My pastor was preaching last Sunday on heaven invading earth. He wants to see heaven poured out in our worship gatherings so that God’s presence would be so manifest that anything would be possible: salvations, healing, forgiveness, restoration, etc. “Not just fifteen minutes, but an hour and a half or even two hours of extended worship would see this start to happen…” At that point in the sermon I shouted out “TWENTY FOUR SEVEN”! He paused. “Okay! Now that’s faith! Who said that?” He asked, looking over in my direction. I raised my hand. He said “that’s good, that’s right on!” and went on with his message.

He seemed surprised it was me expressing such faith.  Perhaps, it was because him and I are having a friendly debate over the nature of reality and how God heals. My wife is a medical doctor. She believes healing is from God whether it comes supernaturally through prayer or naturally through medical skill. For her and I, one way is not necessarily better than the other way.

Our pastor disagrees, preferring a supernatural manifestation of healing. He is taking his cue from a book by Bill Johnson, Senior Pastor of Bethel Church in Redding California entitled When Heaven Invades Earth: A Practical Guide To A Life Of Miracles. Johnson’s states “our mandate is simple: raise up a generation that can openly display the raw power of God. This book is all about that journey… the quest for the King and His Kingdom.” (p.27, online here) 

As a member of a charismatic church, I believe the gifts of the Holy Spirit are a vital part of the ministry of the church. Healing is one of those gifts. I support and I have benefited from prayer for healing in all its various forms at our fellowship. I have personally seen God’s power at work in our congregation through prophetic utterances, physical manifestations and demonic deliverance. I believe that God is alive and aggressively active in establishing his kingdom on earth through his church.

So I enjoy hearing stories of “power encounters” as John Wimber used to describe them. This is when God’s power confronts, overwhelms and undoes demonic powers in the form of healing or deliverance. I attended a Wimber conference in Edmonton in 1989 in which the power of God was so manifest that it blew the electrical system, dimmed the lights  and brought the City emergency services to the building. I have been in prayer meetings and seen evangelistic gatherings where light bulbs blew out and street lamps fizzled and went dark. I believe in the visible tangible demonstration of God’s power.

Bill Johnson’s book is full of these stories and they are of great encouragement to the church. However, I take issue with the way in which he constructs his version of reality. David Ruis, one of the founding pastors of our church, spoke recently on a Sunday morning and one thing he said struck me as capturing this problem. Ruis said, “there is a gospel that can come that puts one thing down to elevate another and that’s always a temptation in the church.” This is what I see Johnson doing in his book.

In the Foreword to the book Jack Taylor sums up Johnson’s view on reality. 

“I love this book because it points us toward primary reality in a world almost totally preoccupied with secondary reality. The reader of Scripture is aware that it ultimately defines primary reality as “unseen and eternal” while secondary reality is temporal, that is, it doesn’t last (see 2 Cor. 4:18). Bill Johnson’s beliefs, teachings, and ministry center on primary or Kingdom reality and finds that reality sufficient to change the face of “that which is seen.” (p. 18, online here)

Here is Johnson’s description of the “primary reality”.

The invisible realm is superior to the natural. The reality of that invisible world dominates the natural world we live in…both positively and negatively. Because the invisible is superior to the natural, faith is anchored in the unseen…

Unbelief is anchored in what is visible or reasonable apart from God. It honors the natural realm as superior to the invisible. The apostle Paul states that what you can see is temporal, and what you can’t see is eternal. Unbelief is faith in the inferior. (p. 45, online here.)

For example, Johnson is fond of making the point that there is no cancer in heaven, so when heaven invades earth cancer must go!

“Real faith is not living in denial of the natural realm. If the doctor says you have a tumor, it’s silly to pretend that it’s not there. That’s not faith. However, faith is founded on a reality that is superior to that tumor. I can acknowledge the existence of a tumor and still have faith in the provision of His stripes for my healing…I was provisionally healed 2,000 years ago. It is the product of the kingdom of heaven—a superior reality. There are no tumors in heaven, and faith brings that reality into this one."

