Why Doesn’t It Make a Greater Difference that God Lives in You?

19 Apr Why Doesn’t It Make a Greater Difference that God Lives in You?

In this blog series, I am building a case for the fact that, no matter what our dissonance is in life with God and the Christian life, that dissonance can only be resolved by moving toward God, and not turning away from Him. There is no hope for anything by turning away from God. The only hope is to move toward Him.

So far, we have made the case that we are moving toward a good God, that we are moving toward the right God, and that we are moving toward a God who loves us.

Today, we look at the question of why God doesn’t make a greater difference in our lives when we do give ourselves to Him.

Why God doesn’t make a greater difference in our lives

When we become a Christian, the Bible says

• We are born again (John 3:3)
• We become an entirely new person (2 Corinthians 5:17)
• We are created in the likeness of God (Ephesians 4:24)
• The Holy Spirit actually lives in us (1 Corinthians 6:19-20)!

If that’s the case, why doesn’t it make a greater difference?!?

I explored this subject in an earlier blog, speculating that if you were going to write a science fiction movie, and you were going to have a Greek god inhabit your hero, wouldn’t it make a big difference? Wouldn’t your hero suddenly take on the superpowers of the god who now inhabits your hero? Wouldn’t he/she be stronger and smarter, with extraordinary abilities? Wouldn’t it be obvious to everyone who sees the movie that your hero was inhabited by a god, at least when the chips were down and supernatural action was the only thing that would suffice?

So why doesn’t it make a greater difference that the Holy Spirit inhabits us?

• Why don’t we have bedazzling power when we speak and minister to others?
• Why don’t we live life with all the right deep and unflagging convictions?
• Why don’t we stand resolute against temptation, laughing in the face of enticement?
• Why don’t we have limitless enthusiasm for the priorities of God and fading enthusiasm for the world’s?
• Why don’t we show the world unfailing peace, love and joy in the face of difficult circumstances and challenging people?

Why doesn’t the world see our super-abilities and stand in awe that we are inhabited by God? Is there something wrong with us? Is there something wrong with God? Is there something wrong with the system?

No, it is all as it should be. And here is why.

We are born as children and need to grow

First, we are born as children who need to grow. And, just as physical children are born with modest abilities and must grow to be able to walk, talk, think, run, and lift, so, when we are born again, we are born as spiritual children who need to grow into their abilities.

Beyond that, the spectacular abilities of an Olympian take many years of intense physical development and practice, and are a world above the abilities of a toddler. So, spiritual Olympians who have spent years of intense spiritual development and practice are a world above spiritual toddlers.

And, just as most humans do not make the commitment to be physical Olympians, so many Christians do not choose to become spiritual Olympians. Hence their limited capacity.

But, even if Christians do commit to extraordinary “Olympian” spiritual development and practice, even so, they do not become spectacular instruments of spiritual ability. Even the most spiritually advanced among us do not appear as super-heroes to the world.

Again, we ask… why?

We have been dramatically diminished by the “fall”

Even those committed to an “Olympian level” Christian life of spiritual development and practice, live in fallen bodies.

When God leaves us free to choose to trust and obey Him, our response might be feebler than we think it should be, or wish it could be, because it is diminished by our weakened and corrupted fallen vessel.

Our brains have been so diminished by the “fall,” our wills so poisoned by the world, our hearts so blinded by the enemy, that our response to God’s love is sapped, like a skeletal, cancer-ravaged athlete trying to become an Olympic gold-medalist.

So, while our response of love to God, our giving back to Him of trust and obedience, are not bedazzling to the world, it is genuine. And that’s what God wants from us: our love, not merely attempts to impress Him with spectacular actions.

God does not want us on divine steroids. He just wants who we are, what we have, what we can do… given back to him in love, in a genuine response to the love that He first gave us (1 John 4:10).

God just wants our love

As I wrote in a previous blog, what God wants from us is love. He doesn’t want anything we can give him. He wants us.

Therefore, God does not inflate our capacities with artificial abilities that are beyond us. Rather, He woos, He pursues, He courts, He persuades. He gives Himself totally to us, and simply asks us to give ourselves totally back to Him.

Love is only love if we are free to reject. If we could program a humanoid robot to act as though it loved us and to talk as though it loved us, we still would never interpret its actions and words as true love. For love to be “love,” it must be free to consciously choose.

If God took over our lives the way a Greek god might take over the life of a movie hero, if God inflated us with power, conviction, and enthusiasm that did not come solely from within us, it would not be genuine. It might impress the world, but it would not impress God. He – of all persons – would know that it was from Him and not us.

So when we do something for the Lord, it’s always done with less excellence than if God did it Himself (anything we can do, God can do better) but if it’s a gesture of sincere love to Him, that’s all he wants.

Conclusion

In times past, I have been tempted to conclude that there was something terribly wrong with me that the indwelling Holy Spirit has not made a greater difference in me. I thought I should be walking on water, absorbing all of life’s blows with unfailing grace, as well as performing miracles of ministry for others. I thought that was the level of difference it should make if the Holy Spirit inhabited me.

But I underestimated the limitations of my growth and the depth of the diminishing of my fallen capacities, and I overestimated God’s desire to have me manifest superhero abilities to the world. He is in charge of the miracles. He wants me to love Him.

So, we have made the case that we are moving toward a good God, that we are moving toward the right God, and that we are moving toward a God who loves us. Now, we make the case that, in spite of the dissonance it might initially create, there is nothing wrong with us if we do not possess divine superpowers. Even in our limitations, we move toward God and discover that all is well.

So, in love, I trust Him and obey Him as best I can, waiting for the day when I will worship Him in heaven, knowing more, being more, and doing more than I ever imagined… thrilled with my (finally) bedazzling resurrection body and abilities, enraptured by the reality that, once again, God is pleased because my love is all He ever wanted in the first place.

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