All is Well

Before me, even as behind, God is, and all is well ~ John Greenleaf Whittier

When the Hurt is Deep: More thoughts on Revival

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Our second revival service was tonight, which, of course, has generated more thoughts on revival.

What place does revival have amongst those whose hurt is deep?  What is it that they need?

I think the answer is found in Psalm 19:7:

7 The law of the Lord is perfect,  reviving the soul;

the testimony of the Lord is sure, making wise the simple;

The law of the Lord is perfect.  It is perfect.  What is the law?  It is scripture.  And what does that scripture do?  It revives the soul.  It revives the soul.  Scripture study is more than just intellectual pursuit of knowledge about God.  No, it is vital for the reviving of the soul.  The reviving of my soul,  the reviving of your soul.

My heart is broken tonight over a nameless thing.  It hurts deeply, this night.  I need revival.  I need life-giving restoration of my soul and, at the moment even more so for my mind.  And my heart.  I need to do scripture work–life-giving scripture work that revives the soul.

We sang a song tonight titled “Do it Lord”.  It speaks to depression.  It speaks to the fatherless.  It speaks to prodigals like me and you.   Here are the lyrics.  I was going to just share parts of it, but I am compelled now to include the song in it’s entirety.

I see your glory, covering the earth Lord
Just as the waters, covering the sea
I see the millions, coming to salvation
I see revival, fire in the land
I see the lost, nameless ones remembered
I see the widows, shouting out your praise
I see the friendless, loved and cele brated
Orphans fullfilling Lord, your calling on their lives

Do It Lord, do it lord
Do it Lord we are praying
Do it Lord, do it
That your glory may be seen

I see forgiveness over taking hatred
Pride and prejudice, now giving way to love
I see depression replaced with joy and gladness
And Satan’s lies, now bowing to the truth

Do It Lord, do it lord
Do it Lord we are praying
Do it Lord, do it!
That your glory may be seen

This is our prayer oh God
This is our desperate cry
In these days that were living now
Let your kingdom come
Let your will be done

I see the brokeness of families, brought to wholeness
I see the prodigals, running home to you
Father’s hearts, now turning toward their children
And the children’s hearts, turning toward the fathers
I see your Church, all rising up in power
Laying down their lives in unity and love
I hear the sound of every tribe and nation
Giving glory to Jesus Christ the Son

O God, let this song be truth. A tremendously autobiographical song of my soul  Let it be truth tonight.  Let it be truth tomorrow as we all rise and go to difficult jobs, difficult school days, tiring schedules.  Do it Lord.

Say Peace to me tonight, my God.

Revive Us, O Lord

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Tomorrow morning my church, Seaford Baptist (you can find out times and dates for the revival at that website), will begin a series of revival meetings.  It’s been years and years since I’ve been involved in a series of revival meetings.  Growing up and in the early years of our ministry, it was often a time of loud, nearly angry preaching coupled with pressure to “make a decision for Christ”, “walk the aisles”, and punctuated with phrases such as “With every head bowed and eyes closed, raise your hand if you need Christ in you life”.  I think I probably raised my hand at every revival meeting I attended as a child.  And generally came away from revival terrified.

But what does revival mean?  What does true revival look like?

Pulling out my beloved dictionary, I find that revival happens on two spheres.  First, there is the very personal, individual aspect of revival.  This revival means the restoration to life, vigor and strength.  And o, how my heart and soul need that.  I am weary, my heart is sad tonight for many reasons.  That God would grant a restoration to life, a restoration to strength that is based on Him; I would be so grateful.

The second aspect of revival is on the corporate church body level:

an awakening, in a church or community, of interest in and care for matters relating to personal religion.

Life-giving to my dead and hurt soul; an awakening of my church family.  That is what we should pray for.  This is what I should long for.

I found these verses tonight on being revived:

Psalm 71:

20 You who have made me see many troubles and calamities

will revive me again;

from the depths of the earth

you will bring me up again.

21 You will increase my greatness

and comfort me again.

God has made me to see many troubles and calamities.  The psalmist, too, and yet he is so confident, so assured that God will revive him again.  How can he know this?  On what basis can he make this audacious declaration that even though God has made this author see many troubles and calamities, God will revive him again?

