|
SET OUR HEARTS ON FIRE Chapter 5
Staying on Track: Using the Handbook of Revival
Once we have begun to experience the joy of spiritual renewal, we need to make sure this new surge of life continues to move in the direction God intends it to take. The Spirit has come into our lives for a purpose far beyond anything we can imagine. He wants to use us in his redemptive plan, to spread the heavenly fire through us to others.
But our old heredity keeps rearing its head and wants to divert the revival into a program of its own. Perhaps I get taken up with this "good feeling" that revival has brought and sail off on a "feeling tangent." I compare how I feel at tonight's prayer meeting with how I felt last week. I wonder whether I am feeling the presence of God as strongly in my prayers today as I felt them yesterday. Or I narrow spiritual renewal to one "movement" or church (the one I belong to), looking upon all other movements or churches as inconsequential.
To protect us from the danger of being carried off on a tangent and losing our way, we are given the Bible. It is not an accident that the Bible holds a prominent place in every spiritual awakening that has ever occurred among the people of God. The Bible keeps us on track. It warns of the dangers that lurk beyond that beam of light God sheds on our path, and it clearly guides our steps. Once we have experienced revival we are more dependent than ever on the witness of Scripture. Revivals personal or corporate that lose touch with Scripture quickly lose touch with God.
Jesus opened the Bible in his hometown synagogue and read from Isaiah 61. "'The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor....' He closed the book, and gave it back to the attendant,... and he began to say to them, 'Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing'" (Lk 4:18, 20-21, emphasis added).
With that reading of Scripture Jesus introduced to Israel a revival such as it had never known. The blind received their sight, and the lame began to walk. Hearts were turned to God. Lives were changed. Most important of all, a band of disciples was gathered who would soon change the course of history. Jesus took pains to make clear to his followers that this revival was based on Scripture. He had come to fulfill Scripture. "And beginning with Moses and all the prophets, he interpreted to them in all the scriptures the things concerning himself" (Lk 24:27).
The spiritual awakening that exploded on Pentecost took its first big leap forward as Peter opened Scripture. "Men of Judea,... these men are not drunk as you suppose, since it is only the third hour of the day; but this is what was spoken of by the prophet Joel: 'And in the last days it shall be, God declares, that I will pour out my Spirit upon all flesh'" (Acts 2:14-17).
It is not an accident that we find Scripture playing a prominent role in every revival the Spirit sends. Revivals are the fulfillment of Scripture. They are the manifestation of the life of God that the Scriptures promise. When we experience personal revival, we are invariably drawn to the Bible and are nourished by it. If our personal revival is to continue to sustain us, we will need to allow the Bible to keep us on course. Without the counsel of Scripture, we are prone to veer from the path of discipleship without knowing it. The Bible is the handbook of revival and is meant to be our constant companion as we walk in the Spirit.
The Bible played a major role in my personal revival. By the time I completed seminary, my respect for Scripture had been weakened by the form critics. Which Isaiah was the real Isaiah? Who really wrote the book of Hebrews?
Four years later, when our new congregation had been organized in Dartmouth, Nova Scotia, and our building program had been completed, I began to ask myself a few questions, like, is this all there is to the Kingdom of God --- a church full of decent people whose hearts, like my own, are wrapped up in a thousand distractions? Where is the presence of God in all this? Where is the power to transform our lives? The answers were in that book lying on my desk, but I didn't know it.
During summer vacation Jean and I stumbled into a church in Reading, Pennsylvania, that was far from that to which we were accustomed. "Where the Healing Waters Flow," flashed the blue neon sign on the roof. We could hear singing as we came in. People were clapping to the beat. Hands were raised. The place was alive with joy. Pastor George spoke with an authority I knew I lacked. So I swallowed my pride and asked him to come over to Nova Scotia while he was vacationing in Maine. He smiled and said he'd "pray about it." Sure. We'll see.
Two months later Pastor George and his wife came. The Holy Spirit came with them. I can still remember the ending of Pastor George's prayer: "Answer the cry of this young man's heart!" And that prayer was answered almost instantly. Call it fire from heaven. Call it the baptism of the Holy Spirit. All I know is that the Spirit of God took hold of me with a grip that has never loosened in all the years since.
Jesus became far more real to me than he had been before. Prayer began to rise from my heart with a freedom and confidence which were totally new. And the Bible came to life. Suddenly the things I was reading about in Scripture described what I was actually experiencing. God does speak. The Spirit does lead. Those healing waters of apostolic days are still flowing.
