Power

This morning, as I walked behind my power mower, I had the power turned on on my iPhone and was listening to some new Christian music. The music was actually quite good, and I was enjoying it a great deal. Then I noticed one word sort of showing up in various places, repeated and repeated again.

The word? You might have guessed -- power.

There's power in your name, Jesus.

There's power in the blood. 

No one else is as powerful as our God.

And on it went. Power.  And more than that, asking God to empower us, fill us with power, and so on. In other words, the songs repeatedly asked for power.

Well, of course, I thought. We want power. We hate to feel powerless. (I know I did when my mower quit working and needed to rest before running again.) So we ask for power. We expect power. We want God to show up in powerful ways. And more than that, we want God to give us power. And we assume he will give us worldly, political or other forms of power that we know. 

Yes, Jesus did promise that the Spirit would bring power (Acts 1), but not for our own sake. The Spirit was going to bring power and does bring power so that we can be witnesses, so that we can can share about Jesus with others. He doesn't bring us "power for living" or "power to be the boldest" or even "power for worship." He brings us power for witnessing and power over evil things so that they will not interfere with our witness.

Because Jesus never said, "Blessed are the powerful." Read the Gospels over and over and you'll never find that. Instead you'll find him saying things like...

Blessed are the meek. 

Blessed are those who mourn. 

Blessed are the poor in spirit. 

Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness. 

Blessed are those who are persecuted. 

Blessed are the merciful, the peacemakers, and the pure in heart (Matthew 5).

Is our focus on power more a symptom of our culture than it is of a transformed heart? When was the last time we prayed to be more merciful, to be more meek, to be pure in heart....or to be persecuted? In other words, when was the last time you and I prayed for the real blessings of God rather than what we think we want?

Every time the church has had "real" power, the Gospel has been perverted. The Crusades, Charlemagne, the Inquisition....and so on. Charlemagne himself gave the conquered people a choice: conversion or beheading. Power does not suit our faith well.

Jesus promised power when we set out to spread the good news across the world. For all other times he called us to seek the true blessings that come to the meek, the poor, the powerless. Do we want to be blessed? Really?