Are We Trying To Conjure God?

Many contemporary praise choruses seem to focus on calling down God’s Spirit. “Spirit of the Living God, Fall Afresh on Me”, “Send it on Down”, “Send Your Rain”, asking God to come down, for the Spirit to be Sent down, etc. Recently, I have come to question whether these are precisely the prayers that we should be praying or singing. Has not God already sent down his Son? Hasn’t the Spirit already been given when we first believe, just as it was for Jews and Gentiles in the Book of Acts? Do we need a “fresh outpouring”? Do we need a “fresh anointing”? Is it possible to have more of the Holy Spirit than was already given when we first believed?

“For Moses writes about the righteousness that is based on the law, that the person who does the commandments shall live by them. But the righteousness based on faith says, “Do not say in your heart ‘Who will ascend into heaven?’” (that is to bring Christ down) or “’Who will descend into the abyss?’” (that is, to bring Christ up from the dead). But what does it say? “The word is near you, in your mouth and in your heart” (that is, the word of faith that we proclaim); because if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.” (Romans 10:5-8)

And here is the ESV cross-reference for this passage:

“For this commandment that I command you today is not too hard for you, neither is it far off. It is not in heaven that you should say, ‘Who will ascend to heaven for us and bring it to us, that we may hear it and do it?’ Neither is it beyond the sea, that you should say, ‘Who will go over the sea for us and bring it to us, that we may hear it and do it?’ But the word is very near you. It is in your mouth and in your heart so that you can do it.” (Deuteronomy 30:11-14)

What does the Lord mean by saying “is not too hard for you”? The study notes in my Bible say the meaning of "hard" here is "difficult to understand", rather than "difficult to perform". God has made himself clear. The Bible is not confusing in and of itself. Confusion arrives alongside our preconceptions of what we imagine it ought to be saying. Anyone who is a parent has experienced the peculiar way that children “misunderstand”. They think they already know what you are going to say, so they don’t listen.  Or they let what they wish you were saying get in the way of understanding. The ways children “misinterpret” our words is quite similar to how people misinterpret God’s Word.

Most interpretation problems can be cleared up with these three rules: context, context, and context. Reading the surrounding passage usually clears up mishandling of individual verses. But both the first passage from Romans and the second passage from Deuteronomy can be understood better when considering the cultural context of each one.

This passage from Deuteronomy speaks to the Israelites who were surrounded pagan cultures and tempted towards their ways. God is saying to the Israelites here, “Do not seek spiritual specialists to call up the divine. Do not make a pilgrimage to a more spiritual place. Seek no special knowledge. I have revealed all necessary revelation. Don’t reach up to heaven like those of Babel. You can’t do it! I have come down to the mountain to you.”

Romans was written to believers in a pagan city. To Romans, gods lived on mountaintops and gave tasks to humans for humans to prove themselves worthy. Roman religions also practiced summoning spirits from the underworld. They would think it quite natural that you must go through special rituals to conjure the divine.

In contrast to pagan ways, Paul, by chapter 10 of Romans, has finished describing how God came down to us. We were helpless, dead in our trespasses and sins, and God bridged the gap between the height of his holiness and the despairing depths of our sinfulness, and gave us his own righteousness—gave it to those who believed in his Son, through whom it was given.

Paul explains that many of his fellow Jews, to whom God originally had revealed himself, were zealous for God, but had zeal without knowledge. They were getting it wrong, still trying to be righteous through the law, but the law was never meant to achieve righteousness. The gift of God’s righteousness is freely given, through Jesus. What could we ever do to earn it?

But our flesh, our ego, wants to deserve something, to receive from God because we are “getting it right”.

Perhaps I've never heard this verse of Romans because it clearly forbids what has become so popular. I’m afraid I’ve seen that it’s become popular to seek ways to “conjure God”. We ask Jesus to descend to us, as if he already didn’t do that on the cross. We ask for the Holy Spirit to come down, but he did already on the day of Pentecost following Christ’s resurrection. Is it biblical to call down God, to ask for his outpouring, especially if those doing the asking have already received it?