While I endorse the fact that there are “no tumors in heaven” and that there is healing in the atonement, and that the prayer of faith brings healing, I cannot endorse the language that divides reality into that which is ‘superior’ verses that which is ‘inferior’.

It is language that puts one thing down (the natural) in order to elevate another thing (the supernatural). It reflects a fundamental insecurity in our creatureliness, (the Latin ‘natura’ means ‘that which we are born with’) as if something is fundamentally wrong with who God made us to be, where God intends us to exist and how God intends us to work.

For example, Johnson contrasts the work of medical doctors with the work of God in telling the story about the healing of a man whose one leg was shorter than the other.

“When the surgeons put him back together, his leg was an inch too short. I had him sit down and encouraged both him and his wife to watch what God was about to do. I held his legs in such a way that they could see the problem and would be able to recognize any change. We commanded the leg to grow. It did. When he stood, he shifted his weight from side to side, almost as though he were trying on a new pair of shoes, saying, “Yeah, that’s about right.” The response of the unchurched is very matter of fact…and very refreshing. I asked him to walk across the room, which he did gladly, without a limp and without pain. God was at work. He replaced one inch of missing bone and removed all the pain caused by Luke’s accident.” (p. 26)

This is a wonderful story of God’s healing provision but as in many of these stories medicine is used as a foil in order to magnify the miracle. A foil is a person or a thing of inferior quality that contrasts with another thing so as to enhance its superior qualities. A swordsman cannot demonstrate his skill unless he has an opponent. In Johnson’s story, when the surgeons operated they left his leg one inch short. The implication is that their work was inadequate, even though they probably did an amazing job reconstructing his leg after a terrible accident.

So when I champion medicine as a means for God’s healing, I get strange looks from my fellow Charismatics who think I am just making excuses and that my problem is that I just don’t have faith for ‘super’ natural healing.  They see life as a stage with a big backdrop proclaiming the truth that “Jesus heals!” There are two chairs on the stage: one is labeled “faith”, the other is labeled, “unfaith”. Their goal is to get us as a church sitting in the chair labeled “faith” so that we can start walking in the supernatural experience of God’s presence and the resulting everyday miracles of God’s healing and provision.  

When I shouted out “Twenty Four Seven!”, some were surprised because they think I sit in the chair labeled “unfaith”. In actual fact, I am sitting in the “faith” chair, but the back drop behind me reads, “Jesus is risen from the dead!” which is the back drop that stands behind the one that reads, “Jesus heals!”  It is also the backdrop that stands behind all other Christian experiences, but especially the ones that read,  “disappointment” or “suffering” or even “death”.

No matter how much Bill Johnson is walking in the “raw power” of God for miracles, everyone who gets healed will eventually die. Heaven may invade earth for a moment in the prayer of faith for healing, or for fifteen minutes in a worship service. Cancer flees and a person is healed but eventually that person will die of something else. It is a sad fact that even though we can experience God’s power momentarily it does not last. Heaven invades earth but it never seems to stay. There is no heaven invading earth ‘twenty four seven’. Disappointment seems inevitable.

As the proverb says, “Hope deferred makes the heart sick…” (Proverbs 13:12) Charismatics often struggle secretly with disappointment. Not everyone we pray for gets healed. Not all the financial provision we believe for arrives.  The future revival we had hoped for never seems to materialize exactly the way we want. Anointed leaders fail to deliver on the promises they make.

