The Best is Yet to Come : Cruel Cliche' or Solid Joy?

 I saw Jim at one of our Christmas Eve services for the first time in two years.  He was bent over in his wheelchair when I greeted him, seated next to his wife, Maggie. Jim did not recognize me when I took his hands and greeted him, even though he has been a fellow pastor for many years and like a grandfather to our children. Jim's mind and body have been ravaged by Alzheimer's disease. Maggie has suffered in similar tragic ways. They are one of the most godly, gentle couples I have ever had the privilege of knowing. Jim's favorite farewell in his Irish brogue was always, 'The best is yet to come!" 

This is hard to believe looking at him now.

Ben Rector is a singer-songwriter with a particular talent for holiday songs. His Christmas album is excellent and his Thanksgiving song captures the feeling of my favorite American holiday with poignant beauty. So, I was pleased, but not surprised, when Ben came out with a song for New Years Eve last week. It's called The Best is Yet to Come. A Bruce Hornsby meets Coldplay mashup of soulful piano and soaring melody backed by a children's choir, it's a modern take on Auld Lang Sine that could well become a standard for New Year's well-wishers.  It's both reflective and honest about the 'wildest menagerie of unfortunate crazy things' this passing year,  yet unsinkably buoyant about the one to come. 

'So raise up your glasses for brand new beginnings, and don't shed a tear for the things that are ending, cos' tomorrow will bring us a new morning sun, friends I believe that the best is yet to come.'

 

 While the lilting hope of the song strikes a chord, it's sunny optimism jars with the minor-key melancholy of our moment.  I so want to believe it to be true.  I just don't know if I can after looking at Jim's vacant eyes and a myriad other sad people with sad stories. How can one's expectations not be tempered by the wild menagerie of crazy unfortunate things that was 2021?'  

Perhaps one's expectation should rather be something like, "It's going to be hard, but God will be with us and will get us through." Not as lyrical,  I know, but certainly more livable? And yet, do the Scriptures not invite us to trust the God who is able to do immeasurably more than we can ask or imagine? Surely this means more than merely He will get us through? 

My question is this.  Is the oft-quoted, the best is yet to come just a cruel cliche' that will leave us with a Champagne hangover on New Year's Day? Or could it be a solid joy that carries us through the darkest of years when rightly understood?

Reading Jonathan Edwards essay on Christian Happiness has made me land firmly on the latter. The theologian who became president of Princeton University was best known for his revival preaching during the Great Awakening. A deeper Christian thinker you would struggle to find, yet Edwards was relentlessly hopeful. In his essay, he distills the secret of Christian Happiness down to three truths. 

"All our good things cannot be taken away. 

All our bad things will come to pass. 

All our best things are yet to come."

If we look at Edwards' statements through the lens of Romans 8 we can understand they are solid statements, not empty cliche's.  The Apostle Paul writes that our adoption as God's dear children cannot be taken away; that absolutely nothing can separate us from the love of our Father in Christ Jesus. All our good things cannot be taken away.  

He insists that God is working in all things - even the worst things - for His glory and our good if we are His. Even our weakness is working for our good as the Spirit groans in intercession for us. One day we will see all our bad things will come to pass. 

He argues that our momentary sufferings cannot compare to the weight of glory that awaits us. In fact, he writes, all of creation groans in anticipation of the glory that will be revealed to us and through us. Our groaning will turn to rejoicing on that day.

 In short, the Apostle Paul and Jonathan Edwards would concur with Jim and Ben.

 Our best things are, in fact, yet to come.

This does not mean that the New Year necessarily brings a brand new day or even a brand new you. It  means that God is making all things new and if we are in his hands we will be included in His grand renovation project. This is no cruel cliche'. This is a solid joy for a New Year, even if that year carries with it another wild menagerie of unfortunate crazy things. 

Striking Malchus : On the Perils of Prayerless Militancy

"Then Simon Peter, who had a sword, drew it and struck the high priest's servant, cutting off his right ear. (The servant's name was Malchus.)  Jesus commanded Peter, "Put your sword away! Shall I not drink the cup the Father has given me?" John 18:10-11

 The arrest of Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane after his betrayal by Judas, is for me, one of the most tragic scenes in Scripture. It's interrupted by a curious little scuffle between Peter and Malchus, the high priests servant, which brings some brief comic relief to the tragedy. 

