Actually, revival is happening right now. But it is not happening the way we
pictured it happening. See, for many people what "revival" means is that the
church building will be loaded with hyped up excited Christians. With the
current decline in church attendance and the recent studies that have shown that
"church" makes little to no impact on our society and that it carries little
relevance to Americans, "revival" is viewed as the great hope to preserve the
churches in America. So, we have prayed for revival, but as we have prayed those
prayers we have had our own picture of what this revival will look like. Well,
God has been answering those prayers, but the problem is that He has been doing
it in such a way that we haven't recognized it for what it is. In fact, for many
Christians, it is out right offensive.
What is revival? Is
it not simply to revive something? To bring something back that was in decline?
Well, what exactly are we praying will come back from decline or be revived?
Organized religion or the life Christ in His people? See, revival is happening,
but not the way we had pictured it. The revival that is happening is that people
are discovering the simplicity of the life of Christ and intimacy with Him and
they are leaving organized religion in droves in order to return to Him. So
strangely what has been viewed as "the great falling away" often is actually
God's people shedding religious trappings and returning to Him. He is being
revived in their daily lives beyond the four walls of the church out in the
"real world" where the people are. People are stopping playing church and are
discovering what it means to "be the church."
But this revival has
come without bells and whistles, noise and emotion. Rather it came silently, and
often painfully, to the hearts of many who have come to realize that Jesus and
religion are not the same thing. But this revival makes no noise because it is
happening in the personal lives of individual followers of Christ all over the
world who are rediscovering what it means to walk in daily intimacy with Him.
Believers are finding such an intimacy with Christ that they are discovering
they no longer need the trappings of religion to "re-charge their batteries" or
to perform religious duties to be loved and accepted. They are leaving religion
because they are discovering that the work Jesus did on the cross was more than
enough. The saints are growing up and discovering how God meets them in the real
world. Christ has been tearing down the walls in their hearts between "secular"
and "Christian" and causing it all to be "Christ."
This revival is not
popular because it comes with a hammer and nails, a torch and a wrecking ball.
It comes crucifying our flesh and causing us to die to our agenda and it comes
tearing down all of our man-made religious ideals and institutions. So of
course, this revival is going unnoticed, but if you talk to those who have been
broken by it, you will see that there is certainly a revival happening. You
can’t help but see that Jesus has been revived in their lives.
Other
Articles by Loren Rosser
