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| The river Raisin, in my backyard |
In my new book Leading the Presence-Driven Church I utilize Gordon Fee's idea of "the presence motif" that runs from Genesis through Revelation. The unifying theme is: God, and his unsurpassing presence.
Gordon-Conwell theologian John Jefferson Davis, in Worship and the Reality of God: An Evangelical Theology of Real Presence, sounds a lot like Fee and what I am putting forward. To experience God in our midst as we gather together - that is our reason for being.
Gordon-Conwell theologian John Jefferson Davis, in Worship and the Reality of God: An Evangelical Theology of Real Presence, sounds a lot like Fee and what I am putting forward. To experience God in our midst as we gather together - that is our reason for being.
Davis summarizes his thoughts:
"Because the living God, the risen Christ and the Holy Spirit are present in the midst of the assembly, true worship takes place in kingdom space and kingdom time, where ordinary space and time are altered by the massive reality of the Creator and Redeemer of space and time, where earth is lifted up to heaven, and the future impinges on the present. The meeting space is spiritually energized and charged by the presence of the Spirit, the Shekinah Glory; ordinary time is suffused with the power of the past redemptive events of the incarnation, cross and resurrection, and anticipates the revelation of the Christ who is to come and who will usher in the new creation." (Kindle Locations 992-993)
When God shows up, space and time shift.
Things are different.
The ordinary becomes the extraordinary, the natural becomes the supernatural, the secular transforms into the spiritual, the mundane gets energized by the powerful presence of God.
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My first book is Praying: Reflections on 40 Years of Solitary Conversations with God.
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My first book is Praying: Reflections on 40 Years of Solitary Conversations with God.
