ERC, CGGC Conference Sessions
Get it: We are living during one of the most powerful times of Christian revival in the entire history of our movement.
God is pouring out His Spirit on people in a way He rarely has, perhaps EVER has.
In China tens of thousands of people become followers of Jesus every day. Some estimate that the number might be as high as 100,000 acts of repentance in the name of Jesus in China on a daily basis.
In India the revival rages in numbers that range in the tens of thousands on a daily basis.
It's being suggested that in post-tsunami Indonesia there is so powerful movement of the Spirit that the population may now be as much as 20% Christian.
The growth of Christianity is so staggering in Africa that the percentage of the population that identifies itself as Christian may have increased by ten to fifteen times in the past century. Some suggest that the growth is greater than that.
When I was at Drew University about 20 years ago a visiting prof who was connected to the Pentecostal revivals in Central America said that the standard joke among the leaders of that movement was that if trends continued that 120% of the population of some Central American countries would be Pentecostal by the year 2010.
And, I've heard Reggie McNeal say:
"This is the first spiritual awakening the American church
has not participated in--because it is too secular."
Nearly 25 years ago I read Martin Lloyd Jones' book, Revival and began to pray that God would bring revival into the world during my lifetime. I suspect that many thousands have joined me in that prayer.
Praise God! That prayer is being answered. God's Spirit is turning our world upside down on this very day!
He is moving powerfully in our world...
...but I'm only getting the stories second hand...
...because the Western Church is withering and dying. It is not being empowered by the Spirit. It is, at best, bearing meager fruit.
I have just returned from three of the most spiritually painful days of my life: The 2011 Sessions of the Eastern Regional Conference of the Churches of God.
That pain was all of my own generation.
I sat through the sessions wondering how I could feel things so different from the things being felt by people whom I have known and admired, in some cases, for decades. During those three days I asked myself again and again,
- How we could have come to believe things so vastly different?
- How we could be working toward goals so diverse?
- How could we get to the point that, in reality, we care about things that are at exact odds with each other?
I wondered if I should condemn or be condemned. I left each day wondering if I should ask God to change my heart or the hearts of so many others.
I was--AM--in agony.
Here's what I know:
The actions of the Conference amounted to rubber stamping reports offered by the organizations and institutions related to the Conference and approving reports of our numerous Commissions and staff people. I heard, again and again, glowing reports of how the Lord is blessing. Had I not known better, I'd have thought that believers in China and India and Africa could be envying the way the Lord is working in the ERC. But, my feet on are the ground in the ERC.
In the midst of those reports and after some debate the Conference achieved its most substantial accomplishment of 2011. It approved an amendment to the Constitution which tweaked the ERC budgeting process by allowing the Administrative Council to approve the annual budget without the consent of the Conference in session.
In an age in which our world is throbbing with revival when, with the passing of each day tens upon ten thousands of people are repenting of sin and embracing Jesus as their Lord, the best the ERC could manage in 2011 was the tweaking of our budgeting process.
I opposed that amendment, but I am heart-broken that that amendment represents the spiritual state of the Conference.
"This is the first spiritual awakening the American church has not participated in--because it is too secular." -- Reggie McNeal.
I believe that it is time that we repent of our earth-bound ways and change our focus.
I honestly don't know if it's too late.
I don't know if the Lord who warns "...because you are lukewarm I am about to spit you out of my mouth," and who says, "Those whom I love I rebuke and discipline so be earnest and repent," has already spit us out of His mouth. I don't know if it's too late to repent or not.
What I do know is that I want revival in my nation and in my community and that the same Spirit Who is rocking our world is not blessing the CGGC or the Western Church as a whole.
We need to set our minds on spiritual things, not the ways we create budgets. We need to stop coming together to rubber stamp reports. There is none of that in the New Testament plan. We need to stop pretending that the Lord is moving in our midst. We need to notice what it looks like when the Lord does move and pray that He really will move among us.
