More or less, here is the sermon I preached today at Salem United Methodist Church and Pleasant Hill United Methodist Church. Initially, the title was “I Say…” but I made a game-time decision (appropriate since it’s the day of that big football game that I don’t have permission to use the name of) to talk about a portion of the Sermon on the Mount with the revival at Asbury University as a backdrop. May you be blessed by my attempt to flesh out what the Savior has to say about how His people are to live.
“You have heard that our ancestors were told, ‘You must not murder. If you commit murder, you are subject to judgment.’[a] 22 But I say, if you are even angry with someone,[b] you are subject to judgment! If you call someone an idiot,[c] you are in danger of being brought before the court. And if you curse someone,[d] you are in danger of the fires of hell.[e] 23 “So if you are presenting a sacrifice[f] at the altar in the Temple and you suddenly remember that someone has something against you, 24 leave your sacrifice there at the altar. Go and be reconciled to that person. Then come and offer your sacrifice to God. 25 “When you are on the way to court with your adversary, settle your differences quickly. Otherwise, your accuser may hand you over to the judge, who will hand you over to an officer, and you will be thrown into prison. 26 And if that happens, you surely won’t be free again until you have paid the last penny.[g] 27 “You have heard the commandment that says, ‘You must not commit adultery.’[h] 28 But I say, anyone who even looks at a woman with lust has already committed adultery with her in his heart. 29 So if your eye—even your good eye[i]—causes you to lust, gouge it out and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to be thrown into hell. 30 And if your hand—even your stronger hand[j]—causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to be thrown into hell. 31 “You have heard the law that says, ‘A man can divorce his wife by merely giving her a written notice of divorce.’[k] 32 But I say that a man who divorces his wife, unless she has been unfaithful, causes her to commit adultery. And anyone who marries a divorced woman also commits adultery. 33 “You have also heard that our ancestors were told, ‘You must not break your vows; you must carry out the vows you make to the Lord.’[l] 34 But I say, do not make any vows! Do not say, ‘By heaven!’ because heaven is God’s throne. 35 And do not say, ‘By the earth!’ because the earth is his footstool. And do not say, ‘By Jerusalem!’ for Jerusalem is the city of the great King. 36 Do not even say, ‘By my head!’ for you can’t turn one hair white or black. 37 Just say a simple, ‘Yes, I will,’ or ‘No, I won’t.’ Anything beyond this is from the evil one.
Matthew 5:21-27 (NLT)
A big buzzworthy event that’s been hopping around in Christian circles over the last few days is of a revival that broke out on Thursday at Asbury University in Wilmore, Kentucky. A chapel service began that morning and has not stopped, with reports of various events being shared. This seems to be nothing short of the beginnings of a fresh movement of the Holy Spirit, one I hope continues to spread and take hold. The spread has already started with students from Asbury Seminary across the street going to AU to participate, students at the University of Kentucky reporting sparks of revival on their campus, Ohio Christian University, and others. It seems God is up to something, and this truly excites me.
Perhaps you have labeled me a skeptic of the movement if you’ve seen my Facebook posts and a blog article about it. Yesterday alone, I was accused of hoping this revival is fake, even having multiple people question my faith and qualification to be a pastor. To try and make my position clear: I do not hope this is fake. I’m very confident this is a movement of the Holy Spirit. My misgivings are that I have seen countless times where God has moved, and the movement has caught on and taken on a life of its own, and people have traveled to the event to witness it and say they were there. I have witnessed “revivals” where the emotional aspect was shown, people got lost in it, and once the emotions were gone, they did nothing with what God was moving them to do.
I want revival. We need revival. But we need more than a moment in time. Holy Spirit brought revival is fully realized in the fruit it bears for the kingdom, not by a moment in time at one place or even a few places. That’s why my approach is “wait and see.” Nothing more.
We pray for revival all the time. I hear from many of you about the need for revival in our world. When we have the camp meeting or attend a revival at another church, I often hear of how wonderful it feels to be in God’s presence. I agree that it’s incredible! But what do we do with that once we’ve left the tabernacle or the service? If we feel our souls awakened for the first time or reawaked for the first time in a while, we can’t sit on it and call it good. Remember, Jesus taught us last week that we are to be salt and light and that unless our flavor is active and our light fully visible, we are useless in the kingdom. Genuine revival leads us to show God’s love, not simply feel good for a few minutes and move on with our lives as if nothing happened.