Some point to great revivals of the past where people responded to the sermon, falling to the ground, despairing of their sin and their hearts miraculously turn towards God and away from their sin. But first of all, these were the lost that were falling before God over their sin, not Christians who felt they needed a “fresh anointing.” And can anyone name a honest-to-goodness occasion such as these “revivals” where the Law is not preached in all its rigor, and then followed by the sweetness of the Gospel? The Word of God must be preached! That is what creates faith, in conjunction with the work of the Holy Spirit, and according to Jesus, the Spirit is sent to convict the world of sin, righteousness and judgment.

Now the Spirit’s help is needed, clearly, for conviction, conversion and transformation, but can we control how or when such help comes? God’s Spirit moves where he pleases:

“Do not marvel that I said to you, ‘You must be born again.’ The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear its sound but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit.”

We clearly can control neither the wind nor the Spirit of God. And was it ever meant to be poured out in a "supplemental way" for the sake of bored Christians who feel like their “walk with God” is just getting flat and stale?

Surely our energy should be expended, not in seeking the Spirit, but learning to wield the Sword of the Spirit, his Word. In Romans 10, Paul says that “faith comes by hearing and hearing through the Word of Christ”. Hasn’t the word of God become sparse in sermons thick with stories, illustrations and even movie clips? What if we cut the length of sermons in half and filled them to the brim with God’s word? I’m pretty sure if I preached the longest of sermons in the book of Acts (notwithstanding Paul’s sermon that went so long someone fell asleep and fell out the window!) it would probably not last even five minutes when read through in its entirety.

Paul writes:

“For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith for faith, as it is written, ‘The righteous shall live by faith.’” Romans 1:16,17

So maybe we should leave behind our obsession with “revival”. I don’t know if anyone has the temerity any more to schedule so-called “revivals”, but we do schedule VBS, Youth Camps, etc., creating emotional pressure cookers that leave you exhausted and susceptible to symptoms of pseudo-revival.

Many are satisfied with conjuring feelings of affection towards God through music and emotional appeals. And we’ve moved away from hymns chock full of good doctrine and instead have songs that are filled with melodic and lyrical repetition that I know now can induce a state of euphoria due to lack of oxygen. I thought it was something more spiritual happening, but I know now that I was experiencing what any lost person would experience in the same circumstances.

If you examine biblical examples of “revival”, such as the thousands added to the church all at once in Acts 2, it does not occur because people were carried along on some wave of ecstasy.  Rather God added those souls, by his will, through his Sprit, and by the Apostles clearly proclaimed the Gospel in faithful obedience to His command. Often, the Apostles' sermons would summarize the entire Old Testament before they uttered a word regarding redemption through Christ Jesus.

Let me finish by comparing new song about the Spirit, and an old one. Look at these lyrics from a popular song from Christian Radio of the 1980’s sung by the group, First Call. It seems to summarize the thinking that has become prevalent regarding God’s Spirit. Do these lyrics reflect the Spirit he has granted that, according to Paul’s first letter to Timothy, gives us “power, love and self-control”? (“Self-control, alternately translated as sobriety, sound mind and wise discretion.)

Somethin' takes over
Somethin' takes over my soul
And soon you get to reelin'
'Cause of all the joy your feelin'
Till you're very nearly out of control
Just like the rollin'
Of the waters of the mighty sea
When you're connected to the spirit

Heavenly father's sure to hear it
'Cause somethin' takes over me.

Now in contrast, here is Martin Luther’s hymn, Come Holy Ghost, God and Lord. For those not familiar with Reformation history, this hymn is about 500 years old.

Come, Holy Ghost, God and Lord,

With all your graces now outpoured

On each believer’s mind and heart;

Your fervent love to them impart.

Lord, by the brightness of your light

In holy faith your Church unite;

From every land and every tongue,

This to your Praise, O Lord, our God, be sung.

Come, holy Light, guide divine,

Now cause the Word of life to shine.

Teach us to know our God aright

And call him Father with delight.

From every error keep us free;

Let none but Christ our master be,

That we in living faith abide,

In him, our Lord, with all our might confide.

Come, holy Fire, comfort true,

Grant us the will your work to do

And in your service to abide;

Let trials turn us not aside.

Lord, by your power prepare each heart

And to our weakness strength impart,

That bravely here we may contend,

Through life and death to you, our Lord, ascend.