WAKING THE DEAD

Amos 4:1-6:14; Revelation 2:18-3:6; Psalm 130:1-8; Proverbs 29:21-22

“For I know the vast number of your sins and the depth of your rebellions. You oppress good people by taking bribes and deprive the poor of justice in the courts. So those who are smart keep their mouths shut, for it is an evil time. Do what is good and run from evil so that you may live! Then the Lord Almighty will be your helper, just as you have claimed. Hate evil and love what is good; turn your courts into true halls of justice. Perhaps even yet the Lord Almighty will have mercy on the remnant of his people.”

This is the message from the one who has the sevenfold Spirit of God and the seven stars: ‘I know all the things you do, and that you have a reputation for being alive—but you are dead. Wake up! Strengthen what little remains, for even what is left is almost dead. I find that your actions do not meet the requirements of my God. Go back to what you heard and believed at first; hold to it firmly. Repent and turn to me again. If you don’t wake up, I will come to you suddenly, as unexpected as a thief.’”

Lord, if you kept a record of our sins, who, O Lord, could ever survive? But you offer forgiveness, that we might learn to fear you. I am counting on the Lord; yes, I am counting on him. I have put my hope in his word. I long for the Lord more than sentries long for the dawn, yes, more than sentries long for the dawn.”

An angry person starts fights; a hot-tempered person commits all kinds of sin.”

It’s almost always surprising when God shows up. It’s not that I don’t expect Him. In at least a theoretical sense, I accept His omniscience and omnipresence. I believe He visits us when, in His sovereignty, He determines the timing is right. It’s just that His timing almost never bears any relationship to my own. So, I get tired of waiting. I fall asleep. I may even die a little bit in the process. Certainly, the calluses around my heart grow thicker the longer I wait for divine intervention. Instead of acting on and in faith to help promote the Kingdom, I spend too much time judging those outside it. In this, I do not do one thing to help Jesus or ready His fields for His harvest.

For example, I’m quite fond of thinking that, if I had been the Creator of the Universe, I would not have let things get so out of hand before stepping in. There would seldom be such a long interval between sin and punishment. I would discipline quickly when self-delusion threatened viable theology. And maybe that’s why I don’t hold any exalted positions in the Kingdom of Heaven. This line of reasoning is more about death sentences than life-giving.

There is such a thing as being too quick on the trigger. Efficiency for efficiency’s sake may assure a well-oiled machine, but it does little in the way of growing the heart. Efficiency tends not to spend much time on compassion. The more mercenary we become, the less human we act and the less like Christ we look.

On the other hand, there will come a time when the Creator does completely reclaim what has rightfully been His from the beginning, and it will cause turmoil for a season. But He won’t need our help then. The ones who need our help are in the world now. They struggle daily with issues of life and death. They need to know more about life, and if we don’t show them, they may never learn. Already dead in their sins (as we once were), if we do not help awaken them by sharing new life with them, they will be lost. We need to understand and appreciate that our own bodies, hearts and minds may be just the tools God would use to awaken new life in others, as well as in ourselves.

Our problem becomes just how to wake the dead. What is the right technique? Humanity has been asleep at the switch for centuries. The Rapture and Tribulation are undoubtedly closer now than they have ever been. Nevertheless, our complacency remains largely unchanged. Even the shock to the system that our recent economic downturn provided has not appreciably increased our focus on spiritual things. It is as if human beings have started to see God and theology as irrelevant, and that is a very dangerous place to be. In ancient times, people at least tended to turn to some form of diety when they turned away from Jehovah. Now, it seems as though we don’t think we need any God.

Those of us who know better cannot help but mourn the souls of those who lock the Lord out of their lives. He does not want us mourning them, though. He wants us involved with them, touching them, supporting them and leading them back to life. There will come a time when they will need to call on His Name. They must know on Whom they need to call on a first name basis. We need to be sure to make the appropriate introductions.

There really is only one way to actually wake the dead: give them a new relationship, something to live for. It begins, though, with a sharing of ourselves. Provide an example of a life that has a reason for being that motivates and rejuvenates jaded lives and fulfills people. Preaching won’t cut it. We must live with our flocks, being transparent and guiding them through the process of once more learning to allow others – and, especially, the Spirit – to love them. The problem with religion is it has become sterile. For many, it is just empty ceremony when it is not stooping to mere entertainment or blatant emotional manipulation. The Church needs to get back to the bedrock of the relationships that bound Christians together in the first place. We need far few educators and a great many more mentors; more examples and fewer preachers.

Christ came so that we might have life, and have it more abundantly. Period. Thus, anytime our missions or evangelical efforts focus on anything short of life giving, we are selling Jesus short. Now, to be fair, we first have to buy into the process and sell out to the Holy Spirit ourselves. But this can be done. It’s not really even all that tough, once we realize what we are truly to be about as disciples. We have been infected by choice with the Holy Spirit. It is the Spirit that gives us life. As we share that, we help others find something to live for, and we learn more of what it means to live abundantly, too.