Slain in the Spirit

ost of you have seen this phenomena occur in the charismatic churches. This is where you see pastors or ministers laying hands on people, usually on their foreheads, and then they fall backwards. The charismatics have named this phenomena as being "Slain in the Spirit." Some people call it "Falling in the Spirit" or "Resting in the Spirit."

Is this a real phenomenon? If it is - is it really God operating through the power of the Holy Spirit, or is it demonic spirits trying to masquerade as the power of Holy Spirit coming onto someone? There are many Christians and Christian groups who are really attacking this phenomena.

I’ll go ahead and give you the main Scripture verses where this phenomena is coming from. I’ll then give you some of the main arguments of those Christians who are against this phenomena and I’ll then end this article with my own personal opinions as to why I think this phenomena is a true manifestation from the Lord.

The Scripture Verses

Here are the main verses from Scripture showing people falling to the ground whenever God would manifest His presence to different people. The first verse is from the Original King James Version of the Bible, the rest are from the New King James Version.

1. "... that then the house was filled with a cloud, even the house of the Lord; so that the priests could not stand to minister by reason of the cloud; for the glory of the Lord had filled the house of God." (2 Chronicles 5:14)
    
2. Jesus said to them, "I am He." And Judas, who betrayed Him, also stood with them. Then when He said to them. "I am He," - they drew back and fell to the ground." (John 18:6)
    
3. "And when I saw Him, I fell at His feet as dead. But He laid His right hand on me, saying to me, "Do not be afraid; I am the First and the Last." (Revelation 1:17)
    
4. "And when the disciples heard it, they fell on their faces and were greatly afraid." But Jesus came and touched them and said, "Arise, and do not be afraid." (Matthew 17:6)
    
5. "And as he journeyed he came near Damascus, and suddenly a light shone around him from heaven. Then he fell to the ground, and heard a voice saying to him, "Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting Me?" (Acts 9:3-4)
    
6. "So I arose and went out into the plain, and behold, the glory of the Lord stood there, like the glory which I saw by the River Chebar; and I fell on my face." (Ezekiel 3:23)
    
7. "Then the Lord opened Balaam’s eyes, and he saw the Angel of the Lord standing in the way with His drawn sword in His hand; and he bowed his head and fell flat on his face." (Numbers 22:31)
    
8. "And behold, the glory of the God of Israel came from the way of the east. His voice was like the sound of many waters; and the earth shone with His glory. It was like the appearance of the vision which I saw - like the vision which I saw when I came to destroy the city. The visions were like the vision which I saw by the River Chebar; and I fell on my face." (Ezekiel 43:2-3)
    
9. "Then He brought me by way of the north gate to the front of the temple; so I looked, and behold, the glory of the Lord filled the house of the Lord; and I fell on my face." (Ezekiel 44:4)

Now I will give you some of the arguments being made by those who are against this phenomena and then some of my own arguments as to why I believe this a real manifestation from the Lord.

Arguments Against Being Slain in the Spirit

The Christians who argue against this phenomena really being from the Lord base their arguments on the following reasons:

• Every time people fell when the presence of God would manifest - they would always fall on their faces, not fall backward.
   
• Nowhere in the Bible do the prophets, the apostles, or Jesus Himself ever lay hands on someone and then the power of God comes through their hands to knock them backward.
   
• The only time people fell in the presence of God was when God was rendering some type of judgment.

Now to some arguments that will counter some of the above arguments if you should ever need them in any kind of debate.

Arguments For Being Slain in the Spirit

I’ll take each one of the above arguments and see if I can give you an opposing point of view in order to try and defend this phenomena as being from the Lord.

1.  The First Argument - people always falling face down rather than falling backwards. Granted, 5 of the above 9 verses specifically state that these people had fallen on their faces rather than falling backward.

However, the other 4 verses say they simply "fell to the ground," or that they "could not stand" when the presence of God would manifest. Who is to say that when these people fell to the ground, they could not have been falling backwards. These verses do not say if they fell forward or backward, so I believe this means they could have fallen either way - thus showing that there was the possibility of falling backwards when the presence of God would manifest.

