Seeking a Revival Culture

      Essays on Fortifying an Anemic Church

      Copyright © 2009 Allen M. Baker III. All rights reserved. Except for brief quotations in critical publications or reviews, no part of this book may be reproduced in any manner without prior written permission from the publisher. Write: Permissions, Wipf and Stock Publishers, 199 W. 8th Ave., Suite 3, Eugene, OR 97401.

      Resource Publishing

      A Division of Wipf and Stock Publishers

      199 W. 8th Ave., Suite 3

      Eugene, OR 97401

      www.wipfandstock.com

      ISBN 13: 978-1-60608-524-0

      EISBN 13: 978-1-4982-7469-2

      Manufactured in the U.S.A.

      All Scripture references, unless otherwise noted, are from the New American Standard Bible, The Lockman Foundation, 1977 edition, La Habra, California.

      I dedicate this, my first book, to the love of my life, my dear wife,the woman who has stood beside me in the good times and the bad.I love you Wini.

      An excellent wife, who can find?For her worth is far above all jewels.

      Proverbs 31:10

      Introduction

      The great burden of my life, that which drives me in ministry more than anything else, is to see the church of our blessed Lord Jesus Christ rise up and become mighty like she has been so many times in the past. I have the privilege of preaching in other places in the United States and one thing has become very clear to me. The western church is in big trouble. Most pastors I know are terribly discouraged in their ministries. So are their people. The influx of immigrants from middle eastern countries that are predominantly Muslim, as well as Hispanic people who are historically Roman Catholic, along with our lack of power in reaching these people with the gospel; not to mention the secularization of our post-modern culture all are working to mitigate the church’s effectiveness in the west. We are simply losing ground.

      Pastors have been told that they can model their ministries after whoever the latest and hottest preacher is, and all will be well with them, that they can expect exponential growth in their churches. With few exceptions, this has not been their experience. They have attended the seminars and have read the latest books, but they have little to show for it. As a pastor I am troubled and heartbroken over the vastness of people’s problems in today’s world. I have been in the ministry nearly thirty years now and have never seen the number and depth of problems as today— everything from incest, child molestation, homosexuality, pornography, severe depression, suicide, divorce, wayward children, adultery, fornication, and more. All the pastors I know confirm my observations. The pastoral problems are epidemic. The Christian faith in our churches is woefully lacking. Our people are generally no different from those of the world.

      Recently I was in East Africa preaching and was struck by a vivid illustration of the weakness of the American church. The indigenous church of this East African nation was thriving under African leadership. There was power, unity, conversions, and growth in holiness. Another younger denomination was struggling with division, lack of numerical growth and conversions, and a general sense of worldliness and powerlessness. When I asked the reason for the latter’s weakness, I was told that we in the west have imported our anemia to the leaders of that denomination. I am grieved. In such circumstances we would be better not to send any of our western missionaries. They need Holy Spirit power, not our anemic, insipid, impotent brand of Christianity.

      What are we to do? We need revival. We need a revival culture in the western church. We need, like Israel laboring under Egyptian bondage, to become intolerable of our circumstances. Israel cried out to the Lord when their slavery became intolerable to them. May God move us to divine discontent, to be dissatisfied with the status quo!

      These essays, with minor additions and corrections, first appeared as part of my weekly devotional series called Forget None of His Benefits that is emailed weekly. Many have encouraged me over the years to have them published, and Wipf and Stock of Eugene, Oregon has graciously agreed to do so. I promise to give any profits from the sale of this book to world missions. My prayer is that these essays will move all of us to pursue Christ with the earnestness and zeal His life, death, and resurrection deserve.

      Perhaps the best way to benefit from these essays is to read one per week (there are fifty-two of them), and ask God to show you your sin, to move you to repentance, to encourage you through the ministry of the Holy Spirit. I know many who use these devotionals as fodder for weekly discussion and prayer groups. I urge you to do the same. Gloria in excelsis Deo!

      Ichabod

      Ichabod. The glory has departed.

      1 Samuel 4:21

John Winthrop, while standing on the bow of the Arbella in 1630, prior to his departure to the new world, gave the most important sermon in the second millennium, A City on a Hill.1 In it Winthrop laid out the Puritan vision for the new world, that which has clearly served as the foundation for so much of what is good in our country, including our Protestant work ethic, the importance of education, and treating all people with honor and respect. The next generation provided us with Cotton Mather of Boston, a great preacher and theologian who was fluent in Latin, Greek, and Hebrew by the time he was ten, and who is the youngest to enter Harvard, having done so at the age of eleven. The following generation gave us the greatest philosopher and theologian in our history, Jonathan Edwards, whose writings are now more popular than ever. But then we began to see a change in the fabric of American Christianity. Charles Finney, a Presbyterian who dismissed the Westminster Confession of Faith, denied the doctrine of total inability, and consequently developed “new measures” that he used to urge conversion to Christ. Asahel Nettleton, also a Presbyterian (both were born in Connecticut), stood against Finney and his new measures, but Finney won a more popular following than Nettleton. Consequently Finney’s theology has generally held sway over Nettleton’s Old School Presbyterianism ever since.2 By the middle of the nineteenth century we have on the scene the most famous man of the day, the son of Lyman Beecher, the brother of Harriett Beecher Stowe. I am referring to Henry Ward Beecher, a pastor from Brooklyn who became incredibly rich by pulpit, print, and platform (preaching, publishing novels, sermons, and newspapers, and lecturing all over the country). Beecher seemed to deny the most basic doctrines of the faith, and was said to look out any given Sunday on his congregation and find ten of his mistresses sitting there. But we have fallen even further in our own day with Your Best Life Now being one of the most popular Christian books in print.3 We have fallen from a God-centered, Christ-exalting, Spirit-anointed, man-debasing theology to one that dethrones God and places man at the center of everything. The glory has departed. Only seventeen percent of Americans (whether they are Roman Catholics, mainline Protestants, or Evangelicals) are in church on any given weekend. Only eight percent are evangelical in our nation, and only one percent is evangelical in Connecticut where I live.

      What are we to do? We must begin with God. More specifically I have in mind the necessity of beginning with the doctrine of God. He is holy, righteous, just, and will by no means leave the guilty unpunished. We must recapture the biblical doctrine of hell and eternal judgment. Most, even within evangelical churches, get nervous about this doctrine. They fear people will reject Christ if we speak too directly on the doctrine of hell. People have always rejected this doctrine. Such opposition is not new. God’s judgment on the wicked is unavoidable and unutterable in its severity.