March 11, 2011

• Ten: A Decade of God: Epilogue

  For Part II: A Sputnik Crisis (a call to young professionals) click here. 

  It's been two weeks since my last update. God is good. The responses I've received and the phone calls I've had and the people I've talked to late into the night have cheered me. Many thoughts remain... and as I look upon Christ, I am shaken. His love is so immense, His sacrifice so great, His mercies so... undeserving. It is often during these times that I look at myself in wonder. How did I get here? 

  Some closing thoughts.

  "A revival of true godliness among us is the greatest and most urgent of all our needs. To seek this should be our first work. There must be earnest effort to obtain the blessing of the Lord, not because God is not willing to bestow His blessing upon us, but because we are unprepared to receive it. Our heavenly Father is more willing to give His Holy Spirit to them that ask Him, than are earthly parents to give good gifts to their children. But it is our work, by confession, humiliation, repentance, and earnest prayer, to fulfill the conditions upon which God has promised to grant us His blessing. A revival need be expected only in answer to prayer."

  I read this quote recently and I am struck. Even if the entire world's population of young professionals, college students, upper management, clergy, and all manner of laity rise up, it is useless without the Spirit of God. There can be no reformation without it. 

  And He is so willing to give it. More than parents are willing to give good gifts to their children. More than mothers are willing to sacrifice sleep and sanity for their newborns. More than fathers are willing to give sound advice to their sons. More than I am willing to give up my days and evenings and weekends for these kids. 

  Is it really that NOT enough people are asking for it? Am I not enough? 

  Silly questions. 

  

  In Part II of this series, I talked about the Sputnik Crisis. I've been wondering what this would look like in our time. What smack-in-the-face experience do we really need? What are we waiting for? When will we wake up? When will these "good works" of campmeetings and revivals and rallys cease to be works and start to be a life-altering commitment by everyone involved?

  These questions have been asked before.

  And yet we are still here. We are still talking about next time, and next year, and the next generation. Is anyone else tired of this? Rise up... 

  Because the Sputnik Crisis is here. It's been here. It's walked this earth. It's touched the sick and the sick of heart. It's here in our sacrifice for others, in the gospel we mumble out because we're insecure, in the blood that covers us and covers us and covers us because we fall back again and again and again. It's in the eyes that look on with love, understanding, and forgiveness as we profess our witness falsely and crucify Him afresh... It's in the friends we betray, the parents we dishonor, the labor we shirk. The slap-in-the-face is His love, and our character which is so fraught with sin that we can't even see the chasm that separates us from Him. It's the children to whom we'll have to say, "It's your turn now..." It's the wars and rumors of wars, earthquakes, disasters, and the degradation of nature, both earthly and human. 

  When will this end?

  These are momentous times. 

  I say that often lately. And I believe it. It's as if the Esthers and Nehemiahs and Ezras and Zerubabbels are all coming out of the woodwork. It is such a time as this. Keep contacting people. Keep looking upward. Keep emailing me and calling me. Keep plugged in. Keep forwarding thoughts and messages to each other. Tell the world. Revival can begin again. 

  Life is exciting. 

  And yet the work is daunting. I look at all the people who have gone before us. All those who say, "Yeah, when I was your age, I used to think Jesus would come before I got married." Before I had children. before I turned forty. before I stopped trying. before I lost hope. 

  And they ask me, "Did we do something wrong?" I don't know what to tell them. I don't know. I don't know what went wrong. I don't know why more people didn't rise up. I don't know if the same thing is about to happen and fast forward thirty years and I'm still here. It brings me to desperation. 

  I don't want to give up. I don't want to flag. Time is like sand through my fingers and during staff meeting when we're looking at calendars and the top it says "April 2012" I want to cry. People are already planning for years in advance. As though nothing is expected to change... as though we're still going to be going 'round and 'round and I know... I KNOW... I know I can't do this alone. I can't even do this with fifty people by my side. But with the Spirit of God, we can. 

  In the end, the Sputnik Crisis will be exactly where it was when the disciples encountered it, some thousand plus years before there was even the dream of broaching the great beyonds of space. It will be in the pricking of the heart and the conversion of the soul. It will be in the outpouring of the Spirit. It will be in confession and repentance and the humility of knowing that we are the ones who are sitting on the walls, looking to our own work while God's house is in ruin. It will be here, where it was, all the time. 

  Sometimes I think I sound like a madman. A madman preacher running through the streets. "The end is near, the end is near!" But if I be mad for Christ, so be it. Rise up, my fellows. Rise up. The time is sooner than you think. It is high time to rise up and build. 

   

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