The gospel and Revival

To bring back to life, to revive, resurrect, to re-impower, are all terms synonymous with 'Revival'. It implies bringing to life again that which died and within Christian circles is often discussed and desired. And I can see why because the examples of 'revival' that we have are awe inspiring but it does leave us with the impression that God comes and goes at his will. This gives rise to a doctrine that teaches we must plead with God to pour out his blessings upon us and several old testament verses are quoted such as 'if my people will humble themselves and pray, i will turn and heal their land'. At the heart of this is the concept that God blesses people when they perform well as someone once said to me ' Wales could have revival again (as in the 1904 one) if God's people will return to holiness and purity' or something like that! I was so shocked at coming face to face with this philosophy that i didn't reply, I mean, where do you start? What adds fuel to the fire is the accounts we have of how revival came to various places with all night prayer meetings, fasting, etc. So what is happening here?

I believe that God's word is our rock and when we move away from it we get carried about by every wind of doctrine, so we must reconcile demonstrations of God's power with his word and specifically with what Jesus accomplished at the cross, if not we are in strange waters! so whilst accounts of revival are exciting we must be careful of how they are interpreted by the writer and bring everything under scrutiny of new covenant truths.

The foundation of the new covenant is that God has made us completely acceptable in his sight, forever pleasing to him because of Jesus work at the cross and now all the promises of God are yes and amen in him. We now stand on grace ground, we are in such a position with God were blessings come as a result of us being one with Christ, we are inseparable from him therefore God treats us as Jesus at his very right hand of power and authority. It is absurd to think that we can earn anything more than what is already freely given unto us in this new covenant.

Colossians 2:10
And you are COMPLETE IN HIM, which is the head of all principality and power

How can you improve on completeness?!

Hebrews 10:14
For by one offering he has perfected forever them that are sanctified

The scriptures paint a picture of perfect union with God for anyone who is trusting in Jesus Christ. Our acts of holiness and purity have nothing to do with God releasing his blessings because they are already released Eph1:3 the key rather is within the writings to the church, mainly the Pauline epistles which instruct us with the knowledge of this union. We have an identity in God that is only enjoyed and experienced when we know of it hence Paul’s prayers in Ephesian’s 1 and 3, ‘I pray that you may know....’ acts of holiness and purity flow from the knowledge of this union and are not conditions to getting union!

So experiencing God is when we know, recognise, acknowledge what we already have because of our union with him.

Philemon1:6

That the communication of your faith may become effective by the acknowledging of every good thing which is in you in Christ Jesus.

At the heart of revival theology is a misunderstanding of a believers identity in Christ, its promoting a struggle with God to receive something from him which he has already given. The truth is that our minds need to catch up with our new born again Spirit!

The power that is manifested during revival has been there for us all along just as the power demonstrated by Smith Wigglesworth, John G. Lake, F.F. Bosworth etc is availbale to every believer, God is not holding back anything from us but the difference is that these men believed what I have written about our union with Christ, that God has done everything he will ever do for man when he sent Jesus to the cross. This confidence propelled these men into the most amazing signs and wonders. God hasn’t visited us sporadically over the centuries when our performance peaked but rather we see that latent power when his people believe what is true of them because of Jesus.

I don’t know of all the details of each revival but the word of God helps us to dissect information so that we see the truth. All night prayer meetings will not accomplish the manifestation of God’s power but it has the potential to sensitize you to what God has already given. Fasting will not make God move on your behalf but it has the potential to shift your focus from carnal realities to spiritual realities where you can see clearly the finished work of Christ. You being holy?.... well, can you really do that? How holy is holy enough? who are we fooling? Our holiness could not earn us a thing from God, if it could then Jesus would not have come and made us holy which simply means separated unto God. Revival is not a word contained in the bible but we could use it to describe some words that are:

2 Corinthians 5:17
Therefore If any man be in Christ he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold all things are become new.

We have been revived when we received the gift of righteousness and the indwelling spirit of God and all that’s left is for us to know it and our world will never be the same again!

