He was troubled.  Have you ever had bad dreams that woke you up, sometimes you remember something in the dread that scared you, but sometimes you don’t remember, you feel scared though.  It has been a while since I have had bad dreams, but I have and awoken really scared.

Then the king commanded to call the magicians, and the astrologers, and the sorcerers, and the Chaldeans, for to show the king his dreams. So they came and stood before the king.    Now we don’t have anyone to call upon in our surrounding friends, but we do have God to call on “What a friend we have in Jesus”.  Nebuchadnezzar didn’t just want an interpretation from his wise men, but he forgot the dream and he wanted them to tell him what the dream was.  No wise man, enchanter, magician or diviner can explain to the kind the mystery he had asked about, but Oh yea, there is a God in heaven who reveals mysteries.

Daniel 2:27 – 28 – Daniel answered in the presence of the king, and said, The secret which the king hath demanded cannot the wise men, the astrologers, the magicians, the soothsayers, shew unto the king; But there is a God in heaven that revealeth secrets, and maketh known to the king Nebuchadnezzar what shall be in the latter days. Thy dream, and the visions of thy head upon thy bed, are these;

What the King asked seemed impossible humanly impossible, but for God is was no more impossible than putting the dream there in the first place. The secret of Daniel’s great faith is that he had his eyes on God.  Like Peter, who walked toward Jesus over the churning water on the Sea of Galilee.  With his eyes fixed on God Daniel did not doubt that God could both disclose the dream and give its meaning. 

That night Daniel called a prayer meeting, and the “effectual, fervent pray” of these four righteous men availed much.  God revealed the dream to Daniel, and the next day Daniel revealed and interpreted the dream to Nebuchadnezzar.

James 5:16 Confess therefore your sins one to another, and pray one for another, that ye may be healed. The supplication of a righteous man availeth much in its working. Remember Elijah was a man of like passions with us, and he prayed fervently that it might not rain; and it rained not on the earth for three years and six months.  

We don’t often have friends to pray with, but one of the things to do when praying, is to first praise God for everything he has done, then confess our sins to him and he will forgive us, Jesus already paid the price for our sins on the cross, and it is through him we are righteous. not because of anything we have done but because he is our righteousness.

Jer 23: 6 In his days Judah shall be saved, and Israel shall dwell safely: and this is his name whereby he shall be called, THE LORD OUR RIGHTEOUSNESS.^a

wnqdu hwhy Y@hovah tsidqenuw ye-ho-vaw’ tsid-kay’-noo

from 3068 and 6664 with pronominal suffix; Jehovah (is) our right; Jehovah-Tsidkenu, a symbolical epithet of the Messiah and of Jerusalem:–the Lord our righteousness.

Jer 51:10 The LORD hath brought forth our righteousness: come, and let us declare in Zion the work of the LORD our God.

If you don’t know the Lord, this would be a good time to accept him into your life and let him rule over your life.  I can tell you for sure He is better at it then you or I am .  Without Jesus you do not have his righteousness.  How effectual our your prayers?  Are you in a right relationship with God?

After Daniel received the dream and interpretation from God he prayed, Daniel 2:19  Then was the secret revealed unto Daniel in a night vision. Then Daniel blessed the God of heaven. 20 Daniel answered and said, Blessed be the name of God for ever and ever: for wisdom and might are his: And he changeth the times and the seasons: he removeth kings, and setteth up kings: he giveth wisdom unto the wise, and knowledge to them that know understanding He revealeth the deep and secret things: he knoweth what is in the darkness, and the light dwelleth with him. 23 – I thank thee, and praise thee, O thou God of my fathers, who hast given me wisdom and might, and hast made known unto me now what we desired of thee: for thou hast now made known unto us the king’s matter.

Daniel was so struck by God’s goodness in answering his prayer and that of his friends that he could not escape praising God.  Calvin wrote, “Whenever God confers any remarkable blessing on his servants, they are the more stirred up to praise him”.  For me too, sometimes I just can’t help praising the Lord. 

That is one reason, but the theme of Daniel’s prayer is also the theme of the opening chapters; the sovereignty of God.  During times such as this there is much to be said about the Sovereignty of God in our lives.    Worried about the economy, about the way our country is moving.  I worry and I voice it at times, but then that small voice reminds me about the Sovereignty of God and I can let go.  God rules and set things in place, not our government, or senators or representatives are really in control.  Think about it.  All, even as bad as it is, is in God’s plan for us.

