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SET OUR HEARTS ON FIRE
Part Two – Use Me For Your Glory Chapter 6
Let Your Fire Spread
The wonderful new sense of communion with God, the joy and the gifts that have come to you through your revival, have a purpose far higher than your personal fulfillment. Thank God for that fulfillment, and know that the flame of God's Spirit burning within you is a foretaste of glory waiting beyond this world. But also be certain of this: God has put his Spirit in you so that he can use you in ways that surpass human comprehension. He has poured life into you so that it may overflow to others. Are you ready to let this happen?
God is giving you the privilege of being part of his redemptive plan on earth at this hour, a plan which is already in motion. The Spirit has ignited a revival on this earth which many believers are hoping will be the last and the greatest. He is causing it to spread. This revival is developing according to the Spirit's agenda, but there is one part of its expansion in which you have a say:
Are you willing to let the fire spread through you? You can say yes or you can say no. If you say no, God will raise up someone who will say yes, for his revival will spread. If you say yes, God will use you in ways that will stagger your mind.
You will discover that the most important things in God's kingdom usually take place away from the spotlights and TV cameras. The significant miracles rarely occur in pulpits or on church platforms. God's kingdom makes its power felt at the "street level," where people actually live: in the workplace, the bus stop, the coffee shop, the kitchen, the backyard. In such places you will find yourself touching lives with the healing power of Christ. It will happen in such ordinary ways that you will hardly be noticed. But these lives will be affected for all eternity – through you.
"Who, me?" you may be inclined to say. "How can God possibly use me?" God did not make a mistake when he revived you and called you to be his servant. The Lord Jesus plans to accomplish supernatural things through you.
When the Spirit of the Lord calls a man or woman into his redemptive purpose, he seems to pick the person who feels unqualified. "You must be mistaken, Lord. What do I have to offer?" Moses protested that he had a speech impediment. Gideon insisted that he was the least in a clan that was the weakest in Manasseh. Mary was "greatly troubled" when the angel Gabriel said, "Hail, O favored one, the Lord is with you!" (Lk 1:28).
If you find it hard to believe that the Lord is calling you to be a means by which he ignites others, you're in good company. The people God uses are invariably those who have no confidence in their own power – they will have to rely on his. And he gives them a promise: "I will be with you."
The God who called you into this revival will empower you to serve it. Here's how it works. First, God will locate you, if he hasn't already, in a place in the body of Christ that could use some encouragement. I said at the beginning of this book that every genuine revival in an individual leads to cleansing and increased life in the body of Christ. In this case, you are the individual. And your personal revival is now about to spread beyond you.
By way of preparation for this miracle, pretend for a moment that you are a member of the church at Laodicea in Revelation 3. This church was very successful by all the standards we are inclined to use to measure success. The crowds were good and the money was coming in. Yet, beneath the surface, this church was in trouble; its connection with heaven was, in Jesus' words, "wretched, pitiable, poor, blind and naked" (v. 17). Oh, it was a busy place. It had found the secret of success in compromise. It gave people what they wanted, the promise of blessing, without due need for radical commitment to Jesus. "You don't have to be a fanatic to be part of this church. Come and be blessed in our relaxed, easy atmosphere!"
You are a member of this thriving Laodicean church – this church with an empty soul. You open your Bible to Revelation 3:20 and read these words directed specifically toward your church: "Behold, I stand at the door and knock; if any one hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and eat with him, and he with me" (Rev 3:20).
Jesus is calling your church to repentance by addressing the individual: "...if any one hears my voice and opens the door...." The key to revival in this spiritually lifeless church is the man or woman who is willing to answer the Mater's knock and let him in. One person responding to the Master's knock will open the door to revival for the whole church.
The key to spiritual ignition in your Laodicean church is you. You don't have to organize a thing. It doesn't begin with preaching or teaching or programs or meetings. Whether you are the pastor or the forgotten soul in the last pew, there is one thing you need to do – the only thing within your power to do: open the door. Open the door to Jesus on behalf of that church. He will come in and eat with you, and as you commune together, he will cause the flame he has already placed within you to spread.
The church in which God actually locates you may not have any of the characteristics of the church at Laodicea. It may not be thriving numerically, as the church at Laodicea was. Or it may be weighed down with discouragement, distracted by the changes going on in the world around it. Or it may be a typical contemporary American church, striving to grow and keep up with the times. Whatever the case, you will begin to discern needs, needs that will be answered by the flame within you, as you keep opening the door to the Master's knock. A Vision of Service God will give you a vision of what he desires to do for that church.