We need to fall on our knees and weep and wail and beg for mercy.
posted by bill Sloat at 8:32 AM
13 Comments:
Bill, you and I sat through the same sessions; but we obviously had different experiences. I heard at least two presentations that gave me great heart for the church. One was Rachel Neely-Sleasman's heart-felt testimony of the support and authentic discipleship she experienced in Matt's death. The other was Glenn's closing message and I, for one, was incredibly moved by President Malick's willingness to let the Glenn be free to open his heart and share that word of both encouragement and challenge to us. I guess my question is simply this: what expectation did you have of HOW or WHAT the Spirit would be doing in the ERC that would not have left you in agony. - Steve Dunn
More ... I was privileged to share with over 135 persons who wanted to figure out how to help their traditional churches reach their unchurched neighbors ... I listened to people from Harrisburg First who have begun to see the missional positioning God has given their congregation ... ETHIOPIAN CHURCHES !!!!!!! Were we at the same conference? - Steve
There is in fact revival going on in many places in the world today. I suspect that if any one of us were to go there and join, we would experience it as well.
I might even speculate that if we were to drop the Eastern Regional Conference of the Churches of God into a place of revival, we would collectively experience it as well, even if we didn't dramatically change.
Things are simply different when the gospel breaks in somewhere in a huge way for the first time. Perhaps we will experience some sort of national-wide revival at some point again here, but I'm not counting on it.
I think that more often local churches and even larger networks can experience revival, but I'm not sure that there is anything we could do that would make our situation like those in the places Bill mentioned.
Interpretation is an interesting thing.
Bill, I'm simply not sure why you think the passing of that amendment was the most important thing the ERC did in 2011. It was just something that happened to come up; something that some people thought would make things easier.
It is true that we 'rubber stamp' the reports, and I truthfully don't know why we are even asked to 'accept' the reports. They are what they are.
But the acceptance of a report is of little significance, it is the report itself that's either significant or not.
I think our conference gatherings could be more meaningful - certainly so. And I think that there is stuff in there that could probably be weeded out. Secular stuff. It's hard to know what and how etc.
I don't think everything is as it should be. I don't think everything is wrong either.
But I will say if you couldn't find anywhere that the Lord was at work in our churches, you may well have a problem.
Steve,
Bill, you and I sat through the same sessions; but we obviously had different experiences.
I was deeply touched by Rachel's "report" and by Glenn's message too.
However, as time goes by, I am in increasing agony over the dissonance between what we say and what we do.
Paul's punch line to his very powerful comments on unity in the church in Romans 14 is, "everything that does not come from faith is sin."
In our Conference we have a Mission Statement. We also have a mission statement as a denominational body. And, by the standard of Romans 14: That every act that does not bear the fruit of what we believe is sin, we are filthy with sin!
There is absolutely nothing in the New Testament plan that resembles what we did during those three days. The early disciples never, ever, not even once got together to attend to institutional concerns and to hear Commission reports, even those as touching as Rachel's or to hear sermons, even poignant messages like the one that Glen preached.
As Conferences go, I guess that probably was a good one. But, the New Testament plan truth is that we invested tens of thousands of dollars and probably more than 10,000 people hours doing something for which there is neither one jot nor a single tittle of biblical authority.
My concern is not about this Conference as much as it is the notion of a Conference at all.
We have gotten very good in the last 80 years in the CGGC at arranging the deck chairs in a stylish and useful configuration but our ship is still heading straight for an iceberg.
We just devoted goo gobs of resources on that with is internally, not externally, focused and church, not Kingdom, oriented. We don't do that on anything like a New Testament model. We are walking a walk that doesn't comport with the content of our talk.
And, everything that does not come for faith is sin.
Dan,
Bill, I'm simply not sure why you think the passing of that amendment was the most important thing the ERC did in 2011. It was just something that happened to come up; something that some people thought would make things easier.
Well, as far as I know, it's the most significant ACTION we took. (The only other actions we look that come to mind are intiating a handful of people into the ERC clergy, by handing out ordinations and licenses--actions that have no root in the New Testament but are steeped in the ways of the Middle Ages.)