We’re still in the Sermon on the Mount. Jesus is teaching his audience of Jewish disciples in ways that they would be able to understand. He is expanding on the teachings of the Torah and of the prophets and giving them new ideas of what it’s like to live as God’s people. A lot of what he’s going over here are the rules by which Jewish people lived. In looking over this set of rules, it seems that it keeps boiling down to that way we can sum up most of the other teachings of God: Love God above all else and treat others the way you want to be treated. Here, Jesus is expanding on what all of that even means. As Jesus is the Messiah, he’s laying out the case for what living under God’s new covenant kingdom will be like, and what the expectations of discipleship and living in the way are. Jesus is letting us know that our relationships with other people matter. Jesus is introducing what the Christian community – the church – should look and act like.
As some of you probably want to say to me from time to time, Jesus has gone from preaching to meddling. No one enjoys their toes being stepped on, but Jesus was stepping and showing no mercy. And immediately, Jesus gives a teaching on a hot-button issue: Anger. We love to hold grudges and want to hurt people back even worse than they hurt us. Jesus says not only is this mindset sinful but goes to the extent that a sacrifice is not acceptable in the eyes of God unless and until the person making the sacrifice reconciles themselves to a person with whom they have had issues and makes amends. The idea that a sacrifice wouldn’t be accepted likely struck a major nerve with the audience and probably made them nervous. This lets them know that Jesus is serious about how we treat one another is vital to our discipleship.
Of course, Jesus doesn’t stop there. He talks about lust, adultery, and even divorce, topics that would rile the dander of people today, perhaps even make some people blush. The way we view other people goes hand-in-hand with not holding grudges. When we lust, we’re making an object out of the other person, a means to some gratification for ourselves. You’re breaking a covenant between you, your spouse, and God when you commit adultery. I believe that’s why Jesus followed up his teaching on adultery with his teaching on vows or oaths. What he’s probably talking about is oaths made to the Roman emperor, but letting our yes be yes and our no be no has much power in other areas of our lives. It attests to our integrity and ethics, which we are called to hold in the highest standards.
All of this translates to this: How you treat one another is vital, so vital that it’s the leading indicator of your spiritual condition. If you treat other people like garbage, the condition of your soul is no better than the pile at the George County Transfer Station on Beaver Dam Road.
I believe that we are on the cusp of something extraordinary happening. I’ve felt this way for quite a while now, but we’re starting to see some of the first indications that God is actively pouring out a fresh movement of the Holy Spirit into the world. I believe people are being moved to confess, pray, sing, to testify in powerful ways. BUT. The thing about revival is that it’s only effective if we take the fire God has given us and take it out into the world. Jesus is teaching us here that how we treat other people is vital. I can tell you that actions speak much louder than words ever will. We can say we’re revived all day long, but if we don’t act like it, no, we’re not. If we don’t act as if God has moved in our lives, then all we did was go to a building somewhere, sing some songs, maybe say some prayers, or even testify, walk out and go about our business. That’s not revival. That’s self-gratification and self-justification. If God is truly moving in our midst, and we feel it, we must do something with it! Let us not hide our flavor or put our light under a sheet. Let us not continue to treat the people who are suffering as if they don’t matter. Let us not continue to claim to be Christians of any stripe and keep grudges, treat the people who ought to mean the most to us like trash, or show a lack of integrity, ethics, and morals. But, too often, we (the royal “we”) do exactly these things and dare to claim to be the people of God. Jesus says, “You can’t do that anymore if you’re one of my people.”
Pray for revival. Long for revival. But when it comes, do something with it. Don’t let revival only be a moment in time that made you feel good; that was it. True revival only happens when we, the people of God, allow the fresh movement of the Holy Spirit to take hold, refine us, and use us to testify to the wonder of God’s grace, mercy, and love. Use words if you must, but actions speak much louder.