Hope For the Future By Looking in the PAST

Did he really just say that?

There was a silence that crossed the room. You could have heard a pin drop.

No bolder or truer words have ever been spoken (in my opinion) than what our pastor Tony Shup had just told our congregation this past sunday in his sermon titled, The Church Has Big Problems.  He went on to say, "Make no mistake, the problem is YOU." He then went on to challenge the church to seek personal revival.

I felt my spirit leap in the depths of my being.  He was right...so right.  He hit the nail on the head. Why would we ever pray for world revival-- when we fail to see the need for revival in our own spirit.  That is the making of one messed-up recipe (or lame excuse) to clearly be ware of the splinter in the eye of the lost while ignoring the log in our own eye. STOP!  Back up....what are we missing here?

I began pondering the revivals of antiquity-- that made the world stop and notice that God was alive and well and moving among us. I began to do some research on The Great Awakening and documented Christian revivals of the past. I came to this deep revelation that going back to the past is not always a bad thing! In fact, there is much wisdom and prudence in taking note of history.  It has often been said that history repeats itself because no one listens. So my heart was so stirred by the challenge of personal revival, I went in search of what was going on in the world at the times the great revivals made their mark on the world?  What were these preachers preaching that so stirred the hearts of men and women? What was so radical in the response of these people to these messages that it turned our world upside down with eternal impact?

So I began reading some sermons from John Wesley. I began learning about who these preachers were teaching these life transforming messages: Jonathan Edwards, George Whitefield, Charles Finney, D. L. Moody, Martin Luther King, Jr, Billy Graham, and the leaders of the Azusa Street Revivals. What did they all have in common? What caused the world to respond to God and get serious about living transformed lives by the power of the Holy Spirit?

Here is what I discovered that was common among them all:

•  Judgment begins with the house of God
• Genuine sorrow and repentence of sin by the church (individually & coorperately as a body)
• A correct understanding of the grace of God and His absolute holiness
• A complete dependence on the power of the Holy Spirit to be the agent of change
• The willingness of the believer to confess, repent and be available to God for His purpose

This is not all inclusive-- but these are the primary points of agreement in the majority of these revivals.

So looking back to the past was very beneficial for me in this context. In fact there are many times in scriture, Old and New Testament,  where people refer to "the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob."  This was a reminder that the MIGHTY God of the past was the same yesterday, today and forever.

So Where Do We Begin in Seeking Personal Revival?

I was reading in Romans chapter 2 this morning and God really touched my heart. Right there in black and white, I saw many pieces of a puzzle that can help lead us in individual repentence which will in turn open the door for individual revival.

The longer we have been Christians, I think the more dangerous this issue can become: spiritual arrogance.  In our spiritual arrogance we may begin to show contempt for God's goodness to others (Rom 2:1-5). We often fail to understand that it is God kindness that leads people to repentence-- even His own church. This passage also deals with how we can develop stubborn and unrepentant hearts in the midst of our spiritual arrogance thinking that we somehow have a corner-market on truth, yet we can fail to apply that truth to our own lives.

We often find that the religious "dos and don'ts" and the traditions made of men are the plumbline by which we measure our righteousness. Romans 2 very explicitly states that this mindset will be storing up for us the wrath and judgment of God.  Now before you get real pious and say that God's wrath and judgment is for the lost not the redeemed, I would like to point your attention Romans 2:16, "This will take place on the day when God will judge men's secrets through Jesus Christ, as my gospel delcares."  This is not a judgment that determines your salvation. This is the judgment seat of Christ that we will face in Heaven.  The lost will never see this judgment because they are eternally condemned already at the rejection of Christ's salvation.  This judgment spoken of in Romans 2 if for the believers.

God clearly wants to deal with our spiritual arrogance and stubborn, unrepentant hearts this side of Heaven! It is these very traits that Romans warns us will cause unbelievers to mock and deny God.  These traits are the height of hypocricy... and if we disciple and train new believers in these God-offensive traits, we are no different that the pharisees who Jesus openly rebuked and called the a "brood of vipers" and told them that they had made their converts twice as fit for hell.  Yes-- God desperately wants us to come to a place of personal repentence -- individually and corporately as a church.  We cannot complete the Great Commission and replicate our brokenness in new believers.

This kind of transformation with genuine sorrow and repentence is not somthing that can be done as an act of our will. TRANSFORMATION is completely dependant upon the power of the Holy Spirit. God is asking us in Romans to move past the circumcision of the flesh which was required by the law-- and seek to grasp a the reality of the circumcision of the heart--which is a complete work of the Spirit done to a fully yielded vessel.

Judgment Begins With the House of God

 For it is time for judgment to begin with the family of God; and if it begins with us, what will the outcome be for those who do not obey the gospel of God? And, "If it is hard for the righteous to be saved, what will become of the ungodly and the sinner?" 

(1 Peter 4: 17-18)

As I read through the Romans chapter 2 this morning my eyes were a little more opened. In my crying out to God for personal revival, God met me there with the truth spoken in love-- though it was painful to hear. I had to ask myself the question: How badly do you really want personal revival?

Maybe I am getting older. Maybe I am just realizing how little this world has to offer and how long eternity really is-- but I am at a place in my life right now that I cannot stand to live ONE MORE DAY the same way I have been with a faith that seems so...benign,  I want my world turned upside down. I want my life to never be the same. I want my faith to change me-- not lull me into complacency and be content just to be saved. NOT ONE MORE DAY. I can't. I refuse.

So Lord, let the judgment begin. Let it begin with me. Take me, mold me, remake me.

I have come to a place like the prophet Isaiah did when he confessed, "I am a man of unclean lips. And I live among a people with unclean lips, but my eyes have seen the King-- the Lord Almighty-- He is HOLY! ..... so take the coal, cleanse my lips. Here am I-- send me."

There is nothing special about me. By I trust a MIGHT God and know the power of the Holy Spirit can make beautiful things out of DUST.

I am praying for a heart that will break for the things that break God's heart. I am praying for eyes to see the church and the world as He sees them. I am praying for revival: in my own heart and in the heart of my church. Let the judgment begin with me, then us... and then may we rise on the wings of Eagles and be mightily used in God's plan....and I suspect that may look extremely different that what I first thought His plan for my life might be.

NOT ONE MORE DAY!!  -- Lord, revive me again.

Dawn