Yet, there is one part of this created order where heaven has invaded earth -- twenty four seven! It is the resurrected body of Jesus. The body that Jesus was born with, that walked the dusty roads of Galilee, that was nailed to the cross on Good Friday, that lay in the tomb on the Sabbath, that arose from that tomb on Easter morning, that walked the road to Emmaus, that appeared to the disciples in the upper room, that ate fish and broke bread and that had holes in its hands and a wound in its side for him who needed to see it to believe. (John 20:27)

This is the one part of God’s created order where heaven and earth are ALREADY joined in an eternal union. Jesus is God’s sovereign claim on his creation that he is taking it back from sin and decay and corruption and death. Jesus is God’s beachhead into this world assuring us that creation has a hope and a future, that it will be redeemed, that one day all of creation will experience the glorious liberty of heaven invading earth twenty four seven. The earth WILL BE filled with the knowledge of the glory of God as the waters cover the sea. (Isaiah 11:9; Habakkuk 2:14)

I liken the life of faith to riding a bicycle. One needs two wheels to make it really work. Charismatics often ride only on the front wheel of a future hope. For example, Bill Johnson ends his book describing the future hope of a church triumphant. He says, “Understanding what is about to come is important, but not  to equip us to plan and strategize more effectively. On the contrary, it’s important to understand God’s promise and purpose for the church so that we might become dissatisfied – so that we will become desperate…” (p. 177) Desperate for the glorious church that God is about to bring into existence. Desperate to pray and intercede and hope for what God is about to do.

I have paced back and forth in early morning prayer meetings crying out to God for revival. I have sat in the large gatherings where leaders have dealt us one revival hope after another. The problem is that it all rides on what God WILL do with little mention of what God has ALREADY done. Riding on the front wheel only makes for an unstable ride. Too often that future hope gets dashed against the hard rock of deep disappointment. 

This is where the two disciples were on the road to Emmaus in Luke’s account of the resurrection. Just like us, they believed in a future hope of what God was going to do. Also, just like us, they had experienced deep disappointment when their hopes were dashed by the crucifixion of their hoped for Saviour. So when the stranger asked them what they were discussing, they were surprised he had not heard about Jesus of Nazareth.   

Then one of them, named Cleopas, answered him, "Are you the only visitor to Jerusalem who does not know the things that have happened there in these days?" And he said to them, "What things?" And they said to him, "Concerning Jesus of Nazareth, who was a prophet mighty in deed and word before God and all the people, and how our chief priests and rulers delivered him up to be condemned to death, and crucified him. But we had hoped that he was the one to redeem Israel. Yes, and besides all this, it is now the third day since this happened. Moreover, some women of our company amazed us. They were at the tomb early in the morning and did not find his body; and they came back saying that they had even seen a vision of angels, who said that he was alive. Some of those who were with us went to the tomb, and found it just as the women had said; but him they did not see."  (Luke 24:18-24)

Then Jesus opened the Scriptures to them, explaining to them a better hope so that  their hearts burned within them. Now they were riding on two wheels -- a hope realized in the person of the risen Jesus and a hope yet to be realized in the future consummation of the Kingdom. Now they had a back wheel to give their faith traction. Now they could go places. Now their task was to announce this good news to the world. And so they rushed back to Jerusalem to tell the other disciples, with a joy “inexpressible and full of glory.” (1 Peter 1:8)

The point about the Kingdom of God is that it is a LIVING hope! (1 Peter 1:3) A hope already realized in the death and resurrection of Jesus – It is a hope fulfilled. A hope that is “at hand.” It is God’s future, already present in our past, grounding and giving traction to our hope for the future.

As the missiologist Lesslie Newbigin once said,

“Hope is, in the New Testament, a very strong word. It does not denote (as it does in contemporary English) merely a strong desire for something which may or may not happen in the future. It is rather an unshakeable assurance about what the future holds. It is the anchor of the soul, firmly secured in that which is beyond our sight but which is the real future. It therefore furnishes us with the criteria for determining all action in the immediate present.

