- Overcomer Literature Trust
- Swindon
- Wiltshire
Revival - Personal and in the Church.
By J.C.Metcalfe.
Revival is a return by the Church to the conditions which make her the vehicle of God’s blessing to needy men and women. The history of the children of Israel from the very earliest days of their occupation of the land of Canaan shows a steady slipping backwards from God’s revealed will. There were times of revival, through the ministry of the judges, the faithful preaching of the prophets, and the leadership of godly kings, but as soon as the instrument of revival was removed the people drifted back into idolatry and were soon in a worse condition than before.
History often repeats itself and it does so in this case. Christians today pray for revival but most of us do not clearly understand what we are praying for. We see the desperate need around us and perhaps have before our minds a vision of crowded meetings and a stream of conversions, but we need to be careful here. The enemy of souls can produce something which looks very like revival at first sight but which drops right away. If we pray for revival, what are we asking for?
Here is a definition of revival which you should read carefully:
A Day of Visitation.
“The hour of Revival is a time of crisis and possible catastrophe. A crisis in the history of every individual, as well as in the history of a country, a church, or a district. A crisis for the unregenerate wherein they settle their eternal destiny, as they accept or reject conversion to God. A crisis to those who receive the fulness of the Holy Spirit, and to those who reject Him; for to the believer who bends and receives the Holy Spirit it is the day of the visitation of the Most High, but to others it means the decision whether they will become spiritual or remain carnal, whether they will elect to remain in defeat in the personal life or determine to press on as overcomers” (War on the Saints p278-9).
“A crisis”, “A day of visitation”, which means God manifesting Himself in the midst of His people and doing His own work in His own way. It is possible that we are being tested as to whether we are worthy to stand with Him in a great and glorious testimony which might well be the last before His coming again, and the testing may have to go very deep. The whole question of revival is actually a question mark to our individual knowledge of the fulness of the Holy Spirit. We must not be frightened because of the way the enemy has produced counterfeits and caused Christians to divide because of varying understandings of this truth.
Let us make it a perfectly clear personal question, ‘Has my life actually been given over to God, that I may be filled with the Holy Spirit and be used in any way He deems best in these days?’
Many of us have attended meetings where a number of those present have professed a desire to be filled with the Holy Spirit, but have never got any further. I think the question at which many flinch is, ‘Am I prepared to go the way of the Cross, the way of conflict?’ There are Christian churches in the world today which are having that question put to them in very drastic ways, and we need to face the question now, before it comes to us in the same way. We must go deep, for what is called revival in these days so often only skims the surface.
To return for a moment to the people of Israel in the days of Hosea. There was a general recognition of the need for revival, “Come, let us return to the Lord” (Hosea 6 v1) was the phraseology used, and then for almost the remainder of the prophecy Jehovah answered His people by going deep down into the question of their lives and their daily behaviour. “Your love is like the morning mist, like the early dew that disappears.” In effect He says, ‘Your prayer for revival is shallow’. How quickly they wanted God to answer them, “after two days He will revive us, on the third day He will restore us”. Much of our thinking to-day is along this line, ‘Oh God, we want revival, and we want it tomorrow’. Then we try to organise revival meetings, but this will not do. It is the visitation of God into the midst of His people for which we are asking and which we must have, and remember, this is what happened at Pentecost.
At the end of His indictment of Israel in Hosea, Jehovah turns to entreaty, “Return, O Israel, to the Lord your God. Your sins have been your downfall” (14 v1), and the question arises, are we ready for a visitation of God? Are there not many things, both in our individual and in our Church life, that are standing in His way?
The Judgments of God.
Revival is not mass excitement, but a Christian Church walking in true holiness, and manifesting Christ to the world. To accomplish this objective God often has to speak to His people through judgment. “Therefore I cut you in pieces with My prophets, I kill you with the words of My mouth; My judgments flashed like lightning upon you”, He says to Israel through Hosea (6 v5).
The French Revolution was a revolt against apostate Christendom and England was only saved from a similar cataclysm by the Methodist Revival. The patience of God with apostate Protestant Christianity cannot go on for ever. It is not merely that Liberalism and infidelity are leading some who profess to be Christians away from the faith, but that they have already laid a foundation, in the condition of our Church life, that has prepared the way for the judgments of God.
Then there is another side to be considered. God also judges with infinite tenderness that which He finds to be wrong in His own children. Near the end of the Epistle of James we are told “you have heard of Job’s perseverance and have seen what the Lord finally brought about”. What did God do with Job? He showed His wrath against what we should call “the natural man” in Job, and built up a new Job, having a living dependence upon God, and not upon his own righteousness or possessions. God simply took His hand off Job’s affairs and permitted the enemy of souls to sift him. It was not because God was angry with Job, but because He was purifying him against the day of visitation.
In the same way God will purify His Church against the day of the Coming of Christ, for the time when they will stand face to face with Him, and see Him as He is. “For it is time”, declares Peter, “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” (1 Peter 4 v17).
