Random Thoughts on Random Things
Sunday 09 March 2008 at 1:00 pm Revival-- Somehow in our sin riddled and morally warped world we have lost the real meaning of this word. The etymology of the word revival is from the Latin word revivere which means “to live again.”The “re” prefix means “again,” and the “vivere” portion means “to live.”So put the two parts together, and you get revive which means, by conclusion, “to live again.” At some point in history we decided to make this a name of a scheduled meeting at a church. We are in great need of Revival in America. Not another church meeting but the spirit of God falling fresh on God's people. God's people to have a heart to go and reach the lost for Christ. When great revivals or even great awakenings happen, it is not people getting saved by bringing them to another church meeting. People get saved because the church (that would be you and me) get on fire for God and go out to reach the lost with the Gospel. The whole idea of telling people to bring their lost friends to church to get saved is part of the mindset that has taken evangelism and ministry out of the hands of the people and put in the hands of “professionals”. If you have a friend who you think is lost don't you think they would hear the Word from you better that from some stranger sounded by strangers? Come on people let's reach the world for Christ! Restore us again, O God our Savior, and put away your displeasure toward us. Will you be angry with us forever? Will you prolong your anger through all generations? Will you not revive us again, that your people may rejoice in you? Psalms 85:4-6Compassion-- Somehow in our sin riddled and morally warped world compassion has become a mark of being weak. Webster defines mercy as “compassion or forbearance shown especially to an offender or to one subject to one's power”, and compassion is defined as sympathetic consciousness of others' distress together with a desire to alleviate it.” Recently our church went through a series of spiritual gifts and personality test. The personalties were compared to shooting a gun. Some personalities would pull the trigger, while others would keep aiming. When it came to those with the gift of mercy it was said, “They were scared of the gun.” Once again if you have mercy you must be weak! One of the best examples of mercy and compassion is none other than Jesus. I wonder if we would classify Him as weak. If I may take the shooting analogy then it would not be that those with the gift of mercy are scared of the Gun it would be they are concerned at what they are shooting; they value the target more that the act of shooting. I scored very high on the gift of mercy and I do not feel weak or feel the need to apologize for this gift. "Blessed are the merciful, for they will be shown mercy." Matthew 5:7
One Last Story-- A seminary student was accompany me to go and share the Gospel at Raleigh North. On the way I had asked him about his calling. His response was maybe youth or college age. I told him that I could get him involved in reaching youth while he was in school. He told me he was more of an intellectual and that he was comfortable with more intelligent question like how can we know if there is one god, or what is truth, that the what he has heard in the apartments. Mostly in the apartments we find people who say they believe in God and in Jesus but they are not willing to turn from their sins, yet we somehow in in our sin riddled and morally warped world we, the saved, are attributing intellect to those who doubt God. This just blows my mind. "The fool says in his heart, "There is no God." They are corrupt, their deeds are vile; there is no one who does good." Psalms 14:1
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