An unbalanced perspective of the Godhead, leads to hues and shades of God that detract from His glory and rob us of power. Just as white light results from the full mix of the visible spectrum, so the truth of God is reflected in the balance of the three sources of divine light: the Father, Son and Holy Spirit.
I grew up in an orthodox context. It gave me good foundations but never brought me to a personal knowledge of Christ. My wife had an evangelical background, which was full of sound doctrine but otherwise staid. I guess it was a miracle that I came to know Jesus at all.
I was in the army, when a fellow soldier told me I also needed the Holy Spirit. After a few weeks of seeking God, I was mightily filled with the Spirit: an experience that set me on fire for God. That transformed me from an orthodox pew-warmer to a passionate believer, leaving me with the view that the power of the Holy Spirit is best revealed in a personal conviction of Christ.
As the years ebbed and waned I came to see that the Pentecostal movement had so swayed to the Holy Spirit that Jesus was almost passé. Many still agonise over the dearth of miracles without fully understanding the profound miracle already extended to all believers through the death, burial and resurrection of Jesus.
So where does this all leave me? Well I still value my roots, for they gave me solid foundations and I value my Pentecostal experiences, which gave me a dynamic faith. However, I am now more concerned with finding the sweet spot of a balanced faith.
Without knowing the father's will, we are self-serving, but without the indwelling Christ we lack the capacity to do the Father's will. Yet without the Holy Spirit, the will of God and the provision of Jesus, risks a form of Godliness without power.
If Jesus had independent power, He would have been reduced to another miracle man. Rather He obeyed His Father, to which the Holy Spirit, through the gifts described in 1 Corinthians 14, added His independent witness, confirming Him as the Christ. Thus by the mouth of two or three witnesses, every truth was established.
If we want to see real evidence of power in our lives, we must first be in the Father's will. The Father's will is to see all things restored through His Son, whom He made heir of all things. Thus, when our obedience to the Father becomes an expression of Christ in us, the hope of glory, the Spirit will independently ratify our witness, as we read in Hebrews 2:4.
If we focus on the Holy Spirit, we will embarrass Him, for He came to reveal Christ, not to be an independent source of power. But if we focus on Jesus and the will of God in Christ, the Holy Spirit will independently confirm our life witness.
(c) Peter Eleazar @ http://www.4u2live.net/
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