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However, my Wesleyan world began to radically change in 2003, when my wife Kay and I began to feel the call of God to plant a church. After serving as a pastor and college instructor in Tennessee for several years, I knew God was preparing me to plant a church. We began to dream of planting a church that would be highly innovative, gospel-centred and culturally relevant. During that time, some close friends began telling us about the need for a contemporary church in the Outer Banks of North Carolina. After much prayer, I resigned as lead pastor of our church in Tennessee and made plans to move to North Carolina’s beautiful Outer Banks. Everyone thought we were crazy because we were moving to a place that we had never been before. With only faith and a few possessions, we moved to the Outer Banks in May 2005.

TOWARD A REFORMED THEOLOGY
As I wrestled with the call to be a church planter, the seeds of Reformed theology began to take form. The implications of planting a church actually shaped and influenced my turn to Reformed theology. I began to ask some sobering questions. Where did the call come from? Why was God calling me to a specific group of people in a place I had never been before? Why was God calling me to do something so radically different from anything I had ever done before? Was it all up to me? How would I know that God would provide for my family if I moved in faith? What would happen if we failed?

I began to realize that the Lord was at the centre of it all. The theological implications were nothing more than astounding. I saw that God was already at work in the Outer Banks preparing the hearts of hundreds of people to receive the gospel before I ever visited. I thought I was going there to do a work for the Lord; rather, I was actually going there to share in the work that he was already doing in the hearts and lives of the people. Many ministers wrongly say ‘my ministry’ or ‘my church.’ In actuality, the church belongs to Christ and ministry is an extension of God’s work in and through the church. It is Christ’s work from beginning to end! This does not remove our responsibility; rather, it frees us to rely on Christ and his cross for ministry. This opened wonderful new possibilities!

I laid aside my Wesleyan lenses and began to see Scripture in a new light. I never really meditated on the meaning of such passages as Ephesians 1:3-14 and Romans.8:28-30. The Scriptures came alive with new meaning and depth. As an Arminian, I had always skipped over these passages and never fully read them. I began reading the works of great historical Reformed thinkers such as Martin Luther, John Calvin, Jonathan Edwards and Charles Spurgeon. Then I began to read the contemporary writings of men like John Piper, D.A. Carson, C.J. Mahaney, Wayne Grudem and Albert Mohler. I also became involved with a Reformed church planting group called the Acts 29 Network, which helped me work through the practical and cultural implications of Reformed theology as a church planter.

I began to see that God was the Sovereign Creator of all things. He upholds, directs and governs all creation from the greatest even to the least by his sovereign will and holy providence. In his foreknowledge, he also governs and directs the affairs of the nations. He rules over all and is the only Sovereign God. John Piper describes the sovereignty of God in the following way, ‘He is the only “Sovereign,” and therefore He is the happy Sovereign, because there is none that can frustrate what He aims to do according to His good pleasure.”3 Contrary to Open Theism, God’s plans and purposes cannot be thwarted or overturned.4 He works all things together for good to those who love him according to his will.

SOLUS CHRISTUS
It followed then, that I began to understand salvation from a Reformed theological perspective. Men like Martin Luther and John Calvin fought to bring a reformation to the church that would put faith back into the hands of the people. Arising out of the period of the Protestant Reformation were five foundations which summarized in part what the Reformers were trying to do. These banners were known as the ‘Five Solas’ (Latin for ‘only’ or ‘alone’) of the Reformation: the authority of Scripture alone, salvation in Christ alone, by grace alone, through faith alone, and to God alone be glory. These five solas of the faith are as important now as they were then.

The Reformed view of salvation is completely Christocentric. Christianity begins and ends with Jesus Christ. The word Christian literally means ‘Christ-like.’ Therefore, a proper Christology is the place to start if we are really going to talk about salvation. Reformed theology distinguishes between man-centred and God-centred views of salvation. Salvation involves the redemption of the whole man and is freely offered to all who repent of their sins and trust Jesus Christ as Lord and Saviour. By his blood, Jesus has obtained eternal redemption for every believer. We are ‘saved by grace through faith, not of works, lest anyone should boast’ (Eph. 2:8—9). Therefore, salvation is the work of God from beginning to end. Salvation is wholly dependent upon the work of God’s grace. God credits his righteousness to those who put their faith in Christ alone for their salvation, thereby justifying them in his sight.