Either Peter was a poor swordsman or Malchus was good at ducking, but I doubt Peter was aiming for his ear. Jesus rebukes Peter, tells him to put his sword away and promptly heals the servants' ear. I have some questions about this scene. Was there a brief search for the missing ear? Did Jesus clean off the blood and  mud before sticking it back on? Did it fit on properly or a bit skew? I'm curious. 

Whatever the case, while Peter's intentions may have been noble in protecting Jesus, his approach was as poor as his aim. He was tone deaf as to what Jesus actually needed him to do. Jesus did not need a militant bodyguard at this time. He needed Peter to be a resilient disciple who would support him in his resolve to drink the cup the Father had given Him, and follow him in the way of the cross. Instead, Jesus had to clean up Peter's militant mess. 

Until recently I had never made the connection between Peter's inappropriate militancy and his sleepiness just hours before in the Garden of Gethsemane. Jesus had warned his disciples to, "Watch and pray so that you do not fall into temptation." He had not asked them to pray for Him. He had asked them to pray for themselves. Three times he had returned from his own prayer to find them sleeping, Peter included.  Isn't there such a stark contrast between Peter's spiritual passivity and his inappropriate militancy in the Garden of Gethsemane? He has done exactly what Jesus had warned him about. He has fallen into temptation and acted rashly in the flesh because of his prayerlessness. Peter must have been so disappointed at the healed ear and the rebuke. After all, he was just trying to serve Jesus! 

Now I want to draw a parallel between Peter's inappropriate militancy and what I have seen in the Church these past two years of social and political upheaval. I am going to make a statement that is clearly a generalization. I want to qualify it by saying that there are some notable exceptions, but by qualifying I do not want you to lose the force of my conviction in the statement. Here it is. 

I have found, that by and large, the most causally militant Christians tend to be the most spiritually passive.  They tend to be immature, lacking in spiritual disciplines like prayer, reading the Bible and fellowship. They are generally poor at receiving counsel from leaders or mature disciples in the church. They are hard to mobilize to service and mission. Yet suddenly, from this place of spiritual passivity, they are awakened to swashbuckling militancy in the Name of Christ. They think they are serving Jesus, but it actually results in a bloody mess that Jesus then has to clean up!

The cause differs. Some get militant about masks. Others about no masks. Some get militant about their chosen political party. Others get militant about their chosen conspiracy theory. Some get militant about getting the vaccine. Others get militant about not getting the vaccine. But almost without fail, the most militant people I know around these causes are some of the most spiritually passive. Their militancy is not a calling birthed out of prayer. It is a temptation birthed out of prayerlessness. It is a militancy marked by outrage and unreasonableness.  Like Peter, their militancy may mean they are just steps away from a complete denial of Jesus. 

Please note, I am not suggesting that we should not have strong convictions. All of us need to wrestle our way to conscience and conviction around masks, vaccines, race, politics and a whole slew of other disputable matters. I am also not saying that there are not just causes to fight for. However, unless our just causes are birthed out of prayer with other disciples we will get into the flesh and strike Malchus again.

The historic connection between justice and prayer in the Church is intriguing. William Wilburforce and his fight to abolish slavery, Dietrich Bonhoeffer and his fight against Nazi Germany, Martin Luther King and his fight to end racial discrimination;  all had different and just causes. However,  all their movements had one thing in common. They were birthed and sustained in prayer amidst authentic Christian community. 

Let's beware of striking Malchus out of prayerless militancy.  

And let's not be tone deaf to what Jesus requires of us which is to follow Him in the way of the cross.

Trigger Warning : exploring the popular use of a loaded saying

  "I feel so triggered right now."

This has become an all-too-common saying in our time and place, one that describes a visceral reaction to something or someone. 

While the concept of triggering has therapeutic roots, it has become so popularized in this cultural moment that we have lost the true weight of its origin. It is one of those great American colloquialisms that subtly shapes our ways of thinking and being. It is even used in a derogatory way when people seem too fragile to see or hear something of an extreme nature. You may hear something like, "Trigger warning for snowflakes!" 

