"Behold I stand at the door and knock" ~ Revelations 3:20
It's not like we've locked Him out, its more like we've pulled Him aside to give Him some advice. "You see Lord, Your Gospel and methods just aren't working, and in our opinion there are three good reasons. 1.Your methods and Gospel are outmoded, 2. Out dated, and 3. Have become irrelevant. As a society we've moved on. Your methods back then may have worked for Peter and Paul; but look around Lord, it isn't working today. Now that we have your attention Lord, what would You suggest?"
We need your "help" on this. We're willing to help Lord but things have to change.
Indeed, is "help from us" the problem ... God lacking our help? Since when has God needed man's help? Could that be the problem? Man integrating himself in God's Divine business?
Remember, way back, God created man ... we didn't create God. gods yes, but God no.
God's Gospel of grace was totally a God thing.
The creation of the Church was totally a God thing.
The Holy Spirit is a God thing, a Divine phenomena. God and God only power!
God will work through what He chooses, or whom He chooses. God and man, or God and angels for that matter are not co-equal! God and man have never been partners in a joint venture, God just doesn't work that way. Where do we get the idea that God and man are involved in a joint venture of spreading the Gospel and planting His Divine Churches?
We might best sit in the beautiful shrine of an empty cathedral and reflect on ... why God has failed in His quest to advance His Gospel throughout the world. Reflect on why the Church hasn't grown? The deadness and smell of death in the Cathedral should give us some answers. The tower of Babel or beautiful cathedral in all of it's beauty both smell of man.
Man has done his best only to find he has contaminated he very Gospel he preaches, God came to save and change man never to partner with man.
Could it be so simply said: God's desire is to work "through" man, never "with" man! ... or God, forbid, "for" man!
