As a kid, I used to really like the Bible stories of the Old Testament characters (even though they all pretty much look the same in flannel). I especially liked the one about Daniel and the lion’s den. The one that makes me sad a bit is the one about Sampson, especially where the Bible tells us that “he did not know that the LORD had left him.” That’s a rather sobering statement for any of us (especially me) who takes God’s presence and blessing and favor for granted and expects it almost as a right.

I think about the churches I have worshipped with in the Nashville area. To say there is an abundance of musical and ministerial talent in this area is a vast understatement. I think where some places grow cotton and soybean, Nashville grows musicians and preachers. It’s our staple crop.

But I wonder with all that talent and technology and creative planning if we haven’t programmed out any room for the Holy Spirit. We can invoke moods and emotions and stir up people, but do they really go away transformed or do they just go away hyped and high off the lastest spiritual fix?

If the presence and glory of God departed from our services and worship events, would we even know? Would anything be different? Would we still go on just the same, having the form of worship, but lacking the power of true worship to affect any real change?

I am more and more convicted that unless we as the Church come to a place of desperation for God to really manifest His presence, we won’t really see wholesale changes. Unless we can really go out in faith to a place where either God comes through or we crash and burn spectacularly, we won’t really see the glory fall and the building shaken.

As a believer, I have to come to a place where it’s no longer about being safe and successful, but about really being willing to risk my reputation, my good standing, and (if it comes to it) my very life for the purposes and calling of the Kingdom. Not just me, but all who profess the name of Jesus as Lord.

I believe now more than ever God is calling us to a place where we fall on our faces and beg Him with tears and sighs (and maybe even with fasting) to come. We need to repent of trusting in our cleverness and talent to draw people to God and let the real Power work through our honest confession of spiritual bankruptcy and brokenness.

Again I ask, “Who’s with me?”

If we don’t awaken from our spiritual stupor, one day the glory and manifesting presence of God really will depart from us and we won’t even know it’s gone until it’s much too late.