That appears to point to the fact that the author of this psalm was revived at one time.  He remembers that closeness to God.  He remembers what it is like to be strong, to be strengthened, to be dead than alive.

And he’s begging for that to happen again.

We need to beg God to revive us-again.  I need to plead with My God to revive my very cynical heart of stone again, back to the way it was at one time.  My “Uncle” C.S. Lewis referred this process as a snowman melting, and as a heart of stone melting.  His chapter in “Surprised by Joy” is a must read,  the title of the chapter is ““Check-mate”.  Revival is an opportunity to re-examine our lives and our doubts (because we all have them) honestly and thoroughly.  Revival is a time to worship our God and our Jesus, fervently.  It’s an opportunity to repair relationships, to clarify the future vision for the church, an opportunity to demonstrate love , joy and compassion to one another.  Oh, how my weary soul needs revival.

And your soul does as well.

Below is the choir from Prestonwood Baptist singing “Sold Out”, one of the songs we will be singing this week.  “Sold Out”.

http://youtu.be/HJxS0xv2MRM

 

I hope my ramblings are helpful to you.  Please sign up for email alerts of new posts if you are interested in doing so,  by adding your email to the box on the right-hand side of this page.

Zechariah, Worship and Motives

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Zechariah is not a book of the Bible that I’ve spent much (read that as any) time in.  The language and flow of thought have, wrongly, steered me away from digging into any of the prophecy books, with the exception of a few chapters of Isaiah.  To tell you the truth, I’m not even very sure who Zechariah is, other than he was a prophet.  That, I realize, is pathetic.

A good friend of mine wrote a blog post this morning in response to his study of Zechariah.  The passage that prompted his response was Zechariah 7:3-4:

3 saying to the priests of the house of the Lord of hosts and the prophets, “Should I weep and abstain in the fifth month, as I have done for so many years?”
4 Then the word of the Lord of hosts came to (Zechariah): 5 “Say to all the people of the land and the priests, When you fasted and mourned in the fifth month and in the seventh, for these seventy years, was it for me that you fasted?

I encourage you to read his post, located here.  Motives are very important to me, I try to always be in examination of my motives.  Unfortunately, sometimes even knowing my motives are erroneous does not prevent me from proceeding down my chosen path, particularly when it comes to spiritual disciplines.  My friend’s time in study this morning and the resulting post reminded me, to use his word, that recalibrating my motives on a continual basis is a necessary part of spiritual growth.  I need to be in constant and consistent questioning myself as to whether or not I am engaging in spiritual disciplines in order to know God more fully and to worship and love Him with all my heart, soul, mind and strength.

Why we Sing, and why I miss it when I can not sing

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I had to miss choir practice tonight due to extenuating circumstances.  I had looked forward to singing tonight, so was somewhat discouraged that I was unable to.  But as a result, the night brought to my mind a recent quote I read by Bob Kauflin on the reason why we sing.  Kauflin recently spoke these words at a Worship Conference:

At one point I quoted Harold Best: “All our musical offerings are at once humbled and exalted by the strong saving work of Christ.” We touched on how our singing is not something we originate, but flows from the relationships of the triune God who sings (Zeph. 3:17; Heb. 2:12; Eph. 5:18-19). We sing because God sings and we’ve been made in his image. I never got to mention it on the panel, but a very helpful book on the Trinity is The Deep Things of God: How the Trinity Changes Everything by Fred Sanders.


The idea that God sings never fails to stir me up.  And Zephaniah 3:17—whew:

17 The Lord your God is in your midst, 
a mighty one who will save; 
he will rejoice over you with gladness; 
he will quiet you by his love; 
he will exult over you with loud singing.
Tonight I came across words from David Ward on why we sing, in relation to the congregation:  Also very true and important insights on this subject:

As we sing to one another, encouraging our brothers and sisters in Christ with the precious truths of God’s works and ways, we bring glory to God. He has designed singing as a wonderful way for those who are strong in the gospel to encourage those who are weak as they give witness with their lips and body to the reality and power of what they are singing about. Even as a song leader, I have had many mornings where I was inwardly struggling to believe and appropriate the gospel. God often uses the sound and the posture of the congregation to help get my attention off of myself and my individual spiritual walk and be encouraged at His work amongst our entire congregation

Singing is very important to me, it is core stuff, it is prayer.

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