Practicing the Ordinary Supernatural Presence of God: Walking with Jesus and the Spirit in the Ordinary Supernatural

By John Jefferson Davis

Growing in our ability to have a conscious awareness of God's presence with us in the midst of our busy and over-stimulated world is a key to our spiritual health and emotional well-being. Practicing the Ordinary Supernatural Presence of God helps us to do exactly that--by enriching our devotional lives with a richer and deeper biblical theology based on key biblical texts such as Acts 2, John 17, and Matthew 28, and crucial biblical doctrines such as the Trinity, Union with Christ, and the Holy Spirit.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Cascade Books
• Release date: Sep 30, 2021
• ISBN: 9781725285026

John Jefferson Davis

John Jefferson Davis, PhD, is Associate Professor of Theology at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary.

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Preface

The purpose of this book is to help you rediscover and enjoy the supernatural experience at the heart of the New Testament church’s spiritual vitality and remarkable growth: a conscious awareness of the joyful, life-changing presence of the living God in the midst of his people. The New Testament’s supernatural quality of life is still available today.

The title Practicing the Ordinary Supernatural Presence of God highlights two crucial ideas: the presence of God and the ordinary supernatural. The title recalls Brother Lawrence’s devotional classic, The Practice of the Presence of God, and offers a richer biblical basis for it. God’s presence in the midst of his people and their enjoyment of that presence is a central theme of the Bible from Genesis to Revelation and is at the heart of our salvation and Christian worship. This book shows how to experience and enjoy God’s presence in Sunday worship and daily living.

The concept of the ordinary supernatural enlarges usual understandings of supernatural. God is supernaturally present not only in extraordinary supernatural acts that are visible and spectacular—miracles, dramatic healings, resurrections of the dead, demons cast out, speaking in tongues—but also in the Holy Spirit’s less visible and quieter actions: illuminating Scripture, convicting of sin, converting sinners, growing the Spirit’s fruit, forming Christlike character. In the long run, the ordinary supernatural actions of the Spirit are more important for the church’s growth than spectacular miracles whose effects may not last. Healings can be temporary, but the fruit of the Spirit lasts into eternity.

As the secular world’s power over nature increases, the church must live by power that is more than natural—by the ordinary supernatural power of the Spirit. Living in the ordinary supernatural is possible now, sustainable over a lifetime, and consistent with Scripture and sound doctrine.

This book focuses on three biblical chapters (Acts 2, Matthew 28, John 17); three Christian doctrines (Trinity, union with Christ, Holy Spirit); and three spiritual practices (worship, meditation, ministry). These biblical teachings equip us to experience God’s ordinary supernatural presence in worship, meditation, and ministry.

Seminary students will find help in integrating their academic study of the Bible and theology with spiritual formation and ministry. Pastors can use this material and the study questions for leadership training sessions. Campus ministry leaders can use this book for staff training. Bible studies and Christian education classes can use it for three or six week courses.

I thank my wife, Robin, who gave valuable help editing this manuscript.

The Appendix A Vision for Renewal surveys modern culture and provides context for the biblical theology presented here. May God bless you as you consider this vision and share it with others.

John Jefferson Davis

Andrew Mutch Professor of Theology

Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary

Hamilton, Massachusetts

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Three Crucial Texts for Spiritual Renewal

Acts 2, Matthew 28, John 17

This chapter provides important new insights for personal growth and church renewal from three of the most important chapters in the Bible: Acts 2: Pentecost and the arrival of the Spirit; Matthew 28: the Great Commission and discipleship; and John 17: Jesus’ great prayer for the unity of the church. The teachings in these texts are essential foundations for experiencing power in the Christian’s life and success in the church’s ministry.

Lives Changed by the Holy Spirit: The Apostle Peter

Before Pentecost, Peter discouraged Jesus from going to the cross, and in Gethsemane, he could not stay awake with Jesus for a single hour. He was afraid of the high priest’s servant girl, denied his Master three times, and deserted Jesus after his arrest.

After Jesus rose from the dead, he breathed on Peter and the other disciples and imparted the Holy Spirit to them (John 20:22). Peter’s life was dramatically changed after being filled with the Holy Spirit on the day of Pentecost (Acts 2:4). Peter powerfully proclaimed the death and resurrection of Jesus to the crowds assembled in Jerusalem. Three thousand were converted in a single day (Acts 2:41). What a remarkable difference a conscious experience of the Spirit’s presence made in Peter’s service to Christ!

Acts 2: Church the Way It Was Meant to Be—And Still Can Be Today

Consider the events on the day of Pentecost (Acts 2:1–41), and the remarkable, Spirit-empowered life of the early Jerusalem church that followed (Acts 2:42–46). Pentecost can be viewed from four simultaneous perspectives: earthly, heavenly, external, and internal.

First, the events of Pentecost on earth seen from an external point of view—from the point of view of those gathered in Jerusalem. The believers were together in one place and heard the sound of a violent wind filling the house. They saw flames of fire resting on each of them. Being filled with the Spirit, they began to speak in other languages, proclaiming the mighty acts of God (Acts 2:1–4). The flames of fire signified a new Mount Sinai, the inauguration of a new covenant, and God’s real presence with his people.

In the old covenant fire was a visible sign that the Lord, the holy God of Israel, was present.