I don't know if the words were any different when I preached, but the results were. People came under conviction. They began making changes in their lives, as I was making changes in mine. I invited people to come together to study the Bible. And they came, hungry to think and share and pray as the Spirit opened the Word to us. The Bible literally became our handbook, as the Spirit worked his work of revival among us.
"Something has happened here since I visited last year," said Bill, my preacher friend who came up from New Jersey. "These people are changed. You are changed. What is it?" Everything Pastor George had given to me I passed on to Bill. He took the "fire" with him to his home in New Jersey, and soon his people too were experiencing revival. And they, like we, found themselves drawn to the Scriptures. The Bible became their handbook.
This kind of spiritual awakening is presented in Scripture as perfectly normal, the kind of thing we should expect wherever Jesus is obeyed. Revival occurred everywhere Paul went. Paul spoke under the unction of the Holy Spirit, and people came to faith. Their lives were changed as the fire of revival spread through the grass roots.
Yet from these earliest days revivals have tended to flare up and fade. So often the brilliant early days of spiritual awakening are followed by long seasons of dull orthodoxy. Churches that were once on fire with passion for the Lord Jesus content themselves, a generation later, with venerating the spiritual giants of their revival days. Sometimes revivals that start out well "jump the track" and roar off on a tangent of excess that everybody-except the participants-seems to recognize as excess. God has given us a handbook to show us how to stay on course and stay fresh. All we have to do is use it.
The Bible is simply the witness of men and women over centuries of time who encountered the flame of God's presence in their lives, welcomed it and obeyed it. Abraham met God. Hagar was visited by God. Moses stepped onto holy ground and didn't even know it, until God told him to take off his shoes. The witness of these people has been preserved for one purpose: to lead us into communion with the same God who spoke to them, to ignite in us the same flame that burned in them. But we have to take the plunge and join them by disciplining ourselves to read this book and learn what they have to tell us.
Personal Bible Reading
If we want to make sure our spiritual awakening doesn't veer off on an unhealthy tangent, a discipline of personal Bible reading is essential. We need to set aside a period of time each day to be alone and become familiar with everything that is in this book.
Begin in the New Testament. Read the Gospels-Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. Always be open, as you read, for a word the Spirit may want to address to you. About forgiveness, perhaps. Or the command to have faith. "Do not fear, only believe" (Mk 5:36) may come just at the moment you need to hear those words. God will help you decide how many chapters to cover each day, but it will probably be at least one. Don't just wet your toes, jump in! Immerse yourself. Pause, once in a while, and listen, or talk to the Lord about what you're seeing and hearing as you read these words.
From the New Testament Gospels read on into Acts and the Epistles. But don't wait too long before adding some Old Testament reading to the New. Genesis, Exodus-wonderful books! They lay the groundwork for the rest of the Bible. Soon you may be ready to memorize some Psalms to help you with your praises and to sustain you through difficult days. Use whatever Bible-reading guides you find helpful. But discipline yourself to read this book daily.
Group Bible Study
As the spiritual awakening spread through our church in Nova Scotia, we began to get together to study the Bible. In the very beginning we would sit in the church for half an hour in total silence. Then we'd gather in a room and take the book of Luke, a paragraph at a time, and talk and share. Later we opened the study time with singing and praise. Intentionally these Bible studies were kept informal. People were free to talk about their personal needs in the light of the Scripture we were covering.
Informal Bible study, where nobody is an expert and everybody is open and reachable, as believers search together for a clear word from God, is a practical way of allowing the Spirit to nourish us and guide us. Unless we sink our roots deep into the Scriptures, the joy of revival will be blown away by the first major storm that comes sweeping into our lives.
We study the Bible together to help each other become the kind of men and women Jesus is calling us to be. "For I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven" (Mt 5:20). Our righteousness is to exceed that of the scribes and Pharisees, and the scribes and Pharisees were no slouches. They put extreme effort into trying to live up to the law. In his Sermon on the Mount (see Mt 5, 6 and 7) Jesus tells us exactly the kind of people we are to be, by the power of his Spirit. We come together and ponder his words and encourage each other to translate them into living.
As we study the Bible alone and together, we need to approach it, first, with eyes that look beyond the letter; second, with ears that are open to a fresh word from the Lord.
Eyes That Look Beyond the Letter
Jesus came to restore wine to the wedding feast of Israel. But at every turn he was opposed, harassed, slandered and threatened. He described his persecutors: "You blind guides, straining out a gnat and swallowing a camel!" (Mt 2324).
Who were these men who gave Jesus such a hard time? Bible students. The scribes and Pharisees spent long hours in their houses of study pouring over Scripture texts, consulting the ancient commentaries, considering every possible meaning for a single word or a phrase that could be interpreted seven ways.