Often we see ourselves as people who have all we can do to survive the changes that are swirling around us. Our jobs are on the line, and bills have to be paid. The children need to be driven to music lessons, ball games, church activities. We are weary, short of time, haunted by the relentless pressure of the workplace. Who's the next person to have the chair pulled out from under him or her? Will it be me? Even the older ones among us are frequently like Martha in the kitchen, "anxious and troubled about many things." Everybody is struggling to function in a hard-edged world. But when we look at ourselves with eyes of the Spirit, we become sheep for whom the Shepherd has glorious plans. He is about to transform these harassed sheep into a kingdom of priests. God gives us vision, and a new vista opens before us. We see ourselves as part of a fellowship of believers where the presence of the Spirit of God is so real and so strong that people are lifted out of their fears, delivered from their weariness, energized by the breath of heaven. Everybody still has to go to work every day, and pay bills and drive the children to ball games and music lessons. But the Shepherd who once seemed so indistinct and distant has become the burning center of their lives. In your vision you will see the Spirit quickening the worship life of these believers. Breath from another world begins to revive them as they give thanks to the Master who is making them whole. You will see reconciliation spreading through the assembly as the Spirit of the Lord calls the people into unity around himself.
Your vision expands into the places where the people of this church go through the week, carrying the healing power of Christ into the shop, the office, the school, the neighborhood. You watch them pass on the healing Jesus gave to them. They're having coffee with neighbors, going bowling with old friends, listening to colleagues at work. They're on the phone. Someone is sliding an envelope with some money in it under the door of an old woman down the hall who paid her rent and has nothing left for food. You are watching supernatural changes taking place in the congregation as the Spirit of God comes to rest with power upon its people.
Empowerment for the Vision
God will empower you to fit into the vision. When God gives you a vision, it is always because you are somehow connected with the vision's fulfillment. You are being shown what God intends for his church, and you are being made to know that you are part of the program. As you fit into the program, God will use you to make it happen.
For instance, the only reason Mary came to Jesus and announced, "They have no wine," was that Mary already had a vision of this faltering wedding feast restored to life (see Jn 2). She saw in her mind's eye what would happen if her son, Jesus, revived this feast. And she knew that she was to fit into this vision. Her job was to step up to her son and tell him, "They have no wine."
Jesus seemed displeased. "O woman, what have you to do with me? My hour has not yet come." But Mary refused to be rebuffed. She held firm in her faith that Jesus would restore this feast somehow.
"Do whatever he tells you," she said to the servants, and returned to the feast.
"Fill the jars with water," said Jesus. The servants filled six stone jars used for the Jewish rite of purification.
"Now draw some out, and take it to the steward of the feast."
The steward tasted the wine and announced to the baffled groom, "You saved the good wine until now! This is excellent!" The wedding feast came to life as joy and laughter filled the rooms. The disciples watched all this and knew that they were witnessing a sign of the kingdom. And it began with one woman fitting into her vision. You fit into your vision by discerning the needs around you and responding as the Spirit leads you. A stranger comes to church and no one seems to notice her as the service ends. Her clothes are out of style. She appears to be working up the nerve to press through the crowd at the door and get out as quickly as possible. Yet you know that some need brought her here. Surely she cannot be allowed to slip out without receiving a welcome. Wal-Mart would treat her better than that. So you walk over to her and smile and open your mouth, hoping that the Lord will give you a few helpful words. You speak, and the woman's troubled face relaxes. Many of us have grown up with the idea that the real work of the kingdom is done by pastors and missionaries. Or at least by people who play some prominent role in worship. After all, what can I do for God, just sitting here in this pew?
But the real work of the kingdom begins when our worship time ends. In corporate worship we offer ourselves to God in thanksgiving and praise. His Word speaks to us. His Spirit refreshes us.
Then we leave the assembly and scatter into the everyday world, where God turns us into broken bread and poured-out wine for the people around us, just by being there. Just by doing your sick neighbor's laundry or changing a tire for the elderly stranger whose wheel went flat in front of your house. Or picking up the phone and calling someone whose name crossed your mind as you were praying this morning. "How are you? Haven't seen you for a while." That's all you need to say, and a conversation begins that brightens this person's day and imparts hope.