This absolute confidence about the future is grounded in the fact that Jesus, the living word of God present as a man in the midst of our human history, who had been rejected, humiliated, condemned to the death of an enemy of God, dead, buried and sealed in the tomb, had been raised from the dead victorious over all the powers of death and hell. That fact, that finished work which is now part of history and therefore irreversible, is the pledge that, beyond all the temporary victories of evil, the ultimate future belongs to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. And that fact must determine all our thinking and planning and doing in the passing present. All thinking and planning and doing which supposes another future for the human race is folly.”[i]

Belief in the resurrection is what will back stop Bill Johnson’s dream for a healing revival. As well, belief in the resurrection affirms our creatureliness as God given and good. Both the fact we can see miracles in ministry and the fact we can make a difference in people’s lives through ordinary work are grounded in the living hope of the resurrection. This is because both are manifestations of God’s Spirit at work. It was the Holy Spirit that raised Jesus from the dead (Romans 8:11). It is the power of that Spirit that will bring healing to our church. It is the power of the Spirit that transforms our everyday lives.

So here is my attempt to reconcile my thinking with Bill Johnson’s views on reality. Instead of dividing reality into the supernatural and the natural, let’s focus on what drives the outcome. If it is the Holy Spirit that drives the outcome than whether or not it is ‘super’ natural or just plain natural is less important.  We don’t need to be insecure about our natural abilities when God’s Spirit is driving those abilities to do God’s work.

From this view, there’s not as much pressure to demonstrate it’s a supernatural event. For example, healing arrived at through good medicine driven by the Holy Spirit qualifies as God at work; whereas, in the supernatural/natural approach, it does not. Witch doctors may manifest supernatural power for healing but it is not driven by the Holy Spirit so it does not qualify as God at work even though it may be a supernatural occurrence.

By viewing things by what powers them, you include all sorts of everyday work, that from the supernatural view would not qualify as God at work, but which most Christians experience. Instead of raising the bar of faith to a supernatural height such that only a few can testify to jumping over it, why not lower it right down to the natural level and make the power that drives the action the concern and not the outcome. That way you get more of the church believing that God is at work in their everyday lives as his Holy Spirit powers them to go about their daily business. You may even get more supernatural happenings because God delights to surprise us when we are least expecting it as the Bible testifies over and over again.

For example, I was on a plane trip to Vancouver from Kelowna. I was sitting beside a lady who was a Professor of Organizational Behavior in the Business department of our local college. I mentioned to her that we had just started a medical clinic. (See Making Soup at a Medical Clinic for that story.)  We had been quite intentional with our vision and core values so as to create a positive work environment. She was interested in our organizational culture so she invited me to visit her business class and share our story. I thought about that for a moment and I replied, “Sure, but before I do that why don’t you visit our clinic and if you notice a difference than you can invite me.” She answered, “Well, I have already been to your clinic. My brother-in-law is handicapped and when we arrived he could not get out of our vehicle. So I went into the clinic and asked if the doctor would not mind coming out to the car and doing the examination there. He did that and I was very impressed with him and your clinic.” I thought to myself that 99 out of 100 doctors would probably have said no, but at our clinic we are powered by God’s Spirit. Miracles may have impressed her more, but she experienced the compassionate touch of heaven through extraordinary patient care by one of our physicians. This is as much God at work as a miraculous healing. This is what heaven invading earth looks like in the everyday life of a medical clinic.

So in conclusion, for us to move forward in this Christian life, we need to be riding on a bicycle of faith that has as its back wheel, providing the traction for forward momentum, the realized hope of the resurrection of Jesus, the one part of creation in which heaven ALREADY occupies earth twenty four seven. As well, we need the front wheel of the glorious hope for our future in Christ. Finally, we need the Holy Spirit who is the one who powers the bicycle forward. It is the Holy Spirit who is writing the history of the church, who is bringing heaven to earth as Bill Johnson describes it in his book. So instead of using the language of a superior or inferior reality, I think the contrast should rather be between the Spirit powered life of faith or a fleshly/soulish powered life of human self centredness. Rather than being insecure about our creatureliness, we can be secure in the resurrection of Jesus and that the gift of the Holy Spirit is now operating in our created order bringing signs of God’s future into the present as much through normal  everyday Christian experience as through miraculous Christian experience.

UPDATE:

Here are two other articles I have written on the resurrection: