I want to see the Church Part 3 (6-10)

1. I want to see the Church led by the Holy Spirit.
   
   It's so tempting to listen to the people. There's a temptation to run the church as a democracy where the majority rules. In John 3 Jesus taught, "Flesh gives birth to flesh, but the Spirit gives birth to spirit." The majority rules mentality sure seems to run a high risk of flesh giving birth to flesh.
   
   
2. I want to see the Church empowered by the Holy Spirit.
   I believe Jesus Christ intended for us to be a force to be reckoned with. In the promise of the Holy Spirit, Jesus said we would receive POWER (read Acts 1), and we read of powerful and miraculous displays of the Holy Spirit through the disciples in the early church (read the rest of Acts). I almost titled this point "I want to see the church practicing the spiritual gifts," but I'm afraid much of us have bought into what I might call "charisphobia" where we've seen abuse of the the gifts. If that's you, please refer back to point one. I want to see us LED BY the Holy Spirit. In any abuse of the gifts I have witnessed, it boils down to a person seeking to lead the Holy Spirit (impose His move) rather than being LED BY (respond to His move).
   I once heard a prominent youth pastor say to a large gathering of youth pastors, "Teach on the Spiritual gifts. I know some of you are from denominations or backgrounds that would say otherwise, but the spiritual gifts are biblical... of course, that may be why some of you aren't teaching the gifts!"
   
   
3. I want to see the Church as ONE.
   Jesus wanted it. In fact he prayed for it... "My prayer is not for them alone. I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message, that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me. " (John 17:20-21)
   Sometimes I wonder if doctrine is the biggest obstacle getting in the way of truly seeing a major outbreak of revival. We must be one in Jesus Christ. Is that not enough? I think it can be when the Holy Spirit is in charge.
   
   
4. I want to see the Church emphasize sin holistically.
   We love to emphasize the ten commandments in the church, and we should. But did you ever notice how the majority of the commandments are "Do Nots". In fact 8 of the 10 commandments tells us not to do something. 2 (honor the sabbath and honor your father and mother) are "do" commandments.
   About 2 years ago, I was introduced to the thought of sins of commission and sins of omission.
   Sins of commission would be those things we "do" where God's challenge is "do not."
   Sins of ommission would be those things we "do not" do where God has challenged us to "do."
   In fact, if you really consider the 10 commandments, they are all rooted in the greatest commandment that Jesus laid out in Matthew 22:37-40 (Love God, Love your neighbor), which is a challenge against sins of omission. I want to see us challenging each other toward both what we ought to be doing as well as what we ought not to be doing.
   
   
5. I want to see the Church known for what we're for as well as what we're against.
   This ties right in with my thought above, but wouldn't it be great if a nonbeliever were to look at the Church and say, "Oh ya, you're those people that value love, grace and forgiveness. You're the ones who believe it is important to look after orphans and widows."
   At the same time, I want it to be known that the church stands against pornography, abortion , and homosexuality. Yet, we're against pornography because we are for valuing people and having a healthy view of sex. We're against abortion because we are for life. We're disagree with homosexuality because we are for God's design for relationships.