As we perform these simple acts, responding to the needs that come our way, two things are happening: life is flowing from the cross of Jesus, through us, into the world; life is also flowing from the cross of Jesus, through us, into the body of Christ. Every time we serve people out in the world in Jesus' name, we are not only conveying life to them, we are being used by the Spirit to strengthen the body of Christ. The body is edified as its people obey the Spirit.
New life
You will see life burst forth, as people ignite with hope.
The seventy returned with joy, saying, "Lord, even the demons are subject to us in your name!" And he said to them, "I saw Satan fall like lightning from heaven. Behold, I have given you authority to tread upon serpents and scorpions, and over all the power of the enemy; and nothing shall hurt you. Nevertheless do not rejoice in this, that the spirits are subject to you; but rejoice that your names are written in heaven." Luke 10:17-20
Some of the best things that are accomplished through our lives will be hidden from us until the Day of the Lord. "Lord, when did we see thee hungry and feed thee, or thirsty and give thee drink?" (Mt 25:37). In his mercy, God often allows us to bring his life to others so unconsciously that we don't even know we're doing it. Perhaps our egos couldn't handle too much "kingdom success." But to encourage us, the Lord always permits us to see at least a glimpse of the joy that comes to people who take hold of the hope we hold out to them. We watch them open their hearts to receive Jesus into their lives.
We see the fire spread. We see men and women and young people coming out of the shadows of unbelief and taking the places God has prepared for them in the spreading revival.
You will see hearts ignite because of the hope you bring them. Encouragement will dawn on their faces because you came to them in their troubled hour and stuck with them throughout the storm. People who were afraid to trust you, because they had been let down so many times, will begin to lay aside their cynicism and fall in step at your side. And the fire within you will leap across to them. You will see revival spread to others through you.
Don't be discouraged if it takes a bit of time. The revival spreads at the Spirit's behest, not ours. Twelve years seemed almost like an eternity to me, as I and others with me kept praying for revival to come to our inner-city church in Detroit. Messiah Church had been standing at the corner of West Grand Boulevard and Toledo Avenue for more than half a century. During that time the neighborhood had changed, the city had refashioned itself, but the church was still there. In the twelve years since I had come from Nova Scotia to be its pastor, Messiah Church had experienced numerical growth and financial increase, but spiritually it was like Elijah's sacrifice, still waiting for fire from heaven.
A handful of us shared this concern in our Bible studies and times of prayer together. We knew that God had something more than we were presently experiencing. And we knew that if this church were to have an impact on the neighborhood for the kingdom of God, it would have to have much more power.
We introduced healing services. We began meeting the first Friday of the month for all-night prayer. Some of us fasted. The congregation continued to grow, new faces mixing with the old and adding some color to the assembly. But we knew this church still lacked the life-transforming power it needed. The gifts of the Spirit, and especially the fruits of the Spirit ... love, joy, peace ... were still in short supply.
Our prayers for renewal were answered in a surprising way. I had come to the conclusion that part of the problem was that this church was still clergy-dominated. And I was the clergyman. Talk all you want about the priesthood of all believers, many folks like the idea of being the "laity." "You take care of the spiritual things, Reverend, and we'll look after the building and count the money."
"How would you feel if I took a year off and got a job in the Cadillac plant" I said to my wife, Jean. "I'd continue to preach on Sundays and lead Wednesday night Bible studies. But I'd take no salary and all the other work would have to be shared by the whole congregation."
It was fine with Jean. Fine with our four children. Not so fine when I broke it to the church council. I held my ground, and the council gave its grudging consent. I sent a letter to the congregation three weeks before our annual meeting, informing them of the new plan.
Pandemonium. Anger. Who does he think he is?
The most troubling concern among the older members was, "Who's going to bury us if we die?"
It was time to back off. At the annual meeting I agreed to continue as pastor. "If you die before I do, I'll bury you, but I'm no longer going to function as chaplain to a religious club. I'm going to be out on the streets and in the bars reaching out to people with the gospel. And if that doesn't work, I'll leave this institution and open a storefront down on Vernor Highway."
The people who had been praying for renewal were with me in this. They were already sharing in the ministry of Messiah Church with their prayers and their witness within the church and beyond it. These people were not a clique. They related well to the larger body of the congregation. But they had a vision of the kind of life that God wanted to give that church and were trying to fit into it.
