this is today

I came across this very good quote recently –

“The purpose of the gifts is to call attention to the Lord … The second object of the gifts is evangelistic … We must test anything that claims to be a movement of the Spirit in terms of it’s evangelistic power … God’s way has been to revive His people and then because they are revived, His power is manifested in their preaching, their witness, their testimony and in the whole of their lives”.

Dr Martyn Lloyd-Jones – “Joy Unspeakable” – Kingsway Books, Eastbourne (2000) – (p256).

I love that. It is the way of God to revive His people and for those revived lives to take Jesus to their homes, workplaces, shopping centres, sporting grounds, wherever they go! It really is such a simple plan.

The truth is though, we seem to do all we can to avoid going in search of One who revives. To reach people we’d rather try a new method or a different angle, re-engineer the church or apply a fresh teaching, or worse rationalise it all away with a new theology*.

The question has got to be, how’s that working for you?

I ask myself the same question and to be honest, it isn’t. And the reason for that is evident; it isn’t God’s way. A revived life is, but for that there is a cost and it is a cost most of us are extremely reluctant to pay.

But the time has come. There is no other way to reach this nation, in my opinion, than to count the cost and go in desperate search of the One who revives. It is He and He alone, by His Spirit, who possesses the “evangelistic power” we lack and need.

* Also known as unbelief and Jesus had some heavy things to say about it.

Prayer does not change God, but it changes him who prays.

-Soren Kierkegaard

1 Timothy 6:6

Now there is great gain in godliness with contentment.

We need to learn to live in the NOW, content with the NOW. Anything else NOW will rob us of our joy and peace we have in Christ.

Our past is our past. It is past. It is gone and we can not change it even if we want to. Feelings and thoughts of regret and shame as we look back rob us of contentment in our lives today.

Likewise, as we look forward to our future, we can feel fear, apprehension, worry, stress, anxiety, depression, hopelessness. Again this emanates from thoughts we entertain in our NOW.

We can’t change the past, we can’t predict the future – but right NOW we can choose to look to Christ and in Him find peace and contentment for today.

Jesus taught us to pray, asking for “daily bread“, not a store for a week, month or longer. When we look to Jesus and rely on Jesus NOW;

• we find contentment and rest for NOW,
• peace and forgiveness for our past,
• and faith and hope for our future.

Jeremiah 25:4

You have neither listened nor inclined your ears to hear…

There is a difference between listening and inclining your ear to hear.

Have you ever found yourself like me, listening to your wife talk whilst at the same time reading or watching the TV? “Are you listening to me?!?” is the question that soon comes. Why? Because there is a difference between listening and inclining your ear to hear.

You can tell your wife you’re listening but she knows (and so do you) you weren’t inclining your ear to hear. In other words you weren’t paying attention.

We can hear the Word of God preached in church, played on podcasts, and read in blog posts. We can passively listen, but that is not actively taking the time to incline our ears to the pitch, volume and frequency of the Lord’s voice to us.

What is God saying to you? Why don’t you take some time to lean into God and incline our ears to hear His voice.

*Image courtesy infovisual.info

What do you do when you don’t know what to do?

You call 9-1-1. That is, Psalm 91:1.

He who dwells in the secret place of the Most High
Shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty.

I heard a preacher say this at a conference years ago. It may sound a little bit corny, but it has stuck with me, and more importantly, it is absolutely true.

Don’t know what to do? Run to God. Go to the secret place. Seek Him. Hide yourself in His presence. When you do that, other things – no matter how desperate they seem – appear less intimidating than they did.

Check out the rest of Psalm 91 as well. So many great promises in there for when you’re in a tough place.

Over Easter I came across this incredible article in The Age which state a recent studies showing:

“42 per cent of Australians believe Jesus had divine powers and 54 per cent believe he rose from the dead. But even among those who do not identify as born again, 45 per cent believe in the resurrection.

I find these astonishing statistics. As the article states we’ve been led to believe that Australians are overwhelmingly secular and skeptical, but interestingly the research is now saying something else altogether.

For me this is hugely encouraging. As I reflect on conversations I have with people outside of the church it is my experience most people are not black and white atheists, but rather most are of the view “I believe there is something out there but I don’t know what”.

The other side of the coin to these findings though is much more challenging. If 45% of non-Christian Australians believe in the resurrection why are less than 10%* born again and in church?

Dr John Dickson is quoted in the article summing this up as follows:

“it shows there is a base-level assumption among the Australian public that accepts the Jesus story even if it has no relevance to their lives.“

Relevance can be seen as a bit of dog-eared word in church circles – the endless chasing of gimmicks, latest and greatest programs and emphases and even the watering down of the core foundations of our faith. Relevance might be a bad word in church circles, but surely IRRELEVANCE is worse.

This study tells us our mission to reach people is stalled not through lack of belief but through simply not connecting the truth to people’s lives. Somewhere along the way the greatest message in the world has failed to register on the radar screens of average Australians and that is a tragedy for the local church.

For me this opens up a whole new vista of seeking to bridge the gap between the church and the community around us – we absolutely must be relevant in their 21st century, suburban lives.

How about you? How have you sought to make Christ relevant to the world around you? What questions are people asking around you that your church is answering? What are you doing (or do you think we can do) to make people know we are there and Jesus matters?

*There are many church / born again statistics for Australia – this being just a conversative rounded figure.