While I can appreciate the term, it has become for me, a loaded saying that trivializes real trauma and rationalizes retaliation.  

Sarah Holland, a clinical psychologist with the Viva Center defines the concept of triggerring as follows.  "When we experience a traumatic event, our brains activate the more primal parts of our nervous system. This initiates our “fight, flight, or freeze” reactions, heightening our senses to help us survive; heart rate and breath quicken, the stomach clenches, and the body shakes. This animalistic, emotional part of the brain overrules other brain processes in favor of survival. We stop processing information and storing it in our brains as linear memory. Rational thought halts as the body readies for action."

Think of a veteran who suffers from PTSD hearing an explosion, triggering a reaction where they dive for cover. Consider an abuse survivor who watches a movie depicting similar abuse and experiences flashbacks or dissociation that causes them to relive their trauma. Triggering is real and in this sense the term proves helpful category that creates empathy for people's otherwise inexplicable reactions. 

Trivializing Trauma

More recently though, the common use of triggering has trivialized real trauma, taking on a meaning more akin to being upset, offended or disgusted. I've found it being used so easily by friends, colleagues, and have found myself using it myself from time time, in a way that is not actually true.  

In the situations I'm thinking of, it would have been more true to say, "I found myself reacting more angrily than I expected to your words," instead of, "Your words triggered me."

Or, "That movie scene caused a surprising fear in me," instead of "That movie triggered me." 

Am I being pedantic? In some senses I can understand its common use. The past two years have been traumatic for everyone in a sense. We all feel a bit triggered somehow. But there is a danger in the popularization of feeling triggered. Allow me to explain my caution with the term. 

Weaponized Emotions

In our culture of outrage, we can easily weaponize our emotions when we use the term triggered. By so doing, we rationalize retaliation. I mean, the very nature of the word triggered implies some kind of violent reaction. If a loaded gun is triggered, a bullet flies out of the chamber. To be triggered is not merely to feel something deeply, it is all too often to say or do something in reaction to that feeling. 

An involuntary reaction 

Moreover, because the term triggered is used in the passive form, it implies an involuntary reaction. Rather than say, "I was hurt so I retaliated," which accepts some responsibility, it implies that this reaction was something over which I had no control, much like the reflex of a nerve that has been touched. If I am triggered, I am therefore absolved of responsibility for my reaction, especially if it is retaliation.  

A hall pass from healthy discourse

Beyond retaliation, being triggered can rationalize our desire to take flight from people with ideas that make us feel uncomfortable. In his book, The Coddling of the American Mind, Jonathan Haidt explores the mental fragility fostered by our education system that has disabled students from interacting with those who hold different ideologies from them. The concept of feeling triggered gives students a hall pass from healthy civil discourse that would otherwise build mental resilience. 

I'm afraid that until we start to take responsibility for our triggers instead of rationalizing them, there are going to be a lot of bullets flying around followed by avid claims of innocence. There may also be a lot of people retreating to hide in their ideological trenches. 

So, perhaps we need to find some practical ways in which to put our triggers on safety? 

This is not to suppress our emotions or ignore unjust treatment towards us. It is to take responsibility for our reactions even while we acknowledge what may have caused them.

 I recommend a few ways to put on our emotional triggers on safety.

• Use the term more sparingly. If everything is a trigger, nothing is a trigger.
• Before you use it, ask whether your motive is to absolve yourself of responsibility for retaliation.
• Be more aware of your levels of emotional resilience. Are you more sensitive to things at some times than others?
• Give a few trusted friends permission to call you out if they see you becoming over-sensitive or reactionary.
• Resolve to sleep on it before responding to a potentially volatile situation. Most things can wait a night.
• Pray through Jesus' Sermon on the Mount in which he calls us to turn the other cheek and pray for our enemies. Ask him for Him grace to do be a non-anxious presence.
• Sit with the example of Jesus' betrayal and denial by his friends, His  false accusation at his trial and mockery at his crucifixion and ask for His Spirit to strengthen you in the face of treatment that would tempt you to retaliate.
• Let's be gracious to those who are genuinely suffering from PTSD and triggering experiences. 