What do you think? Maybe you have read books on revival and have a few spanners to throw?

Giving our life to Christ?

It's commonly suggested that when we become a christian we are 'giving our lives to Christ' but i would say that we are actually receiving his life as he enters us and empowers us with his 'zoe' life. God is propositioning us with his gospel message to come to him and receive his life free of charge and our response is either yes or no. It's really not about what we give up for him but simply receiving his offer of righteousness and the indwelling of his spirit. The gospel contains no conditions other than to believe however we do see that within the book of acts people were instructed to repent and believe but repent means simply to change your mind 'metanoia' change what you have previously thought was the way to God through good works and believe the gospel message of his righteousness becomes mine when I believe!

Martyn Lloyd Jones wrote:

The true preaching of the gospel of salvation by grace alone always leads to the possibility of this charge being brought against it. There is no better test as to whether a man is really preaching the New Testament gospel of salvation than this, that some people might misunderstand it and misinterpret it to mean that it really amounts to this, that because you are saved by grace alone it does not matter at all what you do; you can go on sinning as much as you like because it will redound all the more to the glory of grace. If my preaching and presentation of the gospel of salvation does not expose it to that misunderstanding, then it is not the gospel.

Simple Gospel

2 Corinthians11:3
But I fear, lest by any means, as the serpent beguiled (deceived) Eve through his subtlety, so your minds should be corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ.

I am convinced that there would be no need for so much intellectualizing within Christianity if it wasn't for the fact that the simple message of the gospel has been corrupted over time by religion.

This verse is saying that our minds can become corrupted so that we miss the simplicity of being in Christ. Paul compares us with Eve's temptation in Genesis 3 which was all about convincing her that there was something that she lacked. There was something else that she needed to make her complete ' in the day you eat thereof you shall be as gods knowing good and evil' whereas the reality was that she was as complete as she ever could be before she ate of the fruit. God had given Adam and Eve everything they would ever need to live abundant lives for eternity but they were not established in that or else they would not have submitted to the lie that there was something that God had withheld from them.

It's the very same thing for us Christians today, there is a philosphy that has infultrated the church teaching that there are things that God is withholding from us such as forgiveness, blessings, answered prayers, healing, revival, righteousness but if we will do repentance, good works, fasting, all night prayer meetings, witnessing, church activities, bible reading and on and on the list goes, then God will give the things he has withheld!

But the reality is that as with Adam and Eve he has withheld no good thing from us.

Colossians2:9-10
For in him dwelleth all the fullness of the Godhead bodily and YOU ARE COMPLETE IN HIM which is the head of all principality and power.

We are not trying to be complete in him, we are complete in him!

Colossians2:13b
..having forgiven you ALL trespasses (sins)

We are not trying to be forgiven, we are forgiven!

2 Corinthians5:21
For he has made him (Jesus) to be sin for us who knew no sin that we might be made the righteousness of God in him.
Romans3:21-22
But now the righteousness of God without the law is manifested, being witnessed by the law and the prophets, even the righteousness of God which is by faith of Jesus Christ unto all and upon all them that believe for there is no difference.
Romans5:19
For as by one man's disobedience many were made sinners so by the obedience of one (Jesus) shall many be made righteous

We are not trying to be righteous, we are righteous!

Colossians1:22
In the body of his flesh through death, to present you holy and unblamable in his sight

We are not trying to be holy, we are holy!

My point is that if we don't know what God has already given us we become susceptable to the devil's deception that we lack something and therefore need to go and get it. This philosphy gives rise to all kinds of false doctrines within the church centered around earning favour with God in order to receive from him the good things which he has withheld. It's subtle but effective, because under this mindset we never get to enjoy the blessings that are already ours and the the goodness of God is hidden to those that really need it.

That's why we need able minister's of the new testament (2Cor3) within the church declaring the things that God has already freely given us through the finished work of Jesus at the cross. So our intellectualizing is for the purpose of revealing the deception and bringing us back to a simple knowledge of the gospel.

