Adrian Warnock has once again brought up the charismatics and cessationists issue in his Charismatic Debate – Responding to Dan Phillips post.

I really could not have said it any better. As I read Adrian’s article, I thought about his statement where he stated:

….For most of the charismatics I know at least, it is NOT mere emotion that we seek; rather we seek an appropriate emotional response to the presence of God, and we seek His activity in our lives and churches to be manifestly present.

There is all the difference in the world between trying to “work up” an emotional frenzy (which, of course, we have all seen) and using appropriate God-given means of putting ourselves in an appropriate place where God can meet us……

I want to say that many of the charismatics I have met online who are turning towards a more reformed theological view while maintaining a life with the Holy Spirit desire not only an appropriate (and in decency and order) response to the presence of God, but the unadulterated presence of God that manifests in a supernatural manner that comes out very natural. We really want to partake of the presence of God where God gets the glory for what is done and not man. We do not want to be ‘high for Jesus’ nor do we want to be ‘addicted to Jesus’. All we ever wanted was the presence of God in complete alignment and compliance to the Scriptures. Why, because we see that Word and Spirit are not working against each other, but are compliments to each other.

We need the Word to help us obtain and understand the Holy Spirit.

We need the Holy Spirit to give us the supernatural ability to live out the Word in our lives while appearing natural at the same time (and not be a Kharismatic Kook or a religious robot).

I’ve learned from my many years that you do have to discern and discern very hard. You have to seperate the tares from the wheat. You have to distinguish the kooky from the anointed.

Adrian was 100% correct when he stated that:

I seek my experience of God within the context of His revealed Word to us – not outside it.

Because that is the only way to see the majesty, sovereignity, and providence of God. It can not be seen through some ‘tingles’, not because sister so-and-so ran around the church, not because we cried when we sang the chrous of a favorite song for the thirty-fifth consecutive time like a mantra, not because it is diametrically reversed from the way the world does it, and not because ‘we did this crazy thing before and it caused a move, therefore, it works and we beter repeat it for a new move’. If it does not align with the Word, then it is not of God period.