God's House never comes Turnkey

We've bought and sold a few properties over our twenty-seven years of marriage as we've moved from city to city and nation to nation. A couple were smaller apartments or condos that came turnkey. The term turnkey is realtor speak for brand new or move-in ready. No restoration or repairs needed. Simply turn the key and start living. 

Two of the properties though, were serious fixer-uppers, larger homes that needed plenty of work. They both had good bones, as they say, with great potential when viewed through a restorer's lens. We never had the money to get them to move-in ready condition up front, so we just got the keys and moved in, ready or not.  

My wife and I watch Chip and Joanna Gaines shows just shaking our heads with envy, wishing we'd had some experts like them to get our fixer-uppers turn-key before we'd moved into them. What a rush it must be to have that before banner rolled back and see the immediate after result of their craftsmanship?  But our aim was always to gradually restore the homes to their former glory and even improve on the originals, in order to enhance their beauty and value. 

 Our experience has become a powerful church metaphor for us. 

In our experience, God's house never comes turnkey. 

It's move-in ready or not.  

It's a fixer-upper's dream with no Chip and Joanna Gaines in sight. You're living on a perpetual building site. It's messy and uncomfortable. But the progress is beautiful and the end product satisfying because God keeps restoring His house. 

The Bible describes God's people as living stones in His house. "You also, like living stones, are being built into a spiritual house to be a holy priesthood, offering spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ." (1 Peter 2:5)  This infers that God is always doing renovation projects on his house and that he moves His people around as living stones in order that His Spirit may indwell His spiritual house. This requires a sacrifice on our part, because each of us has been saved and set apart as priests by Jesus' to serve in His house. Mixed metaphors by the Apostle Peter, perhaps, but suffice to say that living stones have to be flexible and priests have to be sacrificial. I think that's Peter's point here.  

When we remodeled the kitchen in our current house we had to move our fridge and microwave into our dining room for three months. It felt horribly confined but so worth it in the end. Sometimes God will close down a part of his house and have us squeeze together in a more confined space while that room is being restored. People who expect their church to be turn-key tend to get disgruntled when God decides to do some remodeling and move the walls and the furniture around. But if we co-operate with our Great Architect we get too see His house more glorious than it was before. 

Every metaphor has its limits, of course, but this is one way to understand what is happening at present in the part of God's house called Southlands. While God graciously enabled us to extend a wing during Covid through the planting Southlands Santa Ana in January, our Whittier congregation endured numerous setbacks over the Covid season. These included more stringent limits on in-person gathering, the loss of their Sunday morning venue, the obvious challenges of online church  as well as numerous key members leaving the LA area. They remain a healthy and faithful community, but we have felt that they have needed both strengthening and a viable morning venue in order to be effective in their mission.

So, last Sunday we welcomed Southlands Whittier back to Brea for a season of refreshing and what we hope will be a relaunch in the Fall or early 2022.  In the meantime, Kevin and Shannon begin a 10 week sabbatical to rest and recalibrate after 6 years of faithful leadership. The congregation will continue doing small groups and outreach in Whittier and will also gather to worship in Uptown Whittier  on the third Sunday of each month at 5pm at Disciple Church. However, on Sunday mornings they will join with us at Brea. Let's make sure they feel like we are a home away from home for them. We also want to encourage people from other Southlands congregations to come out and bolster their monthly evening gatherings with faith and presence. 

In the mean time, we stand with so many churches around the world who have felt confined, displaced and discouraged in this season. God promised that He would restore His house not just to former glory, but to  greater glory.

  "The glory of the latter house will be greater than the glory of the former house." (Haggai 2:9)

This promises is an anchor for our soul as we stand amidst the rubble of God's restoration project. 

Because God's house never comes turnkey.

Umfundisi wenjabulo : a tribute to Elliot 'Bafana' Sonjica

 

I heard today that Elliot Sonjica's life here on this earth stopped suddenly yesterday. Dreadful Covid-19 claimed another victim. This is devastating and we are heart broken for Dolly and Grace and their families, as well as their Hilton Christian Fellowship family.

We can rest assured that Elliot woke up in the presence of Jesus. For those who die in Christ, death has lost its sting. Death will be like waking up from an afternoon nap with the sun streaming in through your bedroom window. Absent from the body, present with the Lord. 