How should we read the bible?

Like Jesus did! not to learn doctrine or win arguments but to find out who we are. Jesus' parents would have told him about his miraculous conception, about the angels, the dreams, the prophecies. So what do you think his approach to the bible was (what is now OT)? It was probably something like 'if all that my parents say is true then there must be something in there about me!?' And what do you think he found? A lot about him! when he was in the synagogue in Luke4 he found the place in the scrolls which we know as Isaiah 61 speaking of the messiah and after reading it said 'here i am!' (it wasn't received very well) He found his true identity in the word and believed it! 1 John3:1 says that we are NOW 'sons of God' Our lives need to be built upon God's opinion of us as joint heirs with Christ, as IN him, ONE with him, As he is so are we in this world etc etc.This is The process of true change in our lives, discovering our true God identity, what he has made us, what he thinks of us. We live out of the image that we have of ourselves, let's make sure that the image we have is the same as God's by looking into the word to see who we really are!

Reasons why we struggle to accept grace from God part 1

We have been well trained in the world's system of 'you scratch my back and I'll scratch yours' or we could say 'do good get good do bad get bad' from a very early age we've learned that if we behave well then we are rewarded and when we don't there is punishment of some kind. It is true that there was a time when man related to God in that way but what Jesus did at the cross has totally revolutionised the man God relationship. He took the punishment for our misbehaviour past, present and future and then gave us the same right standing with God that he has. There is only one response to this - 'oh thank you, i receive what you've done as a free gift' (or similar!) and we CONTINUE in that same attitude knowing that there is nothing we do or don't do that will effect how pleasing we are to God because of Jesus. If you need the relevant scriptures i will give them to you, just too many to put here!

Reasons why we struggle to accept grace from God part 2

Because the law that Jesus delivered us from is written in our bibles (Gal4:5)! And because, as we have already established in part 1, we gravitate to a system of works and put ourselves back under what Jesus removed us out from under! It makes sense to our natural mind and so we say 'yes God is holy and I'm not so i must do these things so that i can be holy and then i can fellowship with God and get my prayers answered' You reach for your copy of the 10 commandments and off you go but you have made a fatal mistake because although the law is holy, righteous and good (Rom7:12) it has no power to make you holy, righteous and good! Only Jesus can do that so we must put the law into the context of what Christ accomplished on the cross, he delivered us from it, we are no longer under it's demands.

Reasons why we struggle to accept grace from God part 3

Because Jesus in certain situations reinforced the law! Matt5:17-48 is part of what we know as the beatitudes or sermon on the mount and these verses have been so misunderstood and used to condemn people when the true meaning is so profound when interpreted in the light of Jesus work on the cross and what Paul reveals about the purpose of the law. We have already used Gal4:5 which illustrates that Jesus has rescued us from slavery to law (things you must do in order to please God) but go back a chapter to Gal3:24-25 and here we see that the law's purpose was to lead us to trust in Christ. Go to Rom3:19 and see that the law was to make everyone guilty before God and more specifically in v20 the law gives us knowledge of our sin, knowledge of our inability to be pleasing to God through our law keeping. And the clincher is beginning of v20 'by the deeds of the law, no man will be made right before God' kowabunga!! Do you realise what these verses are saying? The law was not given to make us right/pleasing to God, it was given to make us realise that we cannot be pleasing to God by our own efforts! So what was Jesus saying in Matt5:17-48? He was using the law for it's true purpose to bring men to the end of themselves and call out for a saviour, a rescuer, a redeemer from the faulty system Heb8:7 he was actually highlighting the fact that they could not keep the law - if your right eye offend you pluck it out!

