What are your expectations?

I started reading this book called "The Forgotten God" by Francis Chan today. He said something that was very interesting to me.

“If you or I had never been to church before and had only read the Old and New Testament; we would have significant expectations of the Holy Spirit in our lives!”

While I understand there is a tad bit of irony in reading that in his book, it still drives home the point of how civilized the church has become (It’s ironic because, had I only read the bible I would have never read his book.)

Our expectation of the Holy Spirit is very low if not non-existent. He mentioned that if you have a charismatic speaker, a good worship band, and some hip, creative events, people will attend your church. I don’t think it’s bad to have those things, but I also think that there should be things that happen at your church that cannot be explained by lights, smoke and mirrors. Jesus said “Greater things than this you will do!”

This reminds me of a book I read when I first became passionate about the Lord called “The Barbarian way.” The main theme expressed in that book is abandon safety, and stand in the gap for Jesus Christ. A friend of mine once said “If you want to see the miracles of God; you will need the Red Sea in front of you and the Pharaoh’s army behind you.”

I said all of that to say this…What are your expectations of the Holy Spirit? Are they limited to what only man can do? Or can God only do it? Greater things than this you will do…