But for those left behind, there are storm clouds of grief that obscure rays of resurrection hope. This grief-hope storm is a God-permitted weather pattern. This too will pass, but we cannot will it to pass. With hope, we must walk slowly through valleys of grief because of the huge gap a man like this leaves in our lives. We grieve exactly because he was a ray of resurrection of hope on this earth, that is now gone.

 One of God's common graces in grief is to celebrate a person's life in tribute, as we bless the One who gives and takes away. In the next week, the tributes will pour in, I know, letting Dolly and Grace and their family know of the giant faith legacy of Elliot Bafana Sonjica. I wish to add my voice to the chorus, if I may.

A Shepherd of Joy. Elliot was to me, Umfundisi wenjabulo, a shepherd of joy. The photo above, posted by his daughter Grace, captures that remarkable smile that would light up a room and chase the shadows out the door of any soul. A deep belly laugh was always just below the surface in the man and it didn't take much to get his feet going with his Madiba moves in worship. He had serious rhythm and soul, even though he couldn't sing quite as well as Dolly or Grace!  How he managed to do that with our white-boy-worship-music that had so little African groove is a miracle, but he did!  Elliot's life reminds me of simpler times. Simpler joys. Not a life of uninterrupted happiness, mind you, but a steadfast trust in His God through every season that produced contagious joy. 

A Gentle Giant. Elliot was a big man with a small ego. He was humble to the point of being self-effacing.  That is a rare virtue for a man from the proudest most powerful tribe in Sub-Saharan Africa.  He always underplayed, and most likely under-estimated, the giant influence he had on so many sons and daughters as a spiritual father. 

You need to know that he is something of an urban legend at Southlands, the church I pastor here in Southern California. Over the years we have hosted many conferences where people visit and minister from different nations. During one such conference, Elliot and Dolly were part of the ministry team and were hosted by a family in the area. The strange thing was that this particular family were not actually in the church. Their son had just got radically saved and so he asked his Mom and Dad to host a couple visiting from South Africa. This salt-of-the earth family had always been hospitable, but they had no idea what was about to hit them as Elliot and Dolly arrived on their doorstep. The Sonjica's faith and love made such a dramatic impact on them that by the end of that week the salvation dominoes had begun to topple in remarkable ways. Within weeks of their visit, the Mom and Dad, brother and sister were all saved and added to the church. They still see Elliot and Dolly like a spiritual father and mother to this day. Nobody else I know has made such a deep and lasting impact on our church in such a short space time. And not from behind a pulpit, mind you, just from around a dining room table. 

The Boy who Believed. Elliot Bafana Sonica. Bafana in Zulu, means boys, but not in a disrespectful way.  In essence, it means, one of the boys! It is the name used for South Africa's national soccer team. I'm still not sure whether this was Elliot's actual middle name or just a nick name. Whatever the case, it stuck, because it was true. He was one of the boys, a man with a noble bearing who had such a common touch. Who could forget the way he wore his jaunty tweed flat cap with such style?  But bafana also speaks to me of Elliot's simple, child-like faith. At the end of the day this gentle giant was simply a son of the Father who believed in Jesus with all his heart. I remember a message he once preached at a conference in Bloemfontein on faith and obedience almost twenty years ago. It was so simple, yet unforgettable, because it was spoken from a life of integrity. He believed God and obeyed and was therefore believable. 

Amidst so much ugliness on social media, there is the beauty of having a record of your interactions with the people you love and may lose. I went straight to my interactions with Elliot after hearing of his death. The last one was brief, yet affectionate. It was a message saying he hoped to visit us in the USA. It was a visit that sadly never came to pass. He ended with  the simple words, 'I love and miss you,' and I believed him.  Even his Facebook profile says, "A man with few words and I love my God and my family." The thing about about the man, was that his life, his faith and his few words were just so believable. Perhaps this was Elliot's most precious gift to us. Perhaps this is what God would most want multiplied through his life into ours, in our current faith famine of integrity.

So, Bafana, we salute you as you receive your crown from your King! 

Ndabezitha isiZulu! 

Hamba kahle, umfowethu!

