When Revival is Necessary - Part 1

The subject of revival is not built upon figments of the imagination, but it's a solidly biblical matter, among the great doctrines upon which all that we believe and hope for in revival rests. Number one, there is one unchanging God. Number two, the love of God is an everlasting love. Whenever he fixes his love upon a person or a people, it is fixed forever. The third, there are many others, but the third that I will mention now is the foundational truth upon which my message this morning is built. To whom much is given, much is required. Now the church doesn't believe that, at least not in a way that in any significant way affects its conduct. Listen to these simple words from Nehemiah chapter 9. Now on the 24th day of this month, the sons of Israel assembled with fasting in sackcloth and with dirt upon them. And the descendants of Israel separated themselves from all foreigners and stood and confessed their sins and the iniquities of their fathers. While they stood in their place, they read from the book of the law of the Lord their God for a fourth of the day. And for another fourth, they confessed and worshipped the Lord their God. When was the last time you participated in a meeting of that sort? When was the last time you sat with dirt upon yourself? Or in sackcloth and in Asher, to whom much is given, much is required. Who has the most? Nehemiah and the people of his day, or believers now? Now, it doesn't take much searching of Scripture to realize that Nehemiah had but a fraction of what we've got. He didn't even have a Bible. There was no cross in his life, a cross to look forward to. Yes, he didn't have the Holy Spirit in the same sense that we have the Holy Spirit today. You can make a long list of things that Nehemiah and his people did not have, yet their response to God was vastly more serious than the typical response to God in churches of today. Do we really believe that to whom much is given, much is required? There are a lot of people today who do not believe that revival is even a possibility. And others who say, well, after all, just about everything that we know biblically on the subject of revival is drawn from the Old Testament. The New Testament has virtually nothing to say on that subject. And because revival is an Old Testament theme, and we are New Testament Christians, it's an irrelevant subject. Strangely, there are others who say there's nothing of revival in the Old Testament. I mean, it's a crazy, wild day in which we live. But it is true that the bulk of what we know on the subject of revival is drawn from the Old Testament. I have thought seriously of trying to write a book on the theology of revival. It's never been done. And because it's looking like I'll never live long enough to do that, I've been encouraging others to consider it. After all, our scriptures do plainly teach us that God is sovereign, and that revival is the work of the sovereign God. It's from the Old Testament scriptures that we understand the cycles of history. After all, we have a great many of these full cycles in the Old Testament. In the Old Testament, over and over, we see how the people begin in right relationship with God. They sin. They do not repent. God brings them under some form of a righteous judgment. When the judgment is so severe, they can't stand it any longer. They cry out to God. And God sends revival. Seven times in the book of Judges alone, that cycle is clearly seen. We understand the place of humility in revival from Old Testament scriptures. We encounter the tender pleadings of God to his people to repent and to return in Old Testament scriptures. Because there is so much on the subject of revival in the Old Testament, we should be able to anticipate that the one book in the New Testament that tells us what we're supposed to think and do about everything in the Old Testament should be a wonderful source of help on the subject of revival. And it truly is. The book of Hebrews is incredibly urgent and consequential for our conference this week. I suppose many of you are well acquainted with the construction of the book of Hebrews. You understand that there are really two parts, and these two parts are intertwined one with the other. There are the passages that are clearly doctrinal in which Christ is elevated, glorious passages, passages in which Christ is shown to be infinitely superior to the angels, infinitely superior to Moses, infinitely superior to Abraham, infinitely superior to the sacrificial system and the priesthood. Glorious book for elevating Christ, but intertwined with those doctrinal passages lifting up the Lord Jesus Christ and showing his superiority. There are warning, not less than six passages in Hebrews that are warnings of the severest possible kind. The heart of all the warning passages is Christianity is not a good beginning, but a glorious ending. Doesn't really matter how you start. It's how you finish the race that counts. Now we don't really believe that, despite the amen. We believe that if a person has a moment of faith, they are forever saved. Now that happens to be sheer nonsense, but being sheer nonsense doesn't keep us from ascribing to it. As I said, these wonderful doctrinal passages elevating Christ mingled with these warnings of great severity. And it's from the warning passages that we get such