Heart Tracks - Standing In The Shadows

     Acts 5:15 tells of the wondrous witness and testimony of the power of Christ's life in Peter, that the people would often bring their sick and crippled out into the street in hopes that should Peter pass by, his mere shadow falling upon them would bring healing and wholeness.  There can be no doubt that Peter walked, lived, and ministered in the power of Jesus' resurrection life.  True Holy Spirit power coursed through him and countless lives were touched powerfully by his life.  Yet, I have so often wondered if those upon whom his shadow fell, and all those who received such powerful ministry from him, did they ever come to know for themselves, experience for themselves, the life that Peter knew.  Did they live, move, and yes, minister, in that same resurrection power?

    I think we in the church have always flocked to see and hear those who have truly seen, encountered, and have known Almighty God, but perhaps never more than in this day.  We want to know what He is speaking, what He is doing.  We want to know what these men and women are hearing.  Somehow we miss the reality that these ones are not "superspiritual believers," living lives that can only be obtained by a select, privileged few.  They are merely ones who have so hungered and thirsted after Him that they would allow nothing to come between they and the Christ they so loved, and so passionately sought.  It is lost to so many of us that the life they are leading is also the life He invites us into as well.  In our spiritual laziness however, we'd rather someone else do the "hard work" of going deeply into His life.  We'll be content to just "stand in the shadows" of those who have.

   Pastor and writer Francis Frangiapane writes that he was very much once among the latter.  He was always asking godly men and women he admired what they were hearing from God.  Finally, one replied to his question, "Tell Francis I miss him."  Might the Father be saying the same to you and I today?  If He is, are we even in the place spiritually, where we could hear Him?
   More than 50 years ago, A.W. Tozer wrote, "We are turning out from the Bible schools year after year, young men and women who know the theory of the Spirit-filled life, but do not enjoy the experience....who turn out a generation of believers who know nothing personally of the inner fire.  The next generation will drop even the theory."  We need, desperately, to be a people who know of Him only through what we've read or heard.  We must be a people, a church, who are able to relate to those around us what we have seen, heard, and felt, and lead them to the place where they too may encounter Him, see Him, hear Him, and encounter Him.  We need to cease standing in the shadows of men, and stand instead in His presence.

Blessings,
Pastor O

---

This email is free from viruses and malware b