Reasons why we struggle to accept grace from God part 4

Because it seems that the law is written in the epistles (letters to the church) because they tell us what to do! Let's just simplify what we mean when we say 'law' It is anything you do, thinking that by doing it you will be pleasing to God. You must know that because of the finished work of Jesus you are already as pleasing to God as you ever can be and ever will be. Col1:22,Eph1:4,1pet2:9. If you had a million years in which to try and make yourself pleasing to God it would not even come anywhere close to how pleasing you are to him today because of Jesus. The reason for instructions in the epistles is not that by doing them you will be right with God but that because you are now right with God you should aim for/expect to see morality, love, self discipline and all the other fruits of the spirit Gal5:22-23. Now these things are possible through the indwelling presence of God. i.e - Col3:9 - why should we not lie? Col3:13 - Why should we forgive each other? The tendency has been because of our bent toward performance orientated relationships that we skip all the powerful truths of our oneness with Christ, our completeness in the Godhead and the gift of everlasting righteousness and dive straight into doing the 'commands' not realising that appreciating our new identity in Christ will produce the commands effortlessly.

Reasons why we struggle to accept grace from God part 5

Because we actually think we are doing ok as far as God's standards are concerned and therefore qualify for deserved favour with God. The pharisees of Jesus day were under the same deception, they had made the law 'keepable' which it wasn't. Their interpretation of the 614 individual commandments that made up the law brought it to a level that man could meet (They didn't add as it is sometimes said that Jesus came to releave us of their additions but the real law as God intended must be kept by a christian) and that's what prompted Jesus to clarify that the law was not just about obedience in deeds and actions but in thoughts also (Matt5:27-28). As we have already said, he was using the law for it's true purpose to convince man of his guilt before God and therefore his need for an alternative method of relating to God which he would ultimately provide through his work at the cross. God's people down through the ages that have made this same point have been labelled 'antinomian' by their opposers, meaning anti-law or against God's law but the reality is that these men including me have an awesome respect for the law to the point that we recognise it is so perfect that no man can keep it. The problem is that we have failed to see exactly what the law demands of us and that if we fail to keep just one of the commands we are guilty of them all!(Jam2:10). What I find myself doing is taking a gauge from other people's behaviour and then judging myself by that rule and then I appear to be doing well giving me the allusion that by my relatively good behaviour I can expect good from God. This is faulty reasoning (2Cor10:12) because if want to relate to God via this method then our gauge is perfection and not imperfection, Its his holy law in its entirety and must be kept consistently in thought and action and if we use this standard we will quickly realise that it is futile and we must humble ourselves and receive his free favour.

Falling from grace is not falling into sin but into law!

Galatians 5:4
Christ is become of no effect unto you, whosoever of you are justified by the law, you are fallen from grace.

Do you know that the only way to disqualify yourself from undeserved favour is to try and earn favour? The only response to undeserved favour is 'Thankyou'!Heb13:15. But because we have not seen the totality of what Jesus did at the cross we are still trying to earn favour from God by doing good and not doing evil. Their is great confusion within the christian church about what covenant we are actually under and as a result we have a mixture of old and new. The old said 'do good and i will bless you' and 'do evil and i will curse you' but the new says 'believe on Jesus and i will bless you' Eph1:3 no conditions attached, no small print, no if's or but's!

'Faith' governs the new covenant and 'works' governs the old

The only response to 'Thou shalt...' is your effort, the emphasis is 'you' so it's all down to what you either do or don't do, it's a work that you must accomplish.

The only response to the gospel of grace (the good news about the undeserved favour of God that places you into everlasting right standing with God and all the benefits that this produces) is faith, which is basically trust. We trust that it is true and rest in it continually.
Eph2:8

The two covenants are in contrast with each other therefore you can tell which one you are under by this simple flow chart! hee!

Law - works - Continual striving to be pleasing to God - Tired
Grace - faith - Resting in his finished work - At peace with God

Jesus is the focus of the new covenant

Whereas we were the focus in the old testament of law because it was all about what we did or didn't do Heb8:9. Now in the new it's all about what Jesus HAS done 2Cor5:21 He is now the focul point Heb12:2 we never look to ourselves to judge how worthy we are to receive from God but to Jesus who has made us everlastingly worthy! We qualify to receive free favour from God ALL THE TIME because of his work at the cross, he did all the work neccessary to place us into right standing with God forever. So when we fail we don't look to ourselves and think that God won't answer my prayers now but we look to Jesus and know that because of Him we remain holy and without blame before God forever Heb10:14.