a profound message on the subject of revival, the absolute mandatory nature of revival, the urgency of it. What I would like to do in my part of the conference this week is to focus upon these six warning passages. It'll be hard. I shall not be able to do anywhere near a decent job, but I would like to take three this morning and then Lord helping me, three later in the week. So take your Bible and turn with me please to the book of Hebrews, and let me set in front of you the first of these warning passages. Chapter two, verses one to four. Now the three warning passages that we'll be dealing with this morning are, as I just said, number one, chapters two, verses one to four, which deals with the issue of drifting away. The second, chapter three, verse five through chapter four, verse 13, the incredible danger of hardening the heart. And the third passage, chapter five, starting at verse 11, running through chapter six, verse 12, that deals with the incredible problem of dullness of hearing and sluggishness of spirit. Those three issues characterize the bulk of the church in our land today. Incredibly large numbers who, if they ever had anything at all, and oft times it's dubious that they really did, they have drifted away to an amazing degree. Everywhere I go, I encounter people who have hardened their hearts. They were at one time under conviction, but somehow they refused to respond to God and in the process of refusing, their hearts were hardened. I would say that the bulk of the church is obviously sluggish, dull, lost in terms of the keenness and the vitality and the passion of true Christianity. I recently had the privilege of preaching 24 sermons on the doctrine of salvation. Taking all the major terms of the New Testament dealing with the subject of salvation and preaching upon them, terms like regeneration and justification and conversion and repentance and faith and so on. But began the series with three messages orientating the people to the theme of salvation. Number one, salvation is a person. Remember the words of Simeon, mine eyes have seen the Lord's salvation. Number two, salvation is a passion. When you come into right relationship with a person, you have come into right relationship with a person of passion. How can you be a child of the king and lack the passion of the king? And the third part was salvation is power. How can I claim to be vitally related to Christ as a son of God and absolutely lacking all power to rise above sin and self? Lacking in all power to serve God in a fashion that demonstrates his glory to a lost world. Instead of those things, the bulk of the people whom I encounter have been drifting away. They've allowed their own hearts to harden. They've become dull and sluggish. So as I said, number one, chapter two, verses one to four. For this reason, we must pay closer attention to what we have heard lest we drift away from it. For if the word spoken through angels proved unalterable and every transgression and disobedience received a just recompense, how shall we escape if we neglect so great a salvation after it was at the first spoken through the Lord? It was confirmed to us by those who heard. God also bearing witness with them both by signs and wonders and by various miracles and by gifts of the Holy Spirit according to his own will. Now before we open that up, let's set our minds and hearts in the direction of application of the truth. I'd like to suggest three realms that we ought to be planning to apply the truth of these warning passages. Number one, in a very personal way. Let every person here this morning ask the question, have I in any fashion drifted? Then, in terms of what we call Christian fellowship, I think what we usually mean by Christian fellowship is as soon as the last amen is sounded, we begin talking about the ball game or the picnic we're going on or where we're planning to have lunch. But my understanding of Christian fellowship has nothing to do with that. My understanding of Christian fellowship is you step up to a fellow believer as I'm doing with Byron now. And I'm asking, Byron, have you in any way drifted? Let me show you the incredible danger of drifting. I mean, when was the last time we took Christian fellowship seriously? And we began to concern ourselves with urgency about our fellow Christians. So, the first application, personally, the second application in terms of genuine Christian fellowship, and the third application church-wide. Many of you are pastors. Others of you teach Sunday school classes. Hasn't the time come when we must take these warnings seriously? And begin to use them for the promotion of the revival of the church. All right. Warning number one, drifting. Is it not quite clear that what the author of Hebrews has been led to do in this first warning is to draw a contrast between what those in the old covenant had received and the means by which they received it with what those of us under the new covenant have received and the means by which we received it. Clearly, it says, they received the law at the hand of angels. Now, that was a tremendously consequential thing and their experience on Sinai when the law was given was indeed a powerful experience. But, receiving the law at the hand of angels can hardly be compared in a consequential way with the gospel that we received from the very Son of