I began to understand that God works in various ways to bring people into full salvation in Jesus Christ. It all begins when God calls us. This is commonly referred to as the effectual call. The effectual call is when the Holy Spirit effectually calls a person by working to awaken the heart, mind and soul of a person to a personal need of salvation. Bruce Demarest helps distinguish between the general call to the unsaved that comes through the preaching of the gospel and the special call that is effected by the Holy Spirit’s secret work on the heart.6 The universal call goes out to all through the general proclamation of the gospel. All should hear the gospel message; however, only the elect will hear the inward or special call of the Holy Spirit. We do our part in preaching the gospel and God does his part in calling the elect unto himself by his Spirit.

The Westminster Confession describes the effectual call as,
God’s free and special grace alone, not from anything at all foreseen in man, who is altogether passive therein, until, being quickened and renewed by the Holy Spirit, he is thereby enabled to answer this call, and to embrace the grace offered and conveyed in it.
This does not diminish the human responsibility in any way. Divine sovereignty and human responsibility are both in the Scriptures. J. I. Packer says that, ‘God’s sovereignty and man’s responsibility are taught us side by side in the same Bible: sometimes, indeed, in the same text.’7

We are also justified by Christ alone, not by any works. Justification is a judicial act, in which God forgives a person’s sins and declares him to be in a position of righteousness before God. It is what God does for us. It is by the merits of Christ’s redemptive work on the cross that we receive justification, which is the forgiveness of sins. Paul makes it clear that this justification comes by grace through faith in God alone, not of works (Rom. 3:24; Eph. 2:8-9). Justification is the work of God’s grace, not ours. For that reason, it is a foundational teaching in the Christian faith, especially in the Protestant tradition.8 The redemptive work of Jesus Christ on the cross brings justification into the life of the believer. Christ’s work of reconciliation transforms our hostility toward God into fellowship with him. Let us then never lose sight of the cross and the doctrine of justification. This is why Charles Spurgeon encourages us to, ‘abide hard at the cross and search the mystery of his wounds.’9 The Father sent his Son to die for us on the cross to apply the fruit of his death to our lives in justification and salvation. D. A. Carson warns,
I fear that the cross, without ever being disowned, is constantly in danger of being dismissed from the central place it must enjoy, by relatively peripheral insights that take on far too much weight.10
THE CENTRALITY OF THE GOSPEL
Reformed theology helped me rediscover the centrality of the gospel for the Christian life. Many Christians have a watered down, man-centred version of the gospel. The result of not having a solid grasp on the gospel is a dysfunctional and fragmented faith. C. J. Mahaney warns that three things result when we move away from the gospel: legalism, condemnation and subjectivism.11 Therefore, the gospel message must always remain central. Jerry Bridges says,
The gospel is not the most important message in history; it is the only essential message in all of history. Yet we allow thousands of professing Christians to live their entire lives without clearly understanding it and experience the joy of living their lives by it.12
What is the gospel? The gospel is the declaration of the good news that Jesus Christ is the Son of God and that he died for our sins on the cross of Cavalry. Simply put, there is no gospel without the sinless life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Tim Keller beautifully describes the gospel:
Through the person and work of Jesus Christ, God fully accomplishes salvation for us, rescuing us from judgment for sin into fellowship with him, and then restores the creation in which we can enjoy our new life together with him forever.13
The gospel has far-reaching implications for every Christian believer beyond salvation. Not only are we saved by the gospel, but we are also called to live by the gospel. Not only should every Christian have a clear understanding of the gospel but they should also apply it to every area of the Christian life. The gospel is to be applied to every area of thinking, feeling, relating, working and behaving.14 We must never move beyond the gospel. We should memorize the gospel, pray the gospel, sing the gospel, review how the gospel has changed our lives, and finally we should continually study the gospel.15 The gospel is for all of life. This is the reason why the gospel is the foundation for Christian life. Only a gospel-centred approach to all of life will produce healthy Christ followers. It is easy to use church growth principles to add people to your church; however, only the gospel can grow people into disciples of Jesus Christ.