Knowing God's grace opens up your heart to receive his love

The message of God's undeserved favour is really all about love! In love he sent Jesus, In love Jesus died for us to open up for us an intimate relationship with God. He has dealt with the judicial claims against us that we should have suffered for our sin so that now the way is open for us to receive only good from God. knowing what he has done enables us to see his love for us. God wants our hearts to be established in grace, why? So that he can get his love to us, so that we will see it and respond to him. A grace filled heart is open to receive from God whereas a works mentality/sin conscious filled heart is closed and expecting judgement. The man or woman who receives this love will be transformed, all sorrow and anguish will be washed away, depression will be a thing of the past, disease will lose it's grip, they will be free indeed and experience life in abundance!

Why is grace so important?

I am sure people get fed up of me banging on about grace all the time as if there were no other important principles within the Christian life to focus on. But let me make it clear - Grace IS the focus of the new covenant and it shares no equal status with anything! But why? Because the new covenant is all about what Jesus has already accomplished on our behalf, it's about his work and how he has brought us into everlasting right standing with God. He alone has qualified us to be in the God class forever, we are seated with him at the right hand of the father and that is where we will remain, so would you agree that grace being undeserved favour is the nature of the new covenant? Did you deserve all that? Er.. no.
Deserved favour has no part in this relationship, it will actually prevent us from enjoying the benefits of what Christ accomplished, it's what Paul refers to as 'falling from grace' grace therefore is the high ground and works (deserved favour) is the low ground. There is nowhere to go with self effort in the new covenant other than downwards! so do you see why grace must be continually emphasized? Super abundant grace is continually being poured out upon us from our loving heavenly father and our response is simply to receive it. But if we are not grace focused we naturally will be works focused and we will not allow ourselves to receive it thereby frustrating the grace of God that seeks to deliver us, heal us, prosper us and protect us.

Submit to righteousness

Romans 10:3
For they being ignorant of God’s righteousness, and going about to establish their own righteousness, have not submitted themselves to the righteousness of God.

We see in this verse two types of righteousness:-

Type 1 - ‘Own Righteousness’
Type 2 - ‘God’s Righteousness’

Type 1 - is all of self effort (going about to) what we can accomplish through self discipline and will power.
Type 2 - Is a gift given to men from God made available through what Jesus accomplished at the cross.

Type 1 - Is directed toward God from man and therefore is our deeds and actions presented as an offering because that’s all we got!
Type 2 - Is directed toward man from God and therefore is not deeds and actions but a state of being, his state of being offered to us as a free gift.

Type 1 - Is totally inferior and will never be enough to even qualify you for one answered prayer.
Type 2 - Is totally superior and qualifies you to receive everything that God is and has for all eternity (Eph1:3)

So we must submit, surrender, give in to type 2 and give up on type 1.

Galatians 5:1
Stand fast therefore in the liberty (freedom) wherewith Christ has made us free, and be not entangled again with the yoke of bondage (the law - self righteousness)

We must discipline ourselves to stay under type 2. its an everyday fight to stand firm in the righteousness of God given to us as a gift. This is the good fight of faith. This is what Ephesians 6 refers to when it says stand, withstand, stand therefore, having done all to stand etc. The enemy wants you to be moved out of a position of rest and peace with God which God has provided (Rom5:1), he wants you to be ‘going about to establish your own righteousness’ because he knows that when you are doing that Christ will be of no effect to you!

Galatians 5:4
Christ has become of no effect unto you whosoever of you are justified by the law (going about to establish your own righteousness) you are fallen from grace

So I’m a Type 2 kinda guy and thats where I’m staying, how about you?

Gospel for the nations

I like the way God preaches, it's real simple:

'And the scripture foreseeing that God would justify the heathen through faith, preached before the Gospel unto Abraham, saying, in you shall all nations be blessed' Gal3:8

So a simple equation would be:- Gospel = blessings for everyone

But how do the blessings come to us?

