Subject: Advice on how it should not be practiced |
Bible Note: I totally disagree with you or anyone who acvocates this practice.Those who advocate this practice need to consider what they are really attributing to the Holy Spirit. There is no Biblical precedent for being “slain in the Spirit” as we see practiced today. Jesus is the baptizer, who anoints with the Holy Spirit. The power really comes only from Christ, just what are people receiving through this experience? Do these displays of power become the convincing proof of God’s presence? John 10:41-42 records, “Then many came to Him and said, ‘John performed no sign, but all the things that John spoke about this Man were true.’ And many believed in Him there.” John convinced the people without a display of miracles. It was the truth that converted them and made them into followers. It is by knowing the truth (the Word) that keeps people following faithfully, not displays of power. We don’t need to be slain “in the Spirit”, but cut “by the Spirit,” the Word (John 6:63; Hebrews 4:12). One way is by expositional preaching the other is offered by experience. One comes by the Word that is objective, that teaches and convicts through the Holy Spirit, the other is subjective, by a person touching you or imparting a power. The Word is Biblical, the other is not. The only way to know the true from the false is to test it. Jesus had the greatest anointing, yet, when He prayed for people they did not fall over; neither did Jesus go down when He was anointed. The Spirit came upon him as a dove, as a gentle companion. This phenomena and practice is foreign to Scripture. Can the Holy Spirit be thrown around like a force? This Spirit goes where the conductor tells Him to go. Biblically we are to submit and take our guidance from the Spirit, this is the opposite. Jesus taught that the Holy Spirit goes where He will, He chooses how He will be known in the heart and life of a believer, and it is not for any man to decide when His abiding in another is to be. In John 3:8 we read, “The wind blows where it pleases, and you hear the sound thereof, but cannot not tell where it came, and where it goes: so is every one that is born of the Spirit.” No one knows where the Spirit comes from or where the Spirit goes. The Spirit is likened to the wind. Those who can dispense the anointing seem to tell the Spirit where to go and know where He will go next and what He or “it” will do. Think, my friend! Where do we find these experiences? Even the apostles did not have such experiences! |