GOSPEL-CENTRED MINISTRY
Because of my shift in thinking to a Reformed view of salvation through the gospel, my thoughts of ministry and evangelism also began to change. I began to realize the important connection between the Bible, theology and ministry. Our theology has a direct effect on our ministry. In many ways, our ministry is the fruit of our theology. As an Arminian, I thought it was all up to me to save people. Arminian theology can result in man-centred approaches to evangelism and ministry. I began to see that Christ was already at work in people’s lives. I realized that ministry is only effective when the Holy Spirit is already present and at work. Ministry is sharing in the mission of God. Christians have been sent as missionaries to share the gospel in our present culture and to fulfill the Great Commission. Gospel-centred ministry is rooted in the concept of the Missio Dei (‘Mission of God’) which recognizes that there is one mission and it is God’s mission. The church is not an end in itself; the church points beyond itself to fulfill the mission of God.

To understand what it means to be a part of the mission of God, one must begin by understanding that God is a missionary God. The very being of God is the basis for the missionary enterprise. God is a sending God, with a desire to see humankind and creation reconciled, redeemed and healed.16 God’s mission can be seen throughout the pages of the Bible and history. Nowhere is the mission of God better understood than in the person and work of Jesus Christ. John 3:16 tells us that ‘God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.’ Being a missional Christian is simply following the way of Jesus. Jesus Christ was and is the first and greatest missionary. The Bible tells us that he came from heaven to earth to die for a lost and dying world.

Ed Stetzer says, ‘Being Missional means actually doing mission right where you are. Missional means adopting the posture of a missionary, learning and adapting to the culture around you while remaining biblically sound.’17 As the Father sent Jesus, he also sends us into our time and culture. Mark Driscoll says, ‘It is imperative that Christians be like Jesus, by living freely within the culture as missionaries who are as faithful to the Father and his gospel as Jesus was in his own time and place.’18 We have been chosen by God to live in this time and place in order to fulfill the mission of God. Acts 17:26-27 tells us that God has determined the exact place and time where we should live so that that men may find him. It is truly awesome to realize that you have been chosen by God to be his representative to this world. It is both a great privilege and great responsibility. In 2 Corinthians 5:20 Paul describes our calling in the following way, ‘we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God were entreating through us; we beg you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God.’

CONCLUSION: MY JOURNEY HOME
I simply wrote this article to share my theological pilgrimage from Arminian theology to Reformed theology. Ironically, my journey has been the exact opposite of Clark Pinnock’s theological pilgrimage in which he moved from Reformed to Arminian theology.19 I have not attempted to try to articulate anything new, but to affirm the importance and relevance of Reformed theology in the 21st century. In many ways, my journey seems to parallel a larger resurgence of interest in Reformed theology within Evangelicalism. Collin Hansen captured the resurgence in an article he wrote for Christianity Today called ‘Young, Restless, Reformed.’20

Reformed theologian John Franke said,
Reformed theology is always re­forming according to the Word of God in order to bear witness to the eternal truth of the gospel in the context of an ever-changing world characterized by a variety of cultural settings: theologia reformata et semper reformata.21
In the spirit of the Reformation, my theology has been reformed and is being reformed. God has taken me on a theological journey from Wesley to Whitefield, from Arminianism to Calvinism.

My theological journey has come full circle. Although I strayed off the road for a while, I have returned home to the roots of my Baptist heritage. My great-great grandfather Rev. William H. Bevins was a Baptist preacher in the late eighteen hundreds in the mountains of Southwest Virginia. He was an adherent to the New Hampshire Baptist Confession, which is a thoroughly Reformed Baptist statement of faith. My great grandfather Phillip Wheeler Bevins built the second sanctuary for First Baptist Church in Concord, Tennessee in 1928. My grand­mother Loretta Bevins was the first person baptized in the church. Decades later, when I became a Christian I was also baptized at the First Baptist Church of Concord. Now, I am currently finishing a doctoral degree at Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary in Wake Forest.

Notes:

1. In fact, by the time many of these were published my theology had begun to shift to Reformed theology. ‘Historical Development of Wesley’s Doctrine of the Holy Spirit.’ Wesleyan Theological Journal (Fall 2006). ‘Pneumatology in John Wesley’s Theological Method.’ The Asbury Theological Journal, Volume 58, Number 2 (Fall 2003).