'So then they which be of faith (in the gospel) are blessed with faithful Abraham' Gal3:9

It's believing the truth of the gospel that produces the blessings. Note that 'being of faith' implies a continuing belief in the gospel as opposed to first believing and then drifting off into works. It is not our long prayers or fasting or doing church activities but our continuing to believe in the gospel declaration that we have been made righteous! we have been qualified to receive God's very best gifts, his abundant blessings.

Why is the gospel the power of God?

Paul says in Romans1:16 ' For I am not ashamed of the gospel for it (the gospel) is the power of God unto salvation to everyone that believes (the gospel message) to the Jew first and also to the Greek.'

So why is it the power of God to salvation (rescue from bondage)?

Romans1:17 For (because) therein (in it - the gospel) is the righteousness of God (the very righteousness of God imputed to man free of charge) revealed from faith to faith.

It's like a jar of the best jam in the world being labelled 'good.' 'Gospel' meaning really good news is simply labelling the content of the message (being God's gift of righteousness) as being really good.

With this in mind we could paraphrase verse 16&17 to be:-

'I am not ashamed of the really good news of Christ's finished work, for this news will release the power of God to break free everyone from whatever bondage there are in, It doesn't matter who you are, what your background is because this really good news is declaring that ALL are made right in God's sight by simply believing that it's true'

It's the content of the jar that we are interested in here, the gospel is the power of God because it contains the message that we are made the very righteousness of God by believing resulting in deliverance power.
...they which receive abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness shall reign in life..Rom5:17 as opposed to being in bondage in this life.

The Devil hates the gospel

I've noticed that not everybody is pro-gospel, most of all the devil.
In whom the god of this world has blinded the minds of them which believe not lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the image of God should shine unto them 2 Corinthians 4:4

Jesus outlined the devils plan for mankind in John10:10 'The thief is come to steal, kill and destroy' and then his plan 'I have come so that they can have abundant life.' Then in the next verse he says how he will accomplish his plan 'The good shepherd gives his LIFE for the sheep' so to understand the significance of this we can turn to 2 Corinthians 5:21 'For he has made him to be sin for us who knew no sin that we might be made the righteousness of God in him' and Romans 5:19 'For as by one man's disobedience (Adam's) many were made sinners, so by the obedience of one (Jesus and the giving of his life at the cross) shall many be made righteous' so we see that Jesus death accomplished right standing with God for all of mankind. He gave his life for us so that we could experience his life, ABUNDANT LIFE!

So let's complete the circle by looking at Romans 1:16-17 For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ: for it is the power of God unto salvation (to save, heal, deliver, prosper) to everyone that believes; to the Jew first and also to the Greek. For therein is the RIGHTEOUSNESS OF GOD REVEALED from faith to faith..' Jesus work at the cross of placing mankind into right standing with God is REVEALED in the gospel! And when you believe that you have right standing with God you will experience salvation, health, wholeness, prosperity, the abundant life!

But that is spoiling the devils plans of death and destruction so what does he do? He actively blinds people to the gospel which is God's abundant life plan because it's seeing the gospel that makes it effective. Seeing God's provision of right standing with him is the power of God to save you from death and destruction. I know that I have just bombarded you with a lot of information there but stay with it and I'll elaborate further.

Gospel revelation

Paul calls it 'the glorious gospel of Christ' also 'the gospel of the grace of God' it is the pinnacle of the Christian faith and yet our understanding of it has been so meager. We have tended to think of 'Gospel' as only what Billy Graham preached or what Black African American choirs sing. We have restricted it's application to the unbeliever in order to get them saved and then we hide it away ready for the next one. But the gospel is much more than that, it's for the unbeliever and believer so on this blog we will explore the gospel examining it from many different angles. You are welcome to comment giving further insight or even disagree however I reserve the right to delete your comments if they are offensive. So lets start exploring this glorious gospel.....