God himself. And not on the basis of rumor, but as clearly stated, how shall we escape verse three if we neglect so great a salvation after it was at first spoken through the Lord. It was then confirmed to us who heard God bearing witness with them by signs, by wonders, by various miracles, by gifts of the Holy Spirit. So, the point is obvious to whom much is given, much is required. Then, while we do not depreciate what those under the old covenant were given, we do understand that they had but a fraction of what we've got. And yet, as I've sought to point out already, our response is wickedly small in comparison with their response. Ask yourself the question now. Has any drifting occurred in my life? Now, we've got to face the fact that an awful lot of people in our churches could not possibly have drifted from anything consequential because they never had anything consequential. They were falsely taught. They were drawn into the church on pretences, not on biblical fact. They had nor nothing of regeneration by the Holy Spirit. At best, regeneration by a decision they make. And that doesn't qualify for kingdom privileges. So, we can't hardly concern ourselves about their drifting away. But we can concern ourselves about ourselves. Have I drifted away? But we also have to face the fact that some who are true children of God never had a very large dose of salvation. They never came all that near to our dear Savior. Even if they held firm to that which they got in the beginning, they're nowhere near where they should have been all the time. Just for instance, take the issue of repentance. There are clearly two kinds of repentance. Paul speaks very powerfully about this in 2 Corinthians chapter 7 when he contrasts the sorrow that is of the world that leads to a form of repentance that results in eternal death. And the sorrow that comes from God that leads to a repentance that results in eternal life. If you look at any old book of sermons published, say, prior to 1840, and you find a sermon on repentance, it's highly likely that you will find within that sermon on repentance a very careful distinction made between what they then called legal repentance, L-E-G-A-L, and evangelical repentance. Legal repentance being what you do for yourself. Evangelical repentance being what you do for Christ. Now we all know that the essence of sin is self. If a person receives Christ for the purpose of escaping hell, for the purpose of gaining heaven, for the purpose of gaining a friend, or if they respond to the gospel because they have been caught in sin and they're ashamed and afraid that they might be exposed, that's not evangelical repentance. That's what you do for yourself. Evangelical repentance is what happens for Christ's sake. So all I've tried to indicate is that there are some who can drift away, but there's nothing to drift from. There are many who have drifted from the little bit they had, but what they had was never near enough. If indeed your repentance is self-serving, all you've done in your repentance is to add to your sin life. So it's a repentance that is still to be repented of, which is exactly what Paul describes, as I said already in 2 Corinthians 7. But now, we're really concerned this morning with those who have received the full dose of the grace of Christ and the benefits of his death, burial, and resurrection, and at one time felt a great deal more passion for Christ, and a great deal stronger hatred of all sin in themselves, and much more true love for God, but have drifted from it. Is there someone here this morning who has drifted, who is not nearly as urgent today in consistent living as you once were, not nearly as apt to set aside the time for serious heart searching and for pleading, if there be any wicked way in me, make it clear. And the setting, of course, is clear to you by now, having received so much our response has got to be vastly greater and more uniform than the response of anyone in the old time. And, of course, the heart of this warning is if those persons who received so little in comparison with what we've received and they violated the little bit that they had received, verse two, if the word spoken through angels proved unalterable and every transgression and disobedience received a just recompense. And we know that included in the just recompense were almost all of those who escaped out of Egypt, died in the wilderness, never having received the promise. And the point is clear, isn't it? If God dealt with them with such firmness when they had so little, how can we think for a moment that we can get away with what we have been trying to get away with? Surely, any heart cry for revival must include the urgent appeal, Oh God, help me to live up to the light that I have received. Help me never in any way to drift from that which you have given. But we move to the second of these warning passages. As I indicated to you, chapter three, starting at verse five, a much longer passage and in truth, a much more complicated passage. But let me read it to you. Chapter three, verse five. Now Moses was faithful in all his house as a servant for a testimony of those things which were to be spoken later. But Christ was faithful as a son over his house, whose house we are if we hold fast our confidence and the boast of our hope firm unto the end. Now let's not glaze over that.