Are you facing a difficult circumstance in your life right now? Do you have a difficult decision to make? Are you suffering under a debilitating illness or a crushing emotional defeat? Wouldn't it be wonderful if Jesus Himself walked up to you right now and asked you, "Child, what would you have Me do for you?" That would solve all your problems, wouldn't it? God wouldn't seem so far away. He would be right there on the scene to minister to you. He could help you make that difficult decision, lay hands on that worn out body and transfuse it with new life.
Well, then, praise God, because He has done even better than that for you! Even better than Jesus Himself in the flesh??? Yes, Jesus told us as recorded in John 16:7, "But I tell you the truth, IT IS TO YOUR ADVANTAGE THAT I GO AWAY; for if I do not go away, the Helper shall not come to you; but if I go, I will send Him to you." As strange as it sounds Christians today have something better than the physical presence of Jesus in their midst. For one thing, Jesus of Nazareth could only be in one place at one time. Even if He had ministered to one person every ten seconds for the last 2000 years, He would not have been able to reach the 6 billion people on this planet. His earthly ministry was a wondrous thing, but His ministry had to be distributed in order to be effective in reaching a fallen world and fulfilling God's ultimate purpose.
The greatest accomplishment in the earthly ministry of Jesus was to redeem mankind from sin and pave the way for every believer to receive the Holy Spirit of God to indwell and empower them. That is the core fact of Christianity. As wonderful as it would be to have Jesus in our midst, how much better that we have the Spirit of Christ within us. Jesus reproduced His divine life and ministry into all the earth by providing the Holy Spirit for every Christian believer. The Spirit of God is present with you at this moment, ready to minister the life and love of God to you, ready to minister the healing power of Jesus to you, ready to minister the wisdom of God to you in a difficult decision. Jesus is vastly more present now on the earth than He was in 33 A.D.
Sometimes we Christians have trouble appropriating this blessed Presence. In that case the church, the Body of Christ, can be called alongside to help. At times when God does SEEM far away and inaccessible, the Lord comes to us through a Christian brother or sister and asks through them, "Child, what would you have Me do for you?" This is supernatural Christianity.
@ copyright 1997 by Scott H. Northrup. All rights reserved.