2. Dr. Larry Wood at Asbury Seminary graciously wrote the foreword to the book: Winfield Bevins, Rediscovering John Wesley (Cleveland, TN: Pathway Press, 2004).

3. John Piper, The Pleasures of God: Meditations on God’s Delight in Being God (Sisters, OR: Multnomah Publishers, 2000), 54.

4. The Openness view concludes that God does not know the future because it has not happened yet. This unbiblical view of God is a heretical doctrine that is a radical form of Arminian teaching and dangerous to the church on various levels. Classical Arminian theology affirms divine sovereignty in general, and many Arminian theologians are rightly suspicious of Openness theology.

5. Micheal Horton, Putting Amazing Back into Grace: Who Does What in Salvation? (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Books, 1994). See especially the introduction to the book.

6. Bruce Demarest and John S. Feinberg, The Cross and Salvation (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Books, 2006), 214.

7. J. I. Packer, Evangelism and the Sovereignty of God (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1976), 22.

8. Demerast and Feinberg, The Cross and Salvation, 346.

9. Charles Spurgeon, Morning and Evening (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson Publishers, 1991), 8.

10. Don Carson, Cross & Christian Ministry: An Exposition of Passages from 1 Corinthians (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Books, 1993), 26.

11. C. J. Mahaney, The Cross-Centered Life: Keeping the Gospel the Main Thing (Sisters, OR: Multnomah Books, 2002), 23.

12. Jerry Bridges, The Discipline of Grace (Colorado Springs, CO: Nav Press, 1994), 46.

13. Tim Keller, ‘The Gospel in All Its Forms’, Leadership Journal (Spring, 2008).

14. Tim Keller, ‘The Centrality of the Gospel’; http://www.redeemer2.com/resources/papers/centrality.pdf

15. C. J. Mahaney, The Cross-Centered Life, 53-71.

16. Michael Frost and Alan Hirsch, The Shaping of Things to Come (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson Publications, 2003), 18.

17. Ed Stetzer, Planting Missional Churches (Nashville, TN: B & H Academic Press, 2006), 19.

18. Mark Driscoll, The Radical Reformission (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Publishing House, 2004), 40.

19. See Clark Pinnock, ‘From Augustine to Arminius: A Pilgrimage in Theology’; http://www.revivaltheology.net/l_cal_arrn/pilgrim.html

20. Collin Hansen, ‘Young, Restless, Reformed.’ Christianity Today (September 2006).

21. John Franke, ‘Reforming Theology: Toward a Postmodern Reformed Dogmatics’, Westminster Theological Journal (2003), 1-26.

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Defined

This serves to remind us of what revival is. We can define it like this: ‘When ordinary spiritual conditions are intensified to the extraordinary.’ Hence the title of this article. We are not talking about a difference in kind from the norm; rather a difference in degree – although a very great degree. In revival God pours out the Holy Spirit and phenomenal results follow.

One outcome of revival is the extraordinary conversions wrought; another is the exceptional recovery of things that have declined in the church. So the chief benefits are vast numbers brought into the church, and the church itself raised up to new heights of blessedness.

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THE URGENT NEED FOR REVIVAL TODAY

‘Then one of the crowd answered and said, “Teacher, I brought you my son, who has a mute spirit. And wherever he seizes him, he throws him down; he foams at the mouth, gnashes his teeth, and becomes rigid. So I spoke to your disciples, that they should cast him out, but they could not.”‘ (Mark 9:17-18 NKJ)

I am calling your attention to these two verses, and to the second in particular, in order that we may consider together the great subject of revival, and of the need, the urgent need, of a revival in the Church of God at the present time. For I am persuaded that this is a very urgent matter.

In a sense, of course all preaching should promote revival and it is only as we, as Christian people, understand the doctrines of the Christian faith that we can ever hope truly to see the need of revival, and therefore to pray for it. But it does seem to me that there are certain considerations which call for a special and an unusually direct and explicit dealing with this subject at the present time.

