The Supernatural Life of the Believer

I had a former student complain to me recently that the problem with ‘some charismatics’ is that they see a demon behind every tree as if every event was somehow supernatural. The real problem is, of course, that every event is supernatural, at least if we are doing it right and really, even if we aren’t. But I understand the sentiment because, after all, the supernatural appears to us as vague and indistinct. Our bacon and eggs in the morning; those are real. The gentle nudge of the Holy Spirit, maybe not so much.

But all of Christianity hinges on a supernatural reality that leads to another supernatural reality. After all, Christianity started with a dead body brought back to life. And not just any dead body; the body of the son of God, Himself. So if you cannot get over that hurdle, then you really cannot embark on the next reality; incarnation.

And incarnation is the aim of every believer. What is incarnation? It is the indwelling of Jesus Christ in the person of the Holy Spirit in our very spirit, soul, and body, transforming and sanctifying us until we become like Him. A visiting pastor posed the question of why the incarnation is so important. What is the purpose? he asked. My mind went blank for a moment. I had thought incarnation was the goal.

His answer was that we might make the true nature of God known to the universe. God, whom no one has ever seen face to face, dwelling as He does in unapproachable light, created us first to know Him. The fall interrupted that. So Jesus came to make Him known, and through Jesus, we know Him and are called to go forth and proclaim who He is. That is, make Him known to those who have not yet come in contact with Him.

Our job as Christians is to make the supernatural accessible to everyone we come into contact with.

But in order for this to become possible, we must change our ideas about ultimate reality. I read recently that one of the problematic paradoxes in physics is that the more that is discovered, the clearer it becomes that we are simply inadequate observers. We simply do not possess enough senses to ‘see’ the universe accurately. There are dimensions that we can only guess at. The gap between what is known and what is knowable increases exponentially.

The truth about ultimate reality is that this material plane in which we live our everyday lives is insubstantial compared to God.

The only way I know how to see this is when Jesus is walking around after His resurrection. He appears and disappears at will. He walks through walls. But He has a physical body because He eats fish. His interaction with what we consider genuine reality is as if He is more real than the wall through which He nonchalantly walked. Walls feel pretty real to me as I have had the misfortune to walk through a few.

So the Christian has an interesting task. We walk the earth but sit in the heavens beside God the Father. I toyed with the notion of naming this post Five Ways to Incarnate Christ but realized I know of only one. Utter surrender. The only way to incarnate Jesus in your life so that the world understands that when they see you, they see Him, is utter surrender.

And He gives us so many ways to learn this submission, doesn’t He? This visiting pastor mentioned all the submission in the Bible; wives to husbands, slaves to owners, children to parents, citizens to leaders. And all these to give us a chance to practice the real submission; to God as the author and finisher of our faiths. But our example of surrender is clear. Jesus surrendered everything to God for us. He didn’t die for our sins. He became our sin. Another supernatural reality.

And so if in that surrender, we are urged to love our enemies, obey evil masters, and submit to even death, we do so because we are incarnating the true nature of God in the world. And by the way, that surrender includes every moral choice we make. If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth (ultimate reality) is not in us. The reason we do not incarnate Christ is that we are not willing to surrender our bodies and minds to Him. Surrender has many levels.

And if you have taken all those steps to enter into the supernatural realities of Christianity, is it too much further to believe in a spiritual realm?

The disciples did not seem to think so. Angels populate the Bible, as do evil entities. In my fifteen years of training and practicing within various inner healing modalities, I get asked about deliverance a lot. The questions usually are phrased in what do I think people should do to get free; prayer ministry, generational deliverance, counseling, medication, fellowship, worship, etc. My answer is to throw everything at the issue and see what sticks.

But my point in this post is simple. Union requires two separate agents. In order to become one with God, or to incarnate Him, we must reach outside of our natural comfort zones. You cannot be a Christian and live as if reality is only what you see. You live in a big universe, most of which you cannot see. And your only hope of navigating the supernatural is to accept the guidance of the Holy Spirit in you. For Him, the powers and principalities, the living creatures, the cherubim and seraphim, and each angel that guards our steps are more concrete than the hard granite which forms mountains.

After all, those solid mountains will one day roll up like a scroll.

Oh, and that is another big supernatural leap the believer must make. We do not rest easy here because we know that we journey through a strange land on our way to an eternal home.

Ask the Father what areas in your life He would like you to surrender. I promise you won’t miss it once you have allowed Him to fill that empty space you were trying to fill on your own. Besides, to deny Him entrance to any area is to deny the living light a chance to heal and make right what we so painfully bear. Come take a walk on the supernatural side. You will find it is hard to go back.

Want more of the supernatural in your life? These books help but remember, just because you don’t necessarily agree with everything in a book doesn’t mean that it can’t teach you something important:

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The Care and Feeding of the Human Spirit