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Hosting His Presence
FEATURE ARTICLE
Senior Pastor of Cornerstone Community Church
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In 1995, we had the privilege of hosting what I could only describe to be an open heaven, over our church for a period of about five months. We had just stepped out of our comfort zone and left the safety nets of the Anglican Church, and we were now an independent church, on a journey to the unknown. And all of a sudden, as if in response to our obedience, the heavens opened over us, and we lived under a supernatural cloud of glory for five months. It was heavenly.
Our weekend services would stretch 5-6 hours and nobody wanted to go home. They were greatly blessed by the outpouring. I never saw people so wrecked and drunk in the Spirit like those five months. In every service, God would just take over. There was no need for a long sermon or anything like that. The presence of God was so overwhelming. After about five months, the presence slowly lifted and by then, we had seen a 30% surge in our attendance, and it left us with a deep hunger for more.
It was in 1994 that God visited a little church in Toronto called the Airport Vineyard Church and it exploded into what is today commonly known as the Toronto Blessing. One of the most visible manifestations of that visitation was the phenomenon of holy laughter and that renewal basically restored the spirit of joy in the church. And God knows we all need some joy in the church. When I first heard of this holy laughter, I just knew it was God and I wanted it. So, I asked the Lord and sought Him for it and each time I heard someone receiving the joy and holy laughter, I said, “Lord, I want this.” Six months passed and I got desperate.
Then we heard that Rodney Howard Browne was visiting Brisbane. So, my wife and I hopped onto a plane to catch the meetings there. The first night was great and all sorts of things were happening around us but nothing was happening to us. The second night came and still nothing!
On the third evening, they shifted the meetings to the main convention centre in the city because of the swelling crowds and we were sitting in the bleachers, right up in the nosebleed section of the stadium. But just before the meeting started, a friend of mine walked by and he asked if I had received the blessings. I said no. He said the key is to block out everything and just keep your eyes on Jesus. Forget about what is happening all around you; just close your eyes and press in. I thanked him for his advice and the meeting started.
About 10-15 minutes in Howard Browne’s message, right up in that nosebleed section, about a 5-metre radius, God seemed to open up the heavens over everyone in that section and we all started laughing uncontrollably. I took the advice of my friend, blocked out everything and kept my eyes on Jesus, and suddenly, the joy of the Lord just gushed out of me and I started laughing hilariously and I have not stopped. The wells of salvation were broken up and the spring began to flow. It was wonderful.
When I came back to Singapore, I gathered all my leaders, about 20 of us, to tell them what I had experienced. I remember we were all sitting in the living room and I shared my experience and showed a video. Halfway through the video, I heard a “plonk” and several of the leaders came under the power of God.
The meeting ended at 12 midnight and we had to carry people out. It was just a supernatural visitation. Then Sunday came and all heaven broke loose. Our services would go on for 5-6 hours and people were so intoxicated with the Spirit that they could not walk nor speak. It was just glorious.
There were a few things I discovered about that precious move of God:
The anointing, or blessing, or presence, wastransferable. I could carry it with me. I got it inBrisbane, and I could bring it back to Singapore.And everywhere I went, I brought it along with me.The good news is, if this happens in the service,tomorrow, you can carry it to your workplace,your schools, your offices, your homes etc. Thisthing can really go viral. It’s the River of Godflowing out of our innermost beings.
The second thing I discovered was that God gaveus the privilege of hosting His presence for fivemonths. I considered it a great privilege andalthough it wrecked our plans and programme,we were all enjoying the move of God. Here’s thegood news: If He did it once for us, He can do itagain. And we must believe that God is about todo this again. We need to learn how to host thispresence and make sure we do all we can to makethe Lord comfortable in this house.
It is interesting that it was God who ignited the fire in the Tabernacle of Moses supernaturally. But it was the responsibility of the priests to keep the fire burning. So, what does that tell us? It tells us God supernaturally ignites every revival; but every revival ended because of the neglect of men. That’s just the nature of fire. For fire to keep on burning, you have got to feed it and you have got to fan it.