The first of these considerations is the appalling need. But I have a subsidiary reason also for calling attention to this matter and that is that it happens to be the year 1959, a year in which many will be calling to mind and celebrating the great revival, the great religious awakening, the unusual outpouring and manifes- tation of the Spirit of God, that took place one hundred years ago in 1859. In that year there was a revival, first in the United States of America, and afterwards in Northern Ireland, in Wales and parts of Scotland, and even in certain parts of England, and this year there are many who will be calling this to mind and commemorating that great and signal movement of the Spirit of God. I believe it is right that we should participate in this, and understand why it is being done, and why the Church of God should be very concerned about it at this present juncture.

This is obviously a matter for the whole Church and not merely for certain of her leaders. The history of revivals brings that out very clearly, for God often acts in a most unusual manner and produces revival and promotes it and keeps it going, not necessarily through ministers but perhaps through people who may have regarded themselves as very humble and unimportant members of the Christian Church.

The Church is so constituted that every member matters, and matters in a very vital sense. So I also call attention to this whole subject, partly because I sense that there is a curious tendency today for members of the Christian Church to feel and to think that they themselves can do very little and so they tend to look to others to do all that is needed for them. This, of course, is something which is characteristic of the whole of life today. For instance, men and women no longer take exercise in sport as they used to. Instead, people tend to sit in crowds and just watch other people play. There was a time when people provided their own pleasure but now the radio and television provide their entertainment and pleasure for them. And I fear that the tendency is even manifesting itself in the Christian Church.

More and more we see evidence that people are just sitting back in crowds while one or two people are expected to be doing everything. Now that of course is a complete denial of the New Testament doctrine of the Church as the Body of Christ, where every single member has responsibility and has a function . . . and matters, and matters in a most vital sense. You can read the Apostle’s great expositions of that doctrine, for example in I Corinthians 12, where you find that he says that our less comely parts are as important as the more comely parts, that every part of the body is to function and is to be ready for the Master’s use, and always to be usable.

That is why I believe that this is a matter which really deserves the most urgent attention of every one of us. Indeed, I do not hesitate to go so far as to say that unless we as individual Christians are feeling a grave concern about the state of the Church and the world today then we are very poor Christians indeed. If we are people who come to the Christian Church merely in order to get some personal help, and no more, then we are the veriest babes in Christ. If we have grown at all, then we must have a concern about the situation, a concern about the state of society, a concern about the state of the Church and a concern about the armour of almighty God. It is, I repeat, a matter that should come home to every one of us.

So let us start considering this incident in Mark 9, and especially these two verses at the end of the account which constitute a kind of epilogue to the story. In the earlier verses we are told how our Lord had taken Peter and James and John and had gone up into ‘an high mountain apart’ with them. And on that Mount of Transfiguration they had witnessed the amazing event that took place there. But then they were coming down from the mountain, and they found a crowd of people surrounding the remaining disciples, with much argument and disputation. They could not understand what it was all about, when suddenly a man stepped forward and spoke, ‘In a sense,’ he said, ‘I am responsible for this. I have a son here . . . a poor boy who has been subject to fits, to attacks of convulsions from his childhood,’ (it does not matter what it was exactly) ‘and,’ he continued, ‘I brought this boy along in order that you might heal him. I came to your disciples and they could do nothing. They tried, but they failed.’

Our Lord, you remember, put a few questions to the man, and elicited certain information and then quite simply proceeded to exorcise the devil out of this boy and the boy was healed and restored in a moment. Having done that, our Lord went into the house and the disciples went with him. And when they got into the house, the disciples turned to our Lord, and said, ‘Why could not we cast him out?’ It is very easy to understand their feelings. They had tried their utmost, but they had failed. They had succeeded in many other cases. Here they had failed altogether. And yet in a moment and with extreme ease our Lord just spoke a word and the boy was healed. ‘Why could not we cast him out?’ they said and our Lord answered and said, ‘This kind can come forth by nothing but by prayer and fasting.’

Now I want to take this story and use it as a very perfect representation of the present position. Here in this boy, I see the modern world, and in the disciples I see the Church of God . . . almost at this present hour. Is it not obvious to all of us, that the Church is patently failing . . . that she does not count even as much as she did in the memory of many of us today? Certainly she does not count as she did seventy, eighty or a hundred years ago. The whole situation speaks eloquently to that. And here is the Church, certainly trying, like the disciples doing her utmost, perhaps in a sense more active than she has ever been and yet obviously failing to deal with the situation.