Revelation 2 and 3, as one of the Phillies' radio guys often says, are "filthy" with Jesus remark: "I know your deeds." Our most intentional 'deed' was the tweaking of our budgeting process. Based on the content of Revelation 2 and 3, what do you suspect He thinks of a body for whom that deed is the one that reflects a whole year's focus.
What we DO is not the kind of thing He did, modeled, taught or commanded. It scares me for all of us that the One who knows our deeds knows what we do.
Dan,
I think that more often local churches and even larger networks can experience revival, but I'm not sure that there is anything we could do that would make our situation like those in the places Bill mentioned.
Yikes!
Clearly you don't know your history.
Other than that, I'm speechless!
Gang,
Back to the "Clearly you don't know your history" comment I made to Dan.
I once heard Alistar McGrath, the most thoroughly British person I know, point out that a total of six people attended the New Year's service at Westminster Cathedral in AD 1700.
During the 1700s England experienced the Methodist revival, which reclaimed that nation for Jesus. What happened in England then was exactly like what's going on in China and other places today.
But, if we think the Spirit can't move, it's very likely that our lack of faith may quench His movement.
Bill & Dan,
Actually, I take Dan's statement somewhat as a challenge - what could we do that would make our situation more conducive to the types of revival experienced in many persecuted/underground churches throughout the world?
Some background about me:
I spent 5 years planting churches with my family in Kharkov, Ukraine right after Communism fell and Ukraine declared a democratic independence from Russia. In that day, church planting was almost easy because there was a fresh hunger, a desperation for the things of God.
Want a crowd? Grab a Bible, stand across from the outdoor marketplace and begin preaching Jesus - you're crowd will come within minutes. Want a church? Take that crowd that has gathered and preach a Gospel of repentance and restoration, preach the Cross and the Kingdom - and then connect them together in community.
We planted so many churches - and those churches planted so many churches - we eventually lost count. (But then again, the ability to count was never the main objective for planting the churches.) I left Kharkov in late 1996 to help plant a church in Vinton, Iowa. My wife and I returned to Kharkov in 2000 to plant another church, but guess what? The times had changed.
We formed Trinity Christian Church in June 2000, a missional liturgical community reaching out to those who grew up with a Russo-Orthodox heritage but had left the faith due to KGB corruption in the church. We still led people to Christ, made disciples, gathered in community. We raised up and sent out about 15 pastor/planters in the year and a half that I pastored there. By Western standards we were probably successful, but we were heartbroken by the lack of response as we had seen in years before.
We left Kharkov in Sept. 2001 to join a brand new church plant called NewSong outside of Boston. In most ways it reminded me of my return to Kharkov - post-Christian, disconnected, self-focused, spiritually bland. And still is.
We have heard the "God is doing something" rhetoric. We have heard the "this is the time of revival" speeches. But we haven't seen it. And while we attempt to equip people to live on mission for Jesus in a Massachusetts suburb, I am starting to wonder if we are missing the point - perhaps the revival is not a result of my love for these people, my understanding of their need for Jesus and salvation. Perhaps revival is not the result of starting more churches.
Which brings me back to the original question: what if it is a situational/environmental issue? What are the factors of spiritual revival? What brings a people group to the tipping point? And what can we do to create those conditions/situations where we are, as we go (which is the essence of Jesus' commission to his disciples) so that people become disciples who make disciples?
Travis Jarrett wrote:
Bill & Dan,
Actually, I take Dan's statement somewhat as a challenge - what could we do that would make our situation more conducive to the types of revival experienced in many persecuted/underground churches throughout the world?
Some background about me:
I spent 5 years planting churches with my family in Kharkov, Ukraine right after Communism fell and Ukraine declared a democratic independence from Russia. In that day, church planting was almost easy because there was a fresh hunger, a desperation for the things of God.
Want a crowd? Grab a Bible, stand across from the outdoor marketplace and begin preaching Jesus - you're crowd will come within minutes. Want a church? Take that crowd that has gathered and preach a Gospel of repentance and restoration, preach the Cross and the Kingdom - and then connect them together in community.