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When the Lord called Moses to lead his people from bondage in Egypt, he appeared at Sinai, speaking from within the flames of fire in the burning bush (Exod 3:2, 4). At the exodus, the Lord was in the pillar of cloud by day and the pillar of fire by night, leading his people across the Red Sea and on to Sinai. The Lord descended on Mount Sinai in fire and called Moses to the top of the mountain to declare his covenant with his people (Exod 19:18, 20). At the dedication of the tabernacle the Lord filled it with his glory (Exod 40:34). During their wilderness travels the Lord continued to manifest his holy presence and to lead the people with the cloud by day and with fire in the cloud by night (Exod 40:36, 38). When Solomon dedicated the temple in Jerusalem, the temple was filled with God’s glory (1 Kgs 8:10, 11), signifying the Lord’s real presence with his people.

The fire—an outward manifestation of God’s glory and a sign of God’s presence—was an Old Testament anticipation of the New Testament’s good news of the gospel of Jesus, who is Emmanuel, God with us. God dwelt in the midst of his people, giving them a visual sign of his presence. This awareness of God’s presence was a distinctive mark of Israel’s identity. Moses asked God, How will anyone know that you are pleased with me and with your people unless you go with us? What else will distinguish me and your people from all the other people on the face of the earth? (Exod 33:16). They knew they were a distinctive people because they knew they had been given distinctive, felt experiences—through sights, sounds, and miracles—of God’s supernatural presence. Many Christian churches today lack felt experiences of God’s presence, and consequently have lost the mark that distinguishes them from the surrounding culture and from other religions.

Because of their later persistent covenant disobedience and idolatry, the people of Israel lost their experience of the Lord’s presence and glory. Ezekiel saw a vision of the divine glory departing from the temple (Ezek 10:18). God deserted his house on Mount Zion, anticipating the temple’s coming destruction in 586 BC. God himself was going into exile with his people.

This was not to be the end of the story of God’s presence with his people, however. The prophets had announced the good news that the Lord and his glory-fire would one day return to Jerusalem and to a new temple. Isaiah foresaw a day when the glory and fire of God would cover a righteous remnant gathered on Mount Zion: Then the Lord will create over all of Mount Zion and over those who assemble there a cloud of smoke by day and a glow of flaming fire by night (Isa 4:5). Zechariah prophesied that the Lord would return and be a wall of fire around Jerusalem and be her glory within (Zech 2:5). Ezekiel and Haggai both looked forward to a new temple that would again be filled with the divine glory (Ezek 43:5; Hag 2:7). Joel foresaw the time when God’s Spirit would be poured out on all people and fire poured out on earth (Joel 2:28–30).

These prophecies and others were fulfilled on the day of Pentecost. Ezekiel and Daniel had seen visions of God’s heavenly throne flaming with fire (Ezek 1:4–5, 26–27; Dan 7:9). The fire surrounding the Lord’s heavenly throne was now present on earth. The heavenly throne of God, now shared by Jesus, came down to earth in fire on Mount Zion, just as the Lord had earlier come down in fire on Mount Sinai. God called to Moses from within the burning bush, yet warned him not to come near (Exod 3:2–5). At Pentecost the newly born church was taken inside the burning bush, as it were, closer to God in the new covenant than even Moses had been in the old covenant when he was first called. When in the wilderness seventy elders were being ordained to help Moses and to be anointed with the Spirit, Moses expressed the wish that all the Lord’s people were prophets and that the Lord would put his Spirit on them (Num 11:29). What was granted to the few in the old covenant was granted to all in the new covenant. Moses’s wish was fulfilled on Pentecost, when all were filled with the Spirit and prophesied (Acts 2:18), proclaiming God’s mighty acts in the resurrection and exaltation of Jesus as Messiah and Lord.

Second, consider the events of Pentecost from a heavenly and internal perspective—Jesus’ own experience in heaven on the day of Pentecost. Sermons on Acts 2 typically focus on what the early church experienced on earth or on what the modern church would like to experience. But the early church’s experience—and anyone’s today—is grounded in what Jesus first experienced in heaven. The firstborn Son, Jesus, exalted in heaven, was the first to experience the promise to sons and daughters in Joel 2:28–29:

I will pour out my Spirit on all people.

Your sons and daughters will prophesy

. . .

Even on my servants, both men and women,

I will pour out my Spirit in those days.

Jesus was the first of these sons and servants to receive the promised Spirit. As Peter declared: Being exalted to the right hand of the Father, he has received from the Father the promised Holy Spirit and has poured out what you now see and hear (Acts 2:33). At his exaltation in heaven at the completion of his earthly ministry, Jesus received from his Father, in greater fullness and joy, the same Spirit he had received in humility at his baptism, at the beginning of his ministry. The Father who was well pleased with his beloved Son at the beginning of his ministry was joyously pleased with his Son at its completion. The Spirit who empowered Jesus on earth was given to him in even greater fullness in heaven. He was Spirit-baptized twice—first through John on earth, then by his Father in heaven.

In Hebrews 2:12, the writer states that Jesus was fulfilling in heaven Psalm 22:22, prophesying in heaven:

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I will declare your name to my brothers; in the presence of the congregation I will sing your praises. On the day of Pentecost, Jesus, who was also fulfilling Joel 2:28 (your sons will prophesy), was the first of the sons who was prophesying—giving praise to the Father. Jesus was—and still is—leading the heavenly worship. The praises of the church below (Acts 2:4, 11) were—and still are—a Spirit-empowered participation in Jesus’ anointed worship above, his prophesying.

Peter’s quotation of Joel 2:28–32 in Acts 2 and his application of it to Jesus is also evidence for the deity of Christ. The Joel text that promises that the Lord, the God of Israel, would pour out the Spirit, was applied by the inspired Peter to Jesus. What the text