California Calling: Reclaiming a Theology of Place for the Golden State

I'm told that U-Haul in California can't keep up with the demand from people hiring their trucks and trailers to pack up and leave for greener pastures. That trend hasn't been helped by two recent and very public departures of two very influential Californian residents; Elon Musk and Joe Rogan. Musk, the South African born  CEO of Tesla and SpaceX, is one of the wealthiest men in the world. He's also one of the most vocal and was never going to leave quietly. In a series of tweets in May 2020, Musk  threatened to move the company's headquarters to Texas or Nevada, where shelter-in-place rules were less restrictive. "Frankly, this is the final straw. Tesla will now move its HQ and future programs to Texas/Nevada immediately," Musk tweeted. A few months later he sold two of his homes in Silicon Valley and announced he was moving to Texas and building a new plant in Austin.

 Popular podcaster Joe Rogan of “The Joe Rogan Experience” cited overpopulation, traffic, and “the need for freedom” as the reasons he has been persuaded to move from his current home of Los Angeles to Texas.“I just want to go somewhere in the center of the country, somewhere it’s easier to travel to both places, and somewhere where you have a little bit more freedom,” he explained on his podcast.   

Officially, California added 21,200 people from July  2019, to July 2020, increasing the state’s population a paltry 0.05% to 39.78 million people — still by far the most of any state. But the bigger news is that 135,600 more people left the state than moved here in that period. It’s only the 12th time since 1900 the state has had a net migration loss, and the third largest ever recorded. * 

That's peculiar when you consider the many positive things California has going for it. Historically, people have flocked to the Golden State for its prosperity, its beauty, its creativity, its diversity and its weather. 

So, what are the primary factors people are giving for leaving the Golden State? I'm no expert, but I would suggest at least 5 Big factors.  

• Cost of Living - the high price of housing and taxation is driving people to cheaper States
• Progressive Politics - California has been a Blue State for years and that doesn't look like changing soon,  which makes Conservatives especially, feel controlled, labelled and claustrophobic. 
• Erosion of Morality  - Many people have a fear that raising kids in a culture that has lost its moral compass is not worth all the beauty and opportunity that California has on offer.
• De-Urbanization - Covid has swiftly reversed the pull that the urban centers of Los Angeles and San Francisco have had as major companies have allowed their employees to work remotely. Why live in expensive cities when you can earn the same and live in a small town in another State?
• Zeitgeist - This one is harder to put your finger on because there's no stat you can point to. But it's in the air. It's where the mind tends to go and where the conversation tends to flow. It's a pervading mood. Basically, it's become fashionable to hate on the Golden State.  

I've written about this extensively before, but Californians by nature, tend to be less rooted and more transient than other people from other places. John Steinbeck, the California native, called it 'an incurable  virus of restlessness. The urge to be some place else.'  The five factors above have simply made our latent virus of restlessness more contagious and it seems like we are at some kind of tipping point. 

It's against this bleak backdrop that we find ourselves fasting through the Book of Joshua as a Church this week. There is a promise from God to his people before they cross the Jordan river into Canaan that, "Every place you set your foot I have given to you. Only, be Strong and Courageous." Of course, there are giants in this land flowing with milk and honey. They have already caused the ten spies' hearts to melt with fear. But God calls Joshua, Caleb, and the people to walk in a different spirit of faith and courage. 

There are significant parallels between Canaan and California. A land flowing with milk and honey and with many giants. There is a great need for the Church in California to recover a theology of place if we are to continue to make disciples of Jesus faithfully in the face of increasing hostility to the gospel. Our call is not to conquest, but to cultivation of gospel fruit in this revival-rich soil, even as the giants loom large. 

 Perhaps our State has lost some of its California Dreaming allure? What is needed then is for the people of God to recover a sense of California Calling. Jesus is still deadly serious about His people fulfilling His Great Commission in this place of promise.  

I see California Calling working itself out in a few different ways. 

• It should involve people calling on the Lord in prayer to awaken and revive California again
• It should  involve Californians consecrating themselves to God's calling on them to make disciples and to 'seek the peace and prosperity of the place where He has carried us into exile.' 
•  It could involve calling people from other States and nations into the mission field of California. 

California Calling should be an ethic that operates in an opposite spirit to California pessimism.  

Why not amplify the beauty, diversity, prosperity and opportunity that is on offer in the Golden State while being discerning about the reality of spiritual and moral giants in the land? Why not change the narrative by speaking well of the place God has called us?

California Calling ultimately amplifies Jesus as the Golden hope of this Golden State.

There is no God forsaken place on the planet unless God’s people have forsaken it.

Who's with me?

https://www.cnbc.com/2020/12/16/californias-growth-rate-at-record-low-as-more-people-leave.htmly

Turning the Tide on Wednesdays: Revival in a Time of Upheaval

Someone should write a book called "The Four Wednesdays." 

That's what my wise friend, Jonathan Shrader said today. Jonathan is a church planter, but in his past life he was a press secretary on Capitol Hill during the Bush administration. That gave his words had a lot more weight. What he was referring to, of course, was the massive upheaval caused by four consecutive Wednesdays in January 2021. 

It began with insurrection on Capitol Hill on the first Wednesday, the impeachment of President Trump on the second, the inauguration of President Biden on the third and the Game Stop Stock Market Surge on the last. These four seismic Wednesdays sent shockwaves through America's political, economic and cultural landscape.  

I am not writing to make commentary on these four Wednesdays or to catastrophize these events.  There has already been enough of that. What I want to do though, is call out the sense of upheaval that they have brought to our already uneasy times.

They have caused a rising tide of fear among us. The sense of faith that God is at work seems to have drained from God's people. Many people are in survival mode just longing for some respite from the relentless wave after wave of bad news. Most pastors I talk to are also in survival mode. They are doing everything in their power to gather the scattered, comfort the grieving and piece together some semblance of unity in congregations that have been shredded by the ripe tide of Covid dissension and political tribalism. Churches are generally hanging on by the skin of their teeth and they expect that 1 in 4 will close in the USA because of these tides. 

So why call our church to study and pray through a 10-week Primer on Revival then when so many are fighting for survival? Isn't that insensitive? Isn't it expecting a bit much? 

I think it all depends on how you think about revival, really. Most Christians have been taught to think of revival as a kind of crescendo of spiritual fervor, in which the strength of the Church and the favor of the culture blend in perfect conditions to create the perfect wave. Yet, if we study the history of revivals we find that they generally occurred when the tide of God's presence was at at its lowest ebb and the tide of culture threatened to engulf the church. Think about it. The very word revival infers that something is about to die and needs to be resuscitated back to life.

Historically, revival starts when a remnant, finding their lives at this low ebb, begins to experience renewal as they cried out to God in desperate faith. This renewal then grows to become a contagious awakening to the presence of God. At some point, by God's mercy, the tide begins to turn and swells to become a tidal wave of God's presence that crashes into a world in upheaval bringing hope and healing.

In that sense, there's never been a better time than now to pray for revival.  

We have been gathering weekly around the Rend the Heavens revival primer in 24 groups humbly asking God to revive us and turn the tide through us. Our group meets in our back yard on Wednesdays. It wasn't planned that way, but it has been so encouraging to sense a rising tide of God's presence despite the waves of upheaval taking place every Wednesday in our world.

 

This primer is aimed to help small groups of people to pray for revival with both faith and wisdom. It explores ten examples of revival in the Bible and connects them with similar contemporary examples in history which will stir people to pray, "Do it again, in our day, Lord!" It is designed with practical prayer prompts and questions for group discussion. We encourage you to gather in any one of the 24 groups on different nights of the week, or perhaps to begin a revival primer group in your church.

We cannot manufacture revival. It is a sovereign act of God. But we can prepare the conditions of our hearts to be ready as the tide begins to turn. We believe that this primer will be a catalyst for a tidal wave of God's presence and healing to flow through the Church and into a world of upheaval.

Rend the Heavens: a primer for revival prayer is available now on Amazon.

 

Fresh Winds and False Winds : discerning when to go and when to stand.

Yesterday was the last Sunday of gathering to worship in the open air. By this coming Sunday we should be meeting under a big tent, which will protect us from the elements and allow us to put up a stage and TV screens.  But yesterday it was blazing hot and blowing a gale and we were exposed to it all; so much so that umbrellas were blown over and people had to stand at each corner of their easy-ups to keep them from blowing away. Meeting outside has definitely brought a new robust grit to our church, for which I'm thankful.  

It seemed appropriate, as we commissioned our Southlands Santa Ana launch team, to do it while these hot Santa Ana winds were blowing. In the midst of these forceful winds I thought of the ways in which the wind can be both disruptive and constructive. The same wind that picks up an umbrella and blows it over can also pick up a seed and carry it to fertile soil where it lands and grows into a tree. 

Jesus, when explaining to Nicodemus what life would be like for those who followed Him said, "The wind blows wherever it pleases. So it is with those born of the Spirit." (John 3:18)

When God blows with the wind of His Spirit, it is both disruptive and constructive. Among the Santa Ana launch team, people have allowed God to uproot them from one place to be planted in another for the sake of gospel. They have invited the disruption of moving house or changing jobs and saying gospel good-byes to friends they love. They've done this because they realize the disruption will be constructive as the wind carries the seeds of the gospel to grow and bear fruit in a new city. 

It's no use resenting the disruption when the wind blows. I mean, this is a crazy time to be planting a church. Most churches are fighting for survival and here we are sending valuable people out to start a new congregation! It's a risk, of course, but we have been praying and planning into this risk for over year now. And we sense the fresh wind of the Spirit blowing. So it seems best just to hoist our sails and  allow the wind to carry us along. If we are to allow God's wind to do constructive things at this time we have to allow it to be disruptive. In Acts 8, the winds of persecution caused a scattering of disciples which caused a spreading of the Word of God. The disruption was constructive. 

Of course, we should not be carried along by every wind. Some winds are not constructive at all. They  are destructive false winds. We must brace ourselves against them so that we are not 'tossed to and fro by every wind of doctrine.' (Ephesians 4:14)  There are destructive false gospels blowing across the Church in these days. We must discern them and stand against them. The winds of Progressive Liberalism will likely blow more strongly with the upcoming change of president and government.  We must find grace to honor and pray for our new President, whether we voted for him or not, to bring unity to a divided nation. We can do this while resisting the likely erosion of religious liberty, Biblical sexual ethics and the sanctity of marriage and life in the womb. On the other hand, we must also stand against the winds of Christian Nationalism that seek to co-opt Jesus for their political ends. This is a subtle but violent wind that is carrying many Christians away as they reduce Jesus' kingdom to their vision for the nation.  This article by PJ Smyth on a-newcomers-guide-to-christian-nationalism is helpful. We have to avoid both political extremes as Christ followers.  As C.S. Lewis wrote, "The devil always sends errors into the world in pairs--pairs of opposites...He relies on your extra dislike of one to draw you gradually into the opposite one. But do not let us be fooled. We have to keep our eyes on the goal and go straight through between both errors. We have no other concern than that with either of them." No doubt, we must also keep standing against the winds of Nominalism, with its false doctrine of cheap grace and vision of Jesus as Savior, but not Lord. These winds must not blow us off track. We must stand our ground against them as we 'contend for the faith once for all delivered to the saints.' (Jude 24) 

Finally, we must remember that the wind has the power either to extinguish or energize a fire. For many of us, the winds of adversity have almost extinguished the flame of faith and passion for Jesus. But God promises that 'a smoldering wick he will not snuff out until justice is led to victory.'(is 42:6) He is more than able to energize the flickering wick of our souls that once burned brightly with the fresh wind. God is mercifully on the move, reviving His Church when it is at it's most feeble! This is a time to allow the fresh wind of God's Spirit to 'fan into flame the gift of God that is within us through the laying on of hands.' ( 2 Tim 1:6) 

As Keith Green sang all those years ago, 

Oh Lord, please light the fire, That once burned bright and clear.

Replace the lamp of my first love, That burns with Holy fear

I also love this more recent song called Fresh Wind around the same theme.

As we begin our 9 week focus on praying for revival by signing up for a micro-revival group, let's pray together that God's fresh wind would help us to fan into flame the smoldering wick of our passion for Jesus that would lead to a blazing fire of revival. 

May His wind be a friend to our fire.