Now here’s the application of this:
If this is transferable, then we have to carry it with us to themarketplace, schools and everywhere we work. If we aresaturated with His presence, then it ought to have an effecton people who come within proximity of our being. We call itthe zone. So when people step into our zone, they will beginto feel the effects of the presence of God upon their own lives.
Remember the apostle Peter. He carried so much of the presence of God that people would line the sick on the street where they knew Peter would walk by and so much as his shadow would pass by them, they would get healed. Now shadow has no substance. So it wasn’t the shadow that was healing the people, it was proximity to Peter. When the people came within proximity of the zone that Peter was living in, they began to be influenced by the power of God. The presence of God just radiated from him and anyone coming near would be affected by that presence. Is this possible in our day and age?
The story was told about Smith Wigglesworth who, on one occasion, boarded a train at Bradford to travel to London. He selected a corner seat and eventually, five more people joined him in the compartment. As was his custom, he took out his Bible and began to read and pray silently. He never spoke a word to his fellow travelers or tried to initiate a conversation. About 30 miles away from London, he went to the restroom and as he was making his way back to the compartment, the man who had been sitting next to him said, “I don’t know what it was, but when I sat next to you, a terrible fear gripped me. I was afraid I was going to die. What was it?” All the other passengers then said that they had experienced the same feeling. Wigglesworth then explained to them about conviction and the way to salvation and right there in the compartment of the train, they knelt on the floor and accepted the Lord.
Don’t you long for the same glory and presence of God to rest upon us? I want to be saturated with the presence of God to the degree that others around me will inevitably be impacted by it without me having to say a word.
We must seek to host the presence of God in our midst.And we can do this individually or corporately.
One of the great revivals of the last century was the Hebrides revival that broke out on a series of islands off the coast of Scotland. The main spark of the revival was a man named Duncan Campbell and that powerful move of God lasted for four years, to 1952. But what precipitated the revival was that a cry came forth from the people in the Hebrides. Seven men bounded together in covenant to pray for God to move and three times a week, they would meet in a barn and there, they would pray for many hours. Two other sisters, very powerful intercessors, joined them in prayer and the rest, as they say, is history. Many years after the revival had waned, they found one of the seven men who had been in the original group crying out for revival. They asked him what he could tell them about the revival and with tears in his eyes, he said that one of the great mistakes they made was that they were more caught up with the effects of the revival than they were to protect the cause of the revival. This is such a powerful revelation that if we don’t get it, we are going to be bound to make the same mistakes again.
The effects of the revival are the shaking, the laughing, the crying, the dramatics, and all that is good. We must not touch the glory.
It is getting the church back on track. It is basically accelerating the purposes of God in our generation.
Having said that, it is important that whilst God is moving in the church, we will see many things that we might not understand and it is vital for us not to try and control what God is seeking to do. Remember David is bringing the Ark of the Covenant back from the House of Abinadab where it has been for the past 20 years. The two sons of Abinadab were riding the oxen that were pulling the cart and somewhere along the way, there was a bump on the road and the cart destabilized and the Ark probably started swaying and Uzzah tried to stabilize it. The fire of God came forth from the Ark and Uzzah was fried into a BBQ crisp. This guy stopped the entire move of God because of his presumption. Here’s the warning—when God starts to move, let’s not try and control what He is seeking to do. A river is exactly that—a river. It meanders and it turns whichever way it desires and we must resist every attempt to try and control it. Do not touch His glory. Even David did not get it right the first time. Instead of priests carrying the Ark on their shoulders, David used the oxen and cart method and that didn’t work too well for him. We all make mistakes; and it is always a learning process, but here’s the warning—you are not to touch the glory. It is His and His alone.
by PASTOR YA NG T UCK YOONG
