Rich Kao

With all the great things the Church is doing today - preaching, teaching, counseling, discipling, outreaching, reforming, community building, authenticity seeking, social needs mobilizing, micro-church planting, relationship-deepening and more - may we never forget His presence.  When I survey every notable figure in the bible, one thing is clear, they all humbly understood their need for God's presence.

There is nothing that can move me, change me, motivate me, fill me, renew me and strengthen me like the presence of God.  Every time I touch it, it's like I  never touched it before.  To me that's noteworthy.  His presence is always new, fresh, current, vibrant, never familiar or routine.    I grew up as a new Christian on the tail end of the Jesus people movement, where the presence of God was being poured out in a wholesale way on the church and in the land (from my perspective, it was the last broad-based coast-to-coast move of God we've had).  Out of those formative years came an imprinting, a conviction, an idelible mark upon my heart as to the importance and absolute crucial-ness His presence must have in our lives.  However as that season waned, it's become harder and harder to pass on that ardor for His presence to the new crop of Christians.  Don't get me wrong, I'm not talking about a love for God's presence at the expense of or substituting it for His personhood.  Seeking God will always result in touching His presence.

How can we stimulate a love for his presence to the next generation, our own family and kids, and our churches, in the midst of a new era of busters, seekers, emergent-loving, socially-connected, church disenfranchised masses?

I don't have any magical answers (wish I did), except to stay faithful to the message.  Do what the bible says, do it well and do it wholeheartedly.  Which for me, means the following:

    1. Do worship right.  If worship is not done in such a way as to move people to God's presence,  for me, it's game over.  Shut it all down. (Although people will endure bad worship for great preaching).  One key (insist on this):  never put in a worship leader that is not a "presence leader," i.e. someone who's passion is to touch God's heart, and has the ability to get people there musically.  PS - also create a worship culture / lifestyle.

    2. Get people baptized in the Holy Spirit.  People who are baptized in the Holy Spirit have a much easier time locating, experiencing, and moving into God's presence.  If Jesus and the apostles needed to be baptized in the Holy Spirit, then I do and so do those that look to me for leadership.

    3. Pray in tongues.  Yep, that one pesky controversial teaching that became a signature issue of the charismatic movement.    What does praying in tongues do?   Many things -- and this is not the time for a full blown teaching on it -- but I want to point out one salient point -- speaking in tongues helps us get connected to the mind of God and into the flow of the Holy Spirit.  It takes us out of our default "natural thinking" into God's thinking.  (I Cor. 15:15)

    4. Get saturated in the word.  Basically Col. 3:16.

    5. Love God the person, with all your heart, mind, soul and strength.

    6. Trust for God to move supernaturally in your midst.  This raises the faith level of the community.

    7. Be a person of consistent prayer.

Here's my prayer:  "Lord your word says if we draw near to you you will draw near to us (Jas 4:8).  As we commit ourselves to faithfully doing that, may you fill us with your immeasurable, priceless, glory-filled presence.  We are hungering and thirsting for you.  Amen."

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