It hardly looked as if revival was on the way. Attendance dropped. Even the furnace seemed to balk at this "rocking boat" and treated us to a cold church one February Sunday. We kept on praying. And in March, for some inexplicable reason, attendance began to climb. New faces turned up out of nowhere. Then came Palm Sunday. That was the day, after twelve long years of praying and waiting, the answer came. I ended the sermon with an altar call, an unheard of thing in the tradition of Messiah Church. People streamed forward. As they were praying the fire fell. Messiah Church ignited, and the flame has been burning among these people ever since.
What do you mean, Messiah Church ignited? I mean that from that day, and for the next eighteen years at Messiah Church, I never had to think of myself as a chaplain to a religious society again. People were igniting with the fire of the Holy Spirit, and the fire was spreading. The atmosphere had changed. Radical commitment to the person of Jesus was no longer considered fanaticism. It was looked upon as the norm. It was what we all desired and pursued.
I went out on the streets and into the bars, as I had promised. I'd park the car along Vernor Highway (the "main drag" of the neighborhood) and start walking. In the bars I received a welcome more often than not. And in the local park there were plenty of people to talk to and listen to. Soon I was no longer doing this alone. Others came out to "work the streets." On Saturdays it became a regular practice for a group of us to meet for prayer at one o'clock and then "go fishing."
Wednesday evening Bible study, which for twelve years rarely exceeded fifteen souls, began to swell. Within a year the numbers had multiplied tenfold, and we had to move the meeting into the church, where it has been ever since. But numbers don't tell the whole story. Numbers may fluctuate as the Spirit gathers and sifts. The proof that the fire of heaven had fallen on Messiah Church was threefold: First, our relationship with Jesus came to life. I began to hear people talking about Jesus as if they knew him. They were no longer ashamed of the name Jesus; it was their joy. Jesus was the Vine, they were the branches, delighted and awed to be drawing their life from him.
This new relationship with Jesus became evident in the worship life of the congregation. Whether it was liturgical worship on Sunday mornings (often interrupted by spontaneous prayer) or "free" worship on Wednesday evening, there was a strong awareness of the presence of the Lord. The assembly was wrapped in an atmosphere of thanksgiving so clear that strangers who came to visit were embraced and held by it.
More than once visitors would declare as they left the service, "The Lord is in this place."
People who had never had a prayer life began to discipline themselves to spend time alone with God each day. Praying. Listening. Reading Scripture. Interceding. And for those who already had a prayer life, prayer became a new thing.
Out of these disciplined prayers came changes in the way people lived. One young man reported to us that he was AWOL from the army, and he was shown in prayer that he would have to turn himself in. He did his time, received his discharge and was soon with us again. Debts were paid. Enemies were reconciled. Work habits were improved. But the driving power behind it all was the fire of heaven, bringing our relationship with Jesus to life.
Second, our relationship with one another came to life. We began to live out the words of Jesus:
A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another; even as I have loved you, that you also love one another. By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another. John 13:34-35
We began to see kindness in places where it had been lacking before. People were reaching out to each other, caring for one another in a new way. A young man needed a car to get to work. Someone else in the fellowship came through with a car for him. Old folks were treated with special deference by the young. People who had only seen each other in church for years were now getting to know each other.
The sick were visited. Families in financial straits were helped, often without even tapping the church's benevolence funds, which also were beginning to flow more freely. Somebody would hear about a need and take care of it without a word. Never before had Messiah Church seen generosity practiced so freely and joyfully. The Spirit of God was moving hearts.
Third, our vision of the harvest came to life. We began to understand as a congregation that God had brought us together in order to reach out beyond ourselves. Within a four-mile radius of our building was a rich mission field made up of people from no less than thirty nations. We knew that we were commanded to go "to the streets and lanes of the city, and bring in the poor and maimed and blind and lame" (Lk 14:21). We found Lazarus at our gate in a hundred forms. Addicts and prostitutes were not strangers, they were our friends and neighbors. Clearly, the Lord wanted them also to become our brothers and sisters.
As we reached out, the Spirit sent in reinforcements. Young families from the suburbs began attending our gatherings. Many of them took the plunge and moved into the neighborhood to help with outreach. We didn't have to go overseas to find the Third World. It was right in front of us. And it was ripe for harvest.
Revival at Messiah Church began and continues because people allowed their personal renewal to spread outward. If you are willing, the revival which has come to you will spread outward through you. "I came to cast fire upon the earth; and would that it were already kindled!" said Jesus as he set his face toward Calvary (Lk 12:49). That fire is now burning – in you. It wants to spread. It wants to bring the power of the kingdom of God to bear on many lives – through you.
From "Set Our Hearts On Fire" published by Servant Publications 1998
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