I agree that we play a role in what sense God’s presence is experienced, by others and by ourselves. Truly welcoming people is only one way in which we reveal the presence of God. Creating a certain ethos with our worship and teaching are two other ways (I’m thinking of things that usually take place during a Sunday gathering). “God has given us minds, and intelligence, and imagination, and creativity, and He expects us to use these.” These also play a role in revealing God’s presence.

Welcoming God and welcoming people are integrated, then. Not necessarily the same thing, but in doing one we also do the other. I think this works both ways.

Welcoming is also deeper than simply saying hello and making people “feel” welcome. We can feel many things that aren’t necessarily true. Just because I feel welcome, doesn’t mean that someone has genuinely welcomed me. They just made me feel good. Welcoming in the name of Jesus, welcoming others with the intent on welcoming the presence of God, goes deep. That’s why I used the phrase “connecting to the core of who people are”. Our own genuiness has a great role to play in determining the sense in which God’s presence is experienced.

I want to be someone who welcomes the tangible presence of God into my life and into the gatherings I am involved with. God wants us to encounter His more directly that just through His general presence everywhere, and I want to make sure nothing I do gets in the way of His presence.

I think the danger of only thinking about God’s presence in the “he’s everywhere” sense is that we can become passive to seeking after God. But God wants us to draw near to Him. He wants us to long for Him. He wants us to pursue Him.

Jason - thanks for stopping by! I’d agree to an extent about welcoming people is welcoming God, but I do think there is a sense that we need to be open and welcoming to the tangible presence of God in our midst. It is possible to do a whole load of stuff that could be said to be “welcoming people” and yet Jesus taught us that some will still stand before Him only to hear Him say, “I never knew you”. I want to actively pursue the presence of God both in my life and in the gatherings I’m involved with.

This was a great post. Thanks for stopping by my site and commenting.

$0.01 :: The presence of God is everywhere, already, whether we welcome it or not. It’s wild like that.

$0.02 :: Our gatherings should, then, consist of loving people, welcoming them, connecting with the core of who they are. For in that honest embrace, we embrace the presence of God. We welcome him. We connect with the core of who he is.

I work at a Christian non-profit, and while we are non-denominational, and have a cross-section of people on staff, sometimes I feel like the more southern, african american, evangelical style holds sway. This, I think, is largely because of the demographics of the people on the street who we are trying to reach. A few of our staff members are even former “customers” of our ministries.

This means that our staff meetings are often very “spirit lead.” I’m not uncomfortable witih that usually, but I’m not wildly excited about it either. Why? Well, while I don’t doubt that God is behind much of what goes on, I also don’t believe that your spiritual life is somehow incomplete without these gifts. I have never spoken in tongues, for instance. My twin sister does, and that’s cool. But I’m certain that if some of the people on staff ever found out that I don’t speak in tongues, they would want to stop everything right then, call up ten of their closest friends, lay hands on my and pray until the spirit fell. And if I didn’t start speaking in tongues right then and there, they would tell me to keep on believing it and keep on asking for it, and to claim it in the name of Jesus. And they would ask me every week until it happpened and have all kinds of advice and insight on the subject for me. And I am way too much of an introvert for all of that! The way God and I communicate is very special to me, and many of the things he tells me or does in my life are intensely personal. The fact that I don’t show them publicly in an expressive way doesn’t mean that they aren’t there; and I won’t have anyone giving me a guilt trip over that. Certainly I won’t have anyone telling me that if I don’t speak in tongues, or get healed of a medical condition, it is because I didn’t have enough faith.

So for me, speaking in tongues or shouting in an apparently uncontrollable manner during a church service is not instructive or edifying. That doesn’t mean there isn’t a time and a place for it– even corporately. But I think that it should be a special event, or if it is weekly, it’s not a consistent Sunday morning thing. It can exclude people who are not comfortable from participating in the church service.

That is a perception that I know I have held, and I know I see others hold to.

I think we would be surprised at the places God is moving.

If only our spiritual eyes were more open!

At the same time, I think that we can end up only using our minds, our intelligence, our imagination, and our creativity and miss out on a whole load more that God wants to do amongst us. Jesus was totally reliant on God. The strength of His minstry flowed from His intimacy with His Father. He was open to doing whatever the Father led Him to do. We must never let the human side become a barrier or obsticle to God doing what He wants to do.

I think we can all have a tendency to want to box God in. We want and expect Him to move and work on our terms and expectations rather than His. Do we even end up choosing the church we go to on the basis of how God is allowed to move in that church and whether we are comfortable with that?

Spending 3 days at a conference recently with John and Carol Arnott (Toronto Blessing) was a real challenge for me. I wasn’t comfortable with everything that was going on and yet I don’t have a doubt that God is really changing lives. I was there with my wife Rachel and my parents and my brother and his wife, and we all undoubtedly encountered God. It made me realise that I need to be open to God’s Spirit however He chooses to move.

The questions I am asking myself at the moment are, “am I really open to the Holy Spirit?” and “what are the ways that I am perhaps limiting the work of God in and through me?”. If I want to see God move like He did through Jesus and in the early apostles, I need to be open to the Spirit and in deep relationship with God the same way that they were. I must be willing to obey everything He says, no matter what it is, whether it makes sense, or even if it will make me look stupid. I need to actually life by faith, and not just talk about it.

I’ve written loads more than I intended…sorry for the ramble!