The first verse says that the priests "could not stand" when the manifest presence of God would enter into the temple. Again, they could have easily as been falling backwards as well as falling forward. Since Scripture does not specifically say in which direction they were falling, I believe we are on safe ground making the assumption that these other 4 verses give us the possibility of people falling backwards whenever the presence of God would manifest.

2.  The Second Argument - stating that at no time did Jesus or the apostles ever lay hands on people causing them fall backwards. Though I could not find any actual Scripture verses that did show this phenomena occurring as it does today by the laying on of hands - I feel the key argument for the possibility of this phenomena occurring is the following argument:

Sometimes when the presence of God would manifest like described in the above verses, people did fall to the ground. No question about it. However, other times God would manifest His presence and people would not fall to the ground. This was thus a manifestation that was completely controlled by God. He, and He alone, would decide when people would get knocked to the ground and when they would not whenever He would manifest His presence.

I think the key point to grab a hold of is that this phenomena can occur when God does decide to manifest His presence in this particular way. And sometimes God will manifest His presence through the hands of a pastor or minister. And if He does decide to manifest His presence through the hands of a minister, then I believe it is only logical to conclude that God can knock people to the ground like He did back in the Bible days if He chooses to do so.

There is no question that the manifest presence of God is coming through a pastor or minister when hands are being laid on someone for a healing. The manifest presence and power of God will literally flow through the hands of the pastor or minister - flow into the person’s body and then the Holy Spirit Himself will do the healing once inside the person’s body.

If "healing power" can come through a minister’s hands - then why not "knockdown power?" God can either knock someone over with a direct hit or through the hands of someone who is operating under His anointing at any given moment. I believe God can and does go either way with this particular manifestation.

3.  The Third Argument - God only knocked people down when rendering some type of judgment on them. Look closely at the above 9 verses. It was only on the apostle Paul that God was rendering judgment on when He knocked him to the ground. The others were priests of the temple, prophets like Ezekiel and John the Revelator, or the apostles themselves. None of them were under direct judgment when this phenomena was occurring.

Conclusions

This manifestation of God’s power can either come directly at you very lightly where you just start to lose your balance and then proceed to fall. Or it can come at you very strongly to the point where you cannot resist it and you are literally blown to the ground. When this happens, it looks like a cannonball is hitting someone right in the stomach and they fall backwards with a fair amount of force. God decides how strong He will manifest this kind of power when He does decide to manifest it on someone.

Granted, there will always be some people in a church service that will be falling backwards out of their own flesh. The power of God is not causing them to fall backward. They just want to be part of the crowd and they will fall backward on their own. However, you cannot throw out the baby with the bathwater on this manifestation just because some people will always choose to act out of their flesh.

2.  So what happens when people are slain in the Spirit? Sometimes just a nice, restful, peaceful, relaxed feeling will come over the person. Sometimes people can receive inner and/or outer healings while resting in the Spirit. Some people can receive visions, instructions or advice from the Lord on a situation that He may want to deal with them on. People can rest anywhere in the Spirit from 1-2 minutes or as long as 4-6 hours if God would choose to go that long with a particular individual.

For those of you who would like additional information on this phenomenon - there is a book titled " Overcome by the Spirit" by Francis MacNutt. Francis MacNutt is an ex-Catholic priest who received a healing ministry from the Lord. He noticed that this phenomenon would occur quite often whenever he would lay hands on people for their healings.

He interviewed many people after they had fallen in the Spirit to find out what their reactions were and exactly what had happened to them while they were resting in the Spirit. There are many direct quotes from the people he interviewed and it was all very positive.

He came to the conclusion that being slain in the Spirit was a very real manifestation of God that was occurring because of all the good fruit it produced in the people who had experienced this phenomena. He said some of the actual healings that came through his ministry occurred when people were "resting in the Spirit" after he had initially laid hands on them.

This man, in my opinion, is a true servant of God. He explored this phenomenon with complete objectivity back in the 1970’s. He covers in this most informative book all of the things that he saw happen when this manifestation would occur.

