For the most part this will be the same but then again I held back because we were in someone else’s house….But this is our house of worship and we long for an intimate time with our God.
They that sow in tears shall reap in joy. Psalms 126:5
Sowing comes before reaping! Tears come before joy! Death comes before Resurrection! Repentance before Revival!
As a Pentecostal I remember a day when didn’t apologize for our zeal. I remember a day when we believed it only right to be passionate about our relationship with God! For sure we dwelt on the other side of the theological tracks, but the glory of the Lord was in our midst.
Jeremiah 2:13 For my people have committed two evils; they have forsaken me the fountain of living waters, and built cisterns, broken cisterns, that can hold no water.
Much of what we experience or see today is artificial, fleshy, and repulsively stagnant. We have no distinguishing marks of servant hood on us. We have compromised, become religious, and worldly…. We do not flow with living waters.
I long, how I long for a church life, that includes nights of prayer, followed by signs and wonders and divers miracles.
I long for the church to freely operate in the genuine gifts of the Holy Spirit.
I am desperate for the time when we weren’t clock watchers and our meetings lasted for hours, saturated with holy power!
We should be moved to tears with heartfelt sorrow because so many of our own children are turning a deaf ear to the Gospel, willingly to risk hell in the process.
The true believer:
Should be grieved at the worldliness of the Church.
Should be grieved at the blindness of the Church.
Should be grieved at the tolerance of sin in the Church.
Should be grieved at the prayerlessness in the Church.
I am not saying the church doesn’t pray however much of what we pray for reads more like a shopping list than intimate conversation with Almighty God!
The true believer is known in Hell! Acts 19:13-16 Then certain of the vagabond Jews, exorcists, took upon themselves to call over them which had evil spirits the name of the Lord Jesus, saying, We demand you by Jesus whom Paul preaches…. And the evil spirit answered and said, Jesus I know, and Paul I know; but who are you? And the man in whom the evil spirit was leaped on them, and overcame them, so they fled out of that house naked and wounded.
We should be disturbed that the corporate prayer of the Church no longer pulls down the strongholds of the devil in this sin-mad society.
Many gathered here today have no heart-sickness for the former glory of the Church because, well basically because you’ve never known what true revival is.
Where are those who’ll allow their hearts to be stirred for salvation and soul winning?
100 years ago, a series of boisterous revival meetings in a converted stable on Azusa Street launched a global movement that overcame differences in class, gender /race to unite around the belief that the Holy Spirit still works miracles.
Today, there are about 600 million Pentecostal and charismatic Christians whose roots are in the Azusa Street revival. The pre-revival meetings were nights filled with public repentance. We sit in our churches void of the living waters because we are content rather to drink from our man-made cisterns.
For the most part we sleep easy at night while this generation is going to hell in a hand basket. They are being swallowed up swiftly into the eternal darkness. Shame on us! This same Jesus who we celebrate today - wept over the lost.
He was aware how near their judgment was. We are not.
The Apostle Paul sent a tear-stained letter to the Philippian saints, writing: For many, of whom I have often told you and now tell you even with tears, live as enemies of the cross of Christ.
Notice that he did not say they are enemies of Christ; rather that they live as enemies of the cross of Christ.
I tell you with tears, they live as enemies of the cross of Christ. Powerful words, words that strike fear into the heart of man. Enemies of the cross of Christ? You gotta wonder who he’s talking about.
I think of people like Hitler. Problem is, Paul isn’t speaking about Hitler. I think of those who commit such horrible crimes that to speak of them is difficult. However, Paul is not talking about those people either.
Listen, and weep this blessed Easter morning For many, of whom I have often told you and now tell you even with tears, live as enemies of the cross of Christ. Paul goes on to say Whose end is destruction, whose God is their belly, and whose glory is in their shame, who mind earthly things.
Enemies because they LIVE IN A WAY that diminishes the redemptive values of the cross. If we believers trust in anything other than the saving work of Christ, we are guilty of living like enemies of the cross of Christ. Paul, knew that earthly things cannot save us. For him the death and resurrection was everything.
But friends, it doesn’t matter how well you adhere to this law or that law…without the saving work of Christ, His death and His resurrection you can’t be saved. Galatians 2:21 if righteousness comes by the law, then Christ is dead in vain.Fellow believers, it is us Paul is talking to… we are the ones who LIVE like the enemies of the cross of Christ. Listen to what Jesus said, When the householder has risen up and shut the door, you’ll stand outside and knock at the door, saying, Lord, open to us. He’ll answer you, I do not know where you come from. Then you’ll begin to say, We ate and drank in your presence and you taught in our streets. But he will say, I tell you, I do not know you, depart from me, all you workers of iniquity!
Jesus condemns all who ate and drank at His table, all those who sat under his teaching, because it was not an intimate relationship it was casual - all too casual.
Jesus isn’t warning wicked men here, this is aimed at us!
We are being warned to take our discipleship seriously. We are warned not to neglect co-crucifixion. That is we need to die with Christ so we can be raised with Him!
Why are we so reluctant to place the cross at the center of our lives? I Corinthians 1:18 the preaching of the cross is to them that perish foolishness; but to us who are saved it is the power of God. Rejoice in the cross of Christ!
Is there a better time to get right in our thinking about the cross?
Galatians 2:20 I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ lives in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me.
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