of what it was a year ago. Our nation is on the verge of Carter-like hyper-inflation due to the falling value of the dollar.

If Jesus is the King of Kings and Lord of Lords, if He is seated at the right hand of the Father, above all power and dominion, if He is more powerful than Allah, Buddha, Sophia, the witchdoctor, or western materialism, then why are we losing the culture war? If we have a plethora of churches, Bibles, Christian literature, and Christian music, then why are we so marginalized?

May I suggest that it is because we do not know the balance between word and Spirit. The neo-Pentecostal movement from the early 1970’s to the present has emphasized the Spirit (that’s good), but has generally been weak in theology and scholarship; while the Reformed and evangelical branch of Christendom has emphasized the word and theology (that’s good too) but not the Spirit. The seeker friendly movement, while overlooking the necessity of the Spirit’s presence and converting power, has mechanically built a church where people are largely biblically illiterate. The loss of a proper balance of word and Spirit has born the fruit of disenfranchisement.

This has not always been the case. Seventeenth century New England stressed scholarship (Harvard was founded eight years after John Winthrop landed at the Massachusetts Bay ). Harvard was established to provide New England with ministers of the gospel and none were admitted unless they read Hebrew, Greek, and Latin. Their theological books are replete with the balance of word and Spirit. They constantly referenced the Holy Spirit in ministry. They had days of fasting and prayer. The same is true in the eighteenth century Great Awakening through the preaching of Jonathan Edwards, John Wesley, George Whitefield, and William Tennent. Their ministries were driven by theological depth and Holy Spirit unction. The same was true of the Old School Presbyterians in both the north (Princeton Seminary and the teaching of Charles Hodge and B.B. Warfield) and the south (the powerful preaching of James Henley Thornwell, Benjamin Palmer, and Daniel Baker). The Spirit without the word leads to chaos, confusion, weird movements like the Toronto blessing, people believing gold dust from heaven comes down into their worship services, people laughing, even vomiting in the Spirit. The word without the Spirit leads to coldness, dryness, lifeless, powerless Christianity that moves no one, empties churches, and signals the retreat of the church from the public square.

I suggest this loss of balance is due to a denial of Christ’s lordship. Jesus says that He has all authority, that He will build His church and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it, that He will see the travail of His soul and be satisfied, that the nations will stream to Jerusalem, that we will do greater works than He did (He must mean conversions because we could never do the miracles He did nor live without sin like He did). Paul says we do not have a spirit of fear but of power, love, and a sound mind, that we are more than conquerors through Him who loves us. Those of us from the Reformed and evangelical branch of the church deny Christ’s lordship by forgetting our doctrine of man’s total inability. We say the unregenerate cannot believe unless the Spirit draws him but then we coddle him, entertain him, fail to confront him with impending doom. We fail to seek God earnestly in prayer, trusting our years of experience, our planning, our gifts, our master plan to bring him into church and Christ’s kingdom. We pride ourselves on our theological knowledge, how much more accurately, deeply, and profoundly we preach the Bible than others, yet our people are generally not transformed by our preaching. They are going after idols just like the rest of our culture. Those strong on the Spirit but weak on the word are denying Christ’s lordship due to a lack of confidence in the word of God. They face the temptation to manufacture the spectacular, to improve on last week’s performance, to create a mood of excitement that purports to be the true presence of the Spirit. On the one hand we deny the Spirit, while on the other we deny the sufficiency of the word.

Let us return to the days of John Calvin, Cotton Mather, Jonathan Edwards, James Henley Thornwell, Charles Spurgeon, and Martyn Lloyd-Jones. Let us regain a biblical balance of word and Spirit. The preached word of God, possessing the unction of the Holy Spirit is an awesome weapon in the hands of our mighty God. Encourage your pastor to move in this direction. Pray for him in this regard. Nothing else will save our once great nation. Politics won’t, nor will an insipid church.

FORGET NONE OF HIS BENEFITS is a weekly devotional by Reverend Al Baker, pastor of Christ Community Presbyterian Church in West Hartford, Connecticut.

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