We planted so many churches - and those churches planted so many churches - we eventually lost count. (But then again, the ability to count was never the main objective for planting the churches.) I left Kharkov in late 1996 to help plant a church in Vinton, Iowa. My wife and I returned to Kharkov in 2000 to plant another church, but guess what? The times had changed.
We formed Trinity Christian Church in June 2000, a missional liturgical community reaching out to those who grew up with a Russo-Orthodox heritage but had left the faith due to KGB corruption in the church. We still led people to Christ, made disciples, gathered in community. We raised up and sent out about 15 pastor/planters in the year and a half that I pastored there. By Western standards we were probably successful, but we were heartbroken by the lack of response as we had seen in years before.
We left Kharkov in Sept. 2001 to join a brand new church plant called NewSong outside of Boston. In most ways it reminded me of my return to Kharkov - post-Christian, disconnected, self-focused, spiritually bland. And still is.
We have heard the "God is doing something" rhetoric. We have heard the "this is the time of revival" speeches. But we haven't seen it. And while we attempt to equip people to live on mission for Jesus in a Massachusetts suburb, I am starting to wonder if we are missing the point - perhaps the revival is not a result of my love for these people, my understanding of their need for Jesus and salvation. Perhaps revival is not the result of starting more churches.
Which brings me back to the original question: what if it is a situational/environmental issue? What are the factors of spiritual revival? What brings a people group to the tipping point? And what can we do to create those conditions/situations where we are, as we go (which is the essence of Jesus' commission to his disciples) so that people become disciples who make disciples?
--------
My response follows.
Travis,
You raise good questions.
I think we need to ask some questions about our theology.
Did Jesus really mean it when He said, "No one can come to me unless the father who sent me draws Him?"
Was He being serious when He said, "Those whom I love I rebuke and discipline so be earnest and repent?"
Or was He just blowing smoke?
I think that what we call revival is described in the Word as a work of God.
It is my belief that the Spirit is moving in China and Africa and India and in other places and that He is not moving here.
Has the Lord already removed our lampstand from its place? Has He spit us out of His mouth?
Is there still time for us to repent?
If there is still time to repent, it seems to me that that is what we need to do.
But, we don't.
Every year since I entered the East Penn Conference, we have gotten together to present reports and to listen to rhetoric that tries to convince us that we are riding a wave of Spiritual blessing. I've been listening to those reports since 1976 but I haven't seen the blessing.
I believe that we need stop tuning up and washing and waxing the institution each year and to fall on our faces in repentance and confession before the Lord who really does rebuke and discipline...
...if He hasn't already rejected us for our secular faithlessness.
I agree that revival is a work of God. It seems that there are often postures that precede revival though - real repentance of sin, crying out to God...
_______
Doesn't revival happen bottom up though, not top down? Revival isn't institutional and we can't plan it on the calendar.
_______
God is blessing in other places in a way He doesn't seem to be here. I do not agree that God is not blessing here at all.
_________
There is always time to repent until the Lord returns. 2Peter 3:9 However, once we begin hardening our hearts...
Wow, Dan. Proverbs.
I agree that revival is a work of God. It seems that there are often postures that precede revival though - real repentance of sin, crying out to God...
It seems to me that the appropriate course of action for this time is to stop tending to the institution and to repent as seriously as the people of Nineveh did when Jonah prophesied.
_______
Doesn't revival happen bottom up though, not top down? Revival isn't institutional and we can't plan it on the calendar.
It can happen any way. In the books of Kings and Chronicles the most common course was for the king to respond to the call of the prophet and to order the tearing down of Baal's altar and the elimination of the priests of Baal. For the moment, our kings, i.e., Executive Directors and Directors are not calling for top-down repentance.
_______
God is blessing in other places in a way He doesn't seem to be here. I do not agree that God is not blessing here at all.
I'm a student of the history of revival. I can't see that we are experiencing blessing in abundance.
_________
There is always time to repent until the Lord returns. 2Peter 3:9 However, once we begin hardening our hearts...
It seems to me that the time comes when those who repent are part of a remnant. The question I'm asking is: Are we to the point that the Lord has decided to cast away the existing body and to call out a remnant as the seed of something new. I wish more people were asking that question.
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