Dear Friends of "Dial Daily Bread,"
The overwhelming majority of people do not care about Jesus and His "everlasting gospel" of Revelation 14. Especially in places where once upon a time the Holy Spirit worked with great power: Germany (where the Reformation was born), Scotland (where John Knox preached), New England (the Great Awakening), yes, England itself where Anglican churches now stand nearly empty on Sunday mornings and some are even being converted to mosques.
In comparison with how Luther's message shook Europe or how Paul's message turned his "world upside down" (Acts 17:6), our best endeavors today seem to be pale. Everywhere Paul went, one of two things happened: either a riot or a revival--well, wait a moment, he preached in the highly intellectual university city of Athens and not much happened (vss. 16-34). But to be fair we must remember that was the one time that Paul failed to preach what later he preached everywhere--"Christ and Him crucified." When he came to Corinth (1 Cor. 2:1-4) he turned the city "upside down" preaching the cross.
How can God judge modern multitudes who have never seen or heard the message, whose prejudices block all efforts to reach them? We try to preach in Europe and sophisticated America, and very little happens; is God giving up on the "first world"? And will present-day "revivals" in Third World cultures eventually repeat the history of great spiritual movements that have been replaced by pleasure-seeking materialism? Is poverty necessary for the success of the gospel proclamation? If so, it would seem appropriate for the church to pray for a really Great Depression.
But wait a moment: history proves that even disasters don't produce permanent revivals! World War II for example.
Revelation 18:1-4 suggests an answer: a Voice from heaven will indeed reach every honest-hearted person in the world when the message is clarified as "light" that can "lighten the earth with glory." The final work will not be so much noise (a "loud cry"), as clearer "light." God grant us to see it.
From the "Dial Daily Bread" Archive: December 16, 2001.
Copyright © 2011 by Robert J. Wieland.
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