Muddling Toward Maturity Blog

NATIONAL DAY OF PRAYER - THURSDAY, MAY 1ST

I think it important to join city-wide and/or  county-wide public gatherings to pray for our nation, it's leaders, our communities, our schools, our military, our foreign policy and all areas that touch our common life.  This has been my practice for many years andI always come away thanking God for the opportunity to join with brothers and sisters of different races and denominations in doing so.

 

AMAZING CHRISTIAN REVIVAL HAPPENING IN NORTH AFRICA

 

George Thomas of CBN News reports:

A Christian revival is touching the northernmost reaches of Africa. In a region once hostile to the gospel, now tens of thousands of Muslims are following Jesus. 

As the sun sets over the Mediterranean Sea, Muslims across Northern Africa are converting to faith in Jesus Christ in record numbers.

"What God is doing in North Africa, all the way from actually Mauritanian to Libya is unprecedented in the history of missions" said Tino Qahoush, a graduate of Regent University and filmmaker.  He has spent years traveling the region to document the transformation.

CHARLES WESLEY'S GREAT HYMN "AND CAN IT BE"

Justin Taylor does a marvelous job supplying background and Scriptural allusions in Wesley's great hymn "And Can It Be."  Taylor writes:

According to the editor of "The Oxford Edition of the Works of John Wesley" (Oxford: Clarendon, 1975-1983, vol. 7), “And Can It Be” was written immediately after Charles Wesley’s conversion (May 21, 1738). Wesley knew his Bible well prior to this time, but had not yet experienced assurance of new birth or the fulness of grace in his life.

The editor also that it was probably this hymn, or “Where Should My Wond’ring Soul Begin?” that was sung late on the evening of his brother John’s Aldersgate Street conversion just three days later on May 24.

John Lawson, in "A Thousand Tongues: The Wesley Hymns as a Guide to Scriptural Teaching" (London: Paternoster, 1987), says this “is perhaps the best known and best loved of all the Methodist hymns associated with the conversion experience.”

Wesley begins the first stanza by expressing amazement over the love expressed in God the Son dying for him; it is a mystery that we who caused his death now benefit from it.

In the second stanza, Wesley calls for adoration at the incomprehensibility of God’s love and mercy in this sacrifice.

In the third stanza, Wesley recounts the infinite grace and mercy of Christ’s love and humility in the incarnation, death, and finding of lost sinners.

Now in the fourth stanza, Wesley turns his attention to the bondage of his own sin and the freedom he found in Christ.

Finally, he explores the results of Christ’s amazing and merciful work: there is no condemnation for those made alive in Christ and clothed in his righteousness; rather, there is bold access to the throne as we have the right to claim the eschatological crown.

Using and adapting the notations in the reference works cited above, I have sought to identify probable biblical allusions (in the KJV) that probably implicitly or explicitly informed Wesley’s wording and concepts in this great hymn:

HAITI FINDS ITSELF IN THE GRIPS OF A SPIRITUAL AWAKENING!

This past week I received  e-mail reports about incredible events taking place in Haiti.  Then this morning our church showed a video clip which captures the essence of some of the reports.   Apparently we can no longer call Haiti a "voodoo nation."  This is truly amazing.  Authentic spiritual life is taking root in answer to the prayers of millions. 

 

J. I. PACKER ON "WHAT IS REVIVAL?"

Justin Taylor posts the following, which I think quite helpful:

Here is how J. I. Packer answers that question [What is Revival?] in his essay, “The Glory of God and the Reviving of Religion” in A God-Entranced Vision of All Things ^[1] (pp. 100-104):

Revival is God touching minds and hearts in an arresting, devastating, exalting way, to draw them to himself through working from the inside out rather than from the outside in.

It is God accelerating, intensifying, and extending the work of grace that goes on in every Christian’s life, but is sometimes overshadowed and somewhat smothered by the impact of other forces.

It is the near presence of God giving new power to the gospel of sin and grace.

It is the Holy Spirit sensitizing souls to divine realities and so generating deep-level responses to God in the form of faith and repentance, praise and prayer, love and joy, works of benevolence and service and initiatives of outreach and sharing.

What is the pattern of genuine revival? Packer suggests the following ten elements:

1. God comes down.
2. God’s Word pierces.
3. Man’s sin is seen.
4. Christ’s cross is valued.
5. Change goes deep.
6. Love breaks out.
7. Joy fills hearts.
8. Each church becomes itself—becomes, that is, the people of the divine presence in an experiential, as distinct from merely notional, sense.
9. The lost are found.
10. Satan keeps pace.

For more on revival, keep your eye out for the book coming out this Fall from ZondervanA God-Sized Vision: Revival Stories that Stretch and Stir ^[2], by Collin Hansen and John Woodbridge.