What they learned in their long years of study failed to prepare them for this Galilean who healed the sick and cast out demons and turned the temple into an uproar. "He can't be of God," they murmured. "He breaks the Sabbath and eats with sinners."
Going by the letter of Scriptures, like ecclesiastical prosecuting attorneys, they pronounced Jesus guilty of major sins. Using Scripture, they found every reason to demand his death. Because they never saw beyond the letter.
From the earliest days of the church Christians have fallen into this trap. They have mercilessly persecuted Jews, fought bloody crusades, burned each other at the stake over points of doctrine and used Scripture to justify their deeds. They found words in the book that could be made to say what they wanted them to say. "His blood be on us and on our children!" (Mt 27:25). Isn't that what they answered Pilate on Good Friday? So let's get 'em. Walls of suspicion that divide believers from one another are built from words taken from Scripture and twisted to mean what the divine Author never intended.
How can this happen? Jesus gives us the answer: "You search the scriptures, because you think that in them you have eternal life; and it is they that bear witness to me; yet you refuse to come to me that you may have life" (Jn 5:39-40).
If we fail to follow the Scriptures to the One to whom they bear witness, or if we try to use Scriptures apart from a relationship of obedience to Jesus, they become for us a "written code" instead of the living Word. And a written code always kills; only the Spirit gives life (see 2 Cor 3:6).
Our personal revival has given us eyes that are able to see beyond the written code to the One to whom the Scriptures point. Nit-picking time is over. It's time to act on the one message that Scripture gives to all who have eyes to see: "Turn to me and be saved, all the ends of the earth" (Is 45:22). "Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest" (Mt 11:28). The message, from Genesis to Revelation, is simply "Come." And the voice we hear is the voice of the Shepherd himself. As long as we are in these bodies of flesh and blood, we keep coming to him who is the source of our hope, the goal of our journey. We come to him through the Scriptures that renew our minds to behold him and that teach us how to obey him.
Open Ears
"Morning by morning he wakens, he wakens my ear to hear as those who are taught." Isaiah 50:4
It's not enough to see. We see to be able to hear. Meeting the Master in the Scriptures, we begin to hear his voice. "The hour is coming, and now is, when the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God, and those who hear will live" (Jn 5:25). The moment we begin to hear, we come to life with the life of God. And as we act on what we hear, the life of God in us increases. On the other hand, if, once we hear, we run away from what we're hearing, a darkness that begins to invade our souls is far worse than the darkness of ignorance.
Sometimes words seem to leap off the Bible's page and cry out to us. Sometimes impressions nudge us in a direction we've been hesitant to take: repentance of an attitude, a phone call to a brother with whom we need to be reconciled, an anonymous gift to a neighbor in need. Sometimes a word of awesome comfort comes to us. "Lo, I am with you always, to the close of the age" (Mt 28:20).
The Bible is the history of the Shekinah glory descending to earth and igniting human lives. This glory manifests itself throughout Scripture as fire. Holy fire. Cleansing fire. Fire that conveys the presence of God.
• When Adam and Eve were expelled from paradise, a "flaming sword which turned every way" guarded the way to the Tree of Life (Gn 3:24).
• God's covenant with Abraham was confirmed with a "smoking fire pot and a flaming torch" passing between the pieces of Abraham's sacrifice, evidence that God was present, confirming his promise (Gn 15:17).
• Moses encountered God at a bush that was on fire (see Ex 3).
• The Israelites were led through the wilderness by the Shekinah, a cloud of glory which by night became a fire in the sky (see Ex 13:20-22).
• When Moses dedicated the tabernacle, "fire came forth from before the Lord and consumed the burnt offering" (Lv 9:24).
• Elijah's prayer was answered with fire from heaven (see 1 Kgs 18:36-38).
• Fire hovered above the gathered believers on Pentecost, broke into tongues and came to rest upon each of them (see Acts 2:1-4). The Shekinah glory, resting on ordinary Jews - not a priest among them - was a sign that God's love was being shed abroad in their hearts by the Holy Spirit.
Now the fire has come to us. God's Spirit burns in us, a living flame, for a purpose far greater than our minds can grasp. We have been brought into God's revival. To keep the flame within us fresh and constant we have been given God's own Word of Testimony, the Bible. If we will use it, allowing the Sprit to guide us as we read, this priceless book will keep us alive and on track throughout our earthly journey.
From "Set Our Hearts On Fire" published by Servant Publications 1998
|
|
|