It is not enough for us to speak of the shelter of the atoning blood. There is also the work of the Holy Spirit, who applies the Cross to purge us. ”For I desire mercy, not sacrifice, and acknowledgment of God rather than burnt offerings”, God said to Israel (Hosea 6v6). “Like Adam, they have broken the Covenant . . .” (Hosea 6v7). Is there a covenant between us Christians and our God that needs to be observed and kept? In Galatians 3 Paul tells us that the gospel was preached to Abraham, when God said to him, “All nations will be blessed through you” and that the covenant promise made to Abraham was fulfilled in Christ, Who “became a curse for us” so that we might receive the promise of the Holy Spirit. This acceptance by faith of God’s promised gift is our side of the covenant.
Equipment for Revival.
It all revolves around the question, have I entered into the reality of God’s covenant? Have I received the power of the Holy Spirit for service? Am I to-day filled with the Holy Spirit? The Church of God must be equipped by the power of the Holy Spirit if she is to grapple with present conditions and to stand triumphant, even if it comes to the question of martyrdom, that Jesus may be glorified in the world.
In Galatians 4 we are shown two covenants, typified by Hagar and Sarah, the old covenant of the Law and the new covenant of Grace; the earthly Jerusalem and “Jerusalem from above, which is the mother of us all”. The Church of God is not just an organization for this world, it is the living Body of Christ, and our citizenship is in heaven, “your life is now hidden with Christ in God” (Col. 3 v3). “Cast out the bond-woman and her son”, we are told. Is not this a call to Christian people actually to live in the fact of their real union with Christ, Who “for the joy set before Him endured the Cross”? The one thing the devil aims for is that the glory of Christ be tarnished, His work hindered and His Church powerless. How is he seeking to accomplish this? By putting Christ in the background. Can he do it? He is triumphing in professing Christendom, and will do so, by God’s permission, but he must never triumph in the Church of God. It is for us to see to this, and the one place where he can gain a foothold and drag the Church down is where the “bondwoman and her son” are still allowed to rule.
What is our personal responsibility in this matter? There is first the question of SIN, and the answer to the state of things to-day is stainless purity in the children of God. “We died to sin; how can we live in it any longer?” The wonder of the Cross of Christ is ours, and it is for us to stand on that ground, “dead to sin” and “alive to God”, trusting the Holy Spirit of God to make it real moment by moment.
Then there is the question of SERVICE. On what level is our Christian service? If it is on the level of the “bondwoman” and her child, the devil will easily thwart it. John 12 v24 is the key, “unless a grain of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains a single seed. But if it dies, it produces many seeds”. Again it is a matter of the Cross and union with Christ there. It is not what we do for HIM that counts, but what HE does through us. It is not that we can stand against the evils in the world, but that He died on the Cross and we died there with Him that matters. He lives in the midst of His Church in order that the work of God shall prosper in His hand. You can only stand true as you enter into such a life-experience.
Our hidden life.
The tide of spiritual evil is rising against us and it is for us to do much more than just deplore the fact. It is true that in our western lands to-day the atmosphere is completely foreign to the Christian life. C.S.Lewis once wrote, “Christians increasingly live on a spiritual island; new and rival ways of life surround it in all directions, and their tides come further up the beach every time”. But where does this opposition come from? It comes from two sources, from a world lying in the evil one, and from the weakness of our own nature. How is it to be overcome? “You died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God.” When the enemy of souls comes, with all his wiles and aggression, does he find us “hidden with Christ in God”, where he cannot harm us? Here is the starting point of true revival.
The world outlook at this time is as dark as it can be, but at the back of it all God is at work. God has His answer to all the pride of man and He is digging deep with His people. The question is, ‘Am I prepared to let Him dig deep in me?’ If I say ‘Yes’, what will it mean to me? I do not know. But I want to say this, there is no other safe hiding place for a Christian to-day than union with Christ in His death and risen life. There is no other place of triumph over the enemy, nor of effective service. There is no other place where we can stand the strain of things now and enter into the joy of harvest at His Coming. I know that when I say, ‘Lord, how can I stand?’ He says “My grace is sufficient for you, for My power is made perfect in weakness”.
May we turn finally to the last chapter of Hosea. Here God takes up the prayer of Israel, “Return, O Israel”, He says, “to the Lord your God . . . say to Him: Forgive all our sins and receive us graciously” (v2). When they do this, He promises that He will “heal their waywardness”, that He will be ”as the dew to Israel”, and that He will revive them.
God’s instruments for the chastisement of apostate Christianity are already gaining power. Opposition both to the law of God, and to the Cross of Christ is open and flagrant. But for the Church of God the promise stands, “I will be like the dew to Israel”. A Church that bears the sweetness and fragrance of the Lord, because of the enriching dew of the Holy Spirit, a Church separated from sin, self and the world, a Church sharing with her Lord the mysterious might of Calvary, that surely will spell “Revival”, and bring joy to the heart of the Lord Jesus, as well as honour to His Name. So, and only so, will the purpose for His Church be fulfilled in our day and generation.
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A5 computer printout booklets by J.C.Metcalfe:
FROM THE CROSS INTO GLORY VICTORY IN THE EVIL DAY
SERVICE WITHOUT STRAIN THERE’S A FIGHT TO BE FOUGHT
A5 computer printout booklets by Mrs Jessie Penn-Lewis:
A REVIVAL OF PRAYER NEEDED BATTLE FOR THE MIND
THE SILENCE OF JESUS UNION WITH CHRIST
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