BVOV Magazine 2013 - present

those people. I'm just saying that tells me we have a problem in the Body of Christ. Not everyone realizes that, although we're supposed to have a good time when we get together, church meetings and services are not just for our entertainment. They're sacred assemblies where we honor God and participate with Him as He carries out His plans and purposes in people's lives. They're gatherings meant to be marked by a corporate sense of the reverential fear of the Lord. "But Gloria," someone might say, "I've always thought of the fear of the Lord as an Old Testament concept. Does it really apply to us as New Testament believers?" Absolutely! It not only applies to us, but we should be known for it. We should be like the believers in the early Church. Acts 9:31 says they were edifi ed and multiplied, "walking in the fear of the Lord, and in the comfort of the Holy Ghost." Notice, according to that verse, even in New Testament times the power of the Spirit and the fear of the Lord go together. They work hand in hand. Therefore, if we want to experience an increasing measure of the Holy Spirit's supernatural comfort and power, we must make sure we're walking in the reverence of the Lord. "How do we cultivate that kind of reverence?" you might ask. How do we overcome the pull of our fl esh and its tendency to distract us? How do we discipline our physical body so that, whether we're in our prayer time at home or assembled with other believers at church, we can give God the honor and the undivided attention He deserves? One way we do it is by practicing. An Uncomfortable Dilemma Our physical body is trained by practice. It's naturally wired to develop habits as a result of doing things over and over. Think about what you were like before you were born again and you'll understand what I mean. As an unbeliever, you had a habit of sinning. You B V O V : 2 9 didn't have to try real hard to do it. You could sin without even thinking about it because you'd practiced all your life. You were well developed in it. When you put your faith in Jesus, although your spirit instantly became a new creation, your body didn't. It still had the same old bad habits you'd practiced when you were in your unsaved condition. As a result, in the early days of your Christian life, while your heart was pulling you toward the things of God your fl esh was still pulling you in the opposite direction. That's a very uncomfortable way to live! When we're fi rst born again, it presents all of us as believers with a real dilemma. The Word of God, however, gives us the solution. It says, "Walk in the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfi l the lust of the fl esh" (Galatians 5:16). When we practice walking in the spirit, we turn the habit-forming bent of our body to our advantage. By spending time every day in fellowship with God, praying and feeding on His Word and doing what He says, we retrain Church meetings and services are not just for our entertainment. They're sacred assemblies where we honor God and participate with Him." "

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