Richard Owen Roberts, President and Founding Director, International Awakening Ministries, may be the greatest historian, theological and practical leader of revival in our contemporary day. Though now in the sunset years of his life, he has given himself to the study and witness of revival, reformation, and/or spiritual awakening.
I am doing a four-part series that begin Tuesday using his material. Click here to see yesterday's and Tuesday's entry is here. Here is today's entry.
God’s Manifest Presence
The manifest presence of God is an altogether different matter. Manifest means palpable or evident to the eye, mind or judgment—thus obvious or felt. Moses in the burning bush encountered God’s manifest presence as did the Apostle John on the Isle of Patmos. An impressive number of passages in Scripture speak of God drawing near and of God distancing Himself. A classic illustration is found in the incident of the golden calf in Exodus 32-33. God first warns Moses that He is about to utterly destroy the people because of their sin (32:10). As a result of Moses’ intercession, God then threatens to send an angel before them but not go with them Himself lest He destroy them on the way because they are a stiff- necked people (32:34; 33:5). As a result of Moses’ further inter- cession, God says, “My presence shall go with you...,” to which Moses responds, “If Thy presence does not go with us, do not lead us up from here. For how then can it be known that I have found favor in Thy sight, I and Thy people? Is it not by Thy going with us so that we, I and Thy people, may be distinguished from all the other people who are upon the face of the earth?” (33:14-16).
The manifest presence of God in their midst is that which distinguishes Christians from all the other peoples on the face of the earth. Moses knew that because of sin, the people of God were about to lose the one thing that distinguished them from all others. Sin always separates people from God’s manifest presence. God never allows His manifest presence in those who cling to their sin. This is powerfully demonstrated in Isaiah 63:7- 64:12. Read it carefully! Notice these urgent portions:
63:10 “But they rebelled and grieved His Holy Spirit; therefore He turned Himself to become their enemy, He fought against them.”
63:15 “Look down from heaven, and see from Thy holy and glorious habitation; where are Thy zeal and Thy mighty deeds? The stirrings of Thy heart and Thy compassions are restrained toward me.”
63:17 “Why, O Lord, dost Thou cause us to stray from Thy ways, and harden our hearts from fearing Thee? Return for the sake of Thy servants...”
63:19 “We have become like those over whom Thou hast never ruled, like those who were not called by Thy name.”
64:12 “Wilt Thou restrain Thyself at these things, O Lord? Wilt Thou keep silent and afflict us beyond measure?”
Isaiah is painfully aware that God’s people are under the righteous judgment of God. These righteous judgments can be either remedial or final. A final judgment involves death and/ or destruction and does not normally prompt one to repentance. The account of Ananias and Sapphira in Acts five provides a tragic illustration of such a final judgment. Isaiah, however, is dealing with a people who have fallen under God’s remedial judgment. A remedial judgment provides time, opportunity and promptings toward repentance. God sends remedial judgments to turn His people back to Himself. Isaiah’s prayer in 64:1-4 clearly indicates his hope.
Another very helpful portion of Scripture is found in Judges 2-16. Something of an outline of
a frequent pattern is portrayed in chapter two:
a. The people begin in a right relationship with God and are blessed.
b. They sin and do not repent
c. God brings them under a righteous judgment
d. When the judgment is too heavy to bear, they cry to the Lord for deliverance
e. When their cry is truly from their hearts, God raises up a judge/deliverer, and they are returned to a place of blessing. This pattern occurs seven times in the next four- teen chapters.
God has an infinite variety of remedial judgments at his disposal. The passages in Isaiah and Judges help us to understand this. Joel (1-2) describes a terrible plague of locusts. Jeremiah (13) speaks of spiritual drunkenness. However, among the many remedial judgments that God may utilize, none appear to be more frequently utilized than the withdrawal of His manifest presence. Every indication is that across this nation right now tens of thousands of churches are under that precise judgment. The proof is in the fact that when the manifest presence of God is withdrawn from a church or society, sin mounts up.
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