Short Story

I will leave you with a short story on this manifestation occurring to someone I used to work with. I will never forget it as long as I live. It was very touching and I feel like God allowed this story to come my way when it did to help confirm that this particular manifestation was really coming from Him.

About 8 years ago, I worked with a man who was a very devout Catholic. He was married, with 2 girls, ages 8 and 11. There was a priest from Chicago who had come down for the Sunday service. I can’t recall the name of the priest, but he had a healing ministry and he did a lot of traveling with the healing gift that God had given him. He too found that people would fall backwards whenever he would lay hands on them.

On the Sunday this event occurred, this man, his wife and his two girls all went to see this priest. When this priest then made the call for anyone to come up and have hands laid on them, all four of them went up just to see if God would do anything to any of them.

My friend said that absolutely nothing happened to either him, his wife or the older 11-year-old daughter. They felt no power come against them and none of them fell backwards in the Spirit.

However, his youngest daughter, only 8 years of age, was hit hard! He said she went down like a ton of bricks. He said it looked like a cannonball or bowling ball hit her right in the stomach blowing her backwards with great force. There obviously was a catcher behind her when she fell backward.

He said the minute she hit the ground - she started bawling profusely. He said she was crying as hard as she could. My friend intially thought there was something wrong with her because she was crying so hard. He then started to go over to see what was wrong with her, but he received an immediate check from the Holy Spirit that he was not to go near her - that God was doing something very special with her.

He said that she laid on the ground crying as hard as she could for a good 10-15 minutes. After the 10-15 minutes, she all of a sudden quit crying and stood up. He immediately went over to her and started to walk with her outside. When they got outside, he turned to her and asked her why she had been crying so hard after she had been slain in the Spirit.

I will never forget these words as long as I live. This little 8-year-old girl turned to her daddy and said with a real big smile on her face:

"Daddy, Daddy, He felt so good, He felt so good!"

God was obviously manifesting His loving presence all over this little girl for the 10-15 minutes that she was "resting in the Spirit" to the point that she was crying as hard as she could. She obviously was in the manifest presence of God and He was allowing her to literally feel His love for her.

As I was driving home from work that day after hearing the above story, I then tapped in and asked God what had happened and was that really Him that did all of that.

These three words immediately came up out of my spirit and again, I will never forget these three words. The three words were - "I touched her" - with an emphasis on the word "touch."

I then immediately started to laugh. He touched her, but she went down like a ton of bricks! I really felt like God was telling me two things with these three specific words:

• That it was His manifest presence that blew her backwards causing her to fall like she did, and that it was His manifest presence stirring on the inside of her causing her to cry as hard as she was crying.
   
• The fact that she told her dad that "He felt so good" - showed that God had to be literally manifesting His love to her where she could literally and physically feel it all over her physical body.

You’ll each have to come to your own conclusions as to whether or not you feel this is a true manifestation from God. For those of you who do believe that this is a real manifestation from the Lord, the above Scripture verses, and arguments off of those Scripture verses, can give you some ammunition should you ever find yourself in a debate with another Christian over this topic.

As for myself, I really do believe that this phenomenon is a true and powerful manifestation from the Lord when it really is Him doing it. But as with all of the other manifestations from God, there are always demons out there who will try and counterfeit some of His manifestations, along with other people just acting out and pretending God is manifesting on them when He is really not doing so. These people are either operating under the power of suggestion or they simply want to be part of the crowd if they see other people truly falling under the power of God.

But don’t let counterfeit activity from the dark side or some people acting out of their flesh prejudice you against what I feel is a very powerful and wonderful manifestation from the Lord when He does decide to do it on someone.

For those of you who have been truly slain in the Spirit - you know exactly what I am talking about since you have had this real experience.

For those of you who have not - I challenge you to go direct God the Father in prayer and ask Him to personally show you if this manifestation is something that is really coming from Him or not. God loves it when you start to press in and ask Him specific questions on anything you may really want an answer on. Ask, and you may just receive His direct answer on this topic!

 

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Scripture taken from New King James Version.
Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc.
Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Copyright © 2005-2008 by Michael Bradley.


This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 2.5 License.