God and the Institutional Church By Kathryn Kuhlman
God and the Institutional Church
If our institutional churches are to be the kind of churches God wants them to be, if they are to carry out the work, the purpose of the Church, they must open their eyes and realize the day and the hour in which we are living.
We’ve come to the place where the world is literally challenging the Church.
The youth of this generation have every right to challenge the institutional church.
Yet this could well be the finest hour of the institutional church.
If only they could realize it.
But the Church must do something about the Holy Spirit.
The institutional church must realize we are still living in the day of Pentecost.
The institutional church must not close its eyes and say, “We will accept only a portion of God’s Word, and forget the rest.”
This comes from the highest authority in Heaven and Earth.
For to this glorious body of believers that we call the Church, Jesus gave the gift of the Holy Spirit.
Jesus had been talking to the Father, referring to this body of believers saying, “These that Thou hast given to Me.”
And before Jesus went away, He gave to the Church the greatest gift it was possible for Him to give: the mighty third person of the Trinity.
The same gift the Father gave to the Son, the Son in turn gave to His own.
Long before God gave His only begotten Son, long before Jesus came in the form of flesh to carry out redemption’s plan, the Word of God says He first offered himself through the Holy Spirit to be given.
He knew the Holy Spirit better than you, better than I, will ever know the Holy Spirit.
He knew the Holy Spirit.
He knew the power.
He knew He could not go in His own strength, for He was coming to earth in the form of flesh.
He would soon become as much man as though He were not God.
In perfect knowledge and perfect wisdom, He knew that the hour would come when He would have to stand face to face with satan.
He knew that unless He had the glorious power of the Holy Spirit as He walked the earth, He would be powerless in the face of the enemy.
He knew it.
He recognized it.
That’s the reason I say to every minister who stands behind the sacred desk, if Jesus the very Son of the living God needed the Holy Spirit, surely you and I need Him also.
Don’t be afraid of the Holy Spirit.
Don’t be afraid of the power of the Holy Ghost in your ministry.
Jesus trusted Him.
Jesus had confidence in Him, and He did not fail Jesus.
That is the reason before Jesus went away, the very last thing He did was to give this gift to His Church, this great body of believers.
And He said, “Ye shall receive power.”
To whom was He speaking?
Not the unbeliever, but to His own.
“And ye shall receive power, after that the Holy Ghost is come upon you.” What power?
The same power that was manifested in His ministry.
There was no greater gift ever given to the Church than the gift that Jesus gave—the Holy Spirit, this mighty third person of the Trinity.
The hour has now come for every minister to come face-to-face with the Holy Spirit.
That’s the reason I say this could be the finest hour of the institutional church.
But if the institutional church will not accept the Holy Ghost, will not accept the manifestations of the Spirit, then, my friends, the Holy Spirit will continue His work in spite of the institutional church.
He will carry out God’s plan outside of the institutional church.
But it should not be that way.
The institutional church should be so powerful that when the world challenges it, when unregenerated man challenges it—it can reply with God’s miracles.
God grant that the ministers of the gospel seek God’s best and give the members of their churches the deep truths of the Spirit.
We are living in a great hour.
God is literally pouring out His Spirit upon all flesh.
We are on the threshold of the greatest spiritual awakening, the greatest revival, in the history of the world.
But only those who have spiritual ears will hear.
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