And so we can understand the feelings of the disciples only too easily, conscious of failure, aware of certain things that have happened which indicate that there is a possibility of success, and yet not achieving success. And the question therefore that we ask, or certainly should ask, and ask urgently, is ‘Why cannot we cast him out? What is the matter? What is the cause of the failure? What is the explanation of the situation which confronts us?’

Here in this story, our Lord seems to me to be dealing with that very question. And the principles that he laid down on that occasion are as vital and as important today as they were when he uttered them on that famous occasion. Fortunately for us, they divide themselves up very simply into three main headings. Why could not we cast him out? The first answer is ‘this kind’. There we have a significant statement. Why could not we cast him out? Oh,’ says our Lord, ‘this kind can come forth by nothing but by prayer and fasting.’ He is telling them, in other words, that the first thing they have to learn is to differentiate between case and case. Clearly what was at the back of the disciples’ question was this: our Lord had sent them out to preach and to cast out devils, and they had gone out, and they had preached and had cast out many devils. Indeed, we read in Luke 10 that on one occasion they had been so successful and had come back with so much elation, that they were very guilty of pride.

Our Lord had to rebuke them, saying, ‘Rejoice not, that the spirits are subject unto you; but rather rejoice, because your names are written in heaven’ (Luke 10.20). They were full of jubilation . . . of excitement. They said that the very devils had been made subject to them, and they had seen Satan, as it were, fall before them.

So on this occasion, when this man brought his boy to them, they approached the problem with great confidence and assurance. They had no doubt that they were going to succeed. And yet in spite of all their efforts the boy was no better at all, he was as desperate as he was when the father first brought him to them. So naturally they were in trouble and our Lord helped them just at that point. He said, ‘this kind’: there is a difference between ‘this kind’ and the kind with which you have been dealing hitherto, and with which you have been so successful.

This is a principle that one cannot but notice in reading through the New Testament. In an ultimate sense of course the problem is always the same. This, like the others, was a case of devil possession. Ah yes but there is a difference, as it were, between devil and devil. In that evil kingdom there are gradations . . . there is a kind of hierarchy. You remember how the Apostle Paul puts it in Ephesians 6: ‘For we wrestle not against flesh and blood . . .’ – against what then? ‘. . . principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.’

There is a gradation, and at the head of all is Satan himself, ‘prince of the power of the air, the spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience’ (Eph. 2.2). There he is, with all his mighty power. But under him are these various other spirits and powers and forces, which vary much in strength and power. Therefore, the disciples could very easily deal with the lesser ones and master them, and exorcise them. But here, says our Lord, is a spirit of greater power. He is not like those other feebler spirits that you have been able to master. This kind is altogether different, and therefore constitutes a much greater problem.

It is important for us to grasp this self-same principle, for it is still as true today as it was then.

I. The first thing, therefore, that we must consider is this whole problem of diagnosis. ‘This kind’. The problem with the disciples was that they had rushed into an attempted treatment before they had understood the nature of the problem. And here is the lesson that the Church so badly needs to learn at this present time. We are all such activists; we are all so busy. We are practical people, we say. We are not interested in doctrine and we must be doing something, so we rush off to our activities. And perhaps that is the main cause of our failure. We have not stopped to consider ‘this kind’. We may not be as aware as we should be of the real essence of the problem which is confronting us. But it is a universal rule and principle that it is sheer madness and waste of energy to attempt any kind of treatment until we have first established an accurate diagnosis.

Of course, it is a great relief to be doing things. I am always reminded of the people who during the last war used to confess that what they really could not stand was just to be sitting in an air raid shelter. They felt that the strain was intolerable and they were going mad! But if they could only get up and walk about somewhere, or if they had something to do, they all immediately felt better. It is a great relief to have something to do. But it is not always very intelligent just to be doing something. There is this danger of rushing into activity before we fully realise the nature of the problem by which we are confronted.

So, as we look at the expression, ‘this kind’, I wonder whether as Christian people we are aware of the real depth of the problem which confronts us, in a spiritual sense, at this present time. I ask that question because it seems to me to be so clear, from the activities of many, that they have not even begun to understand it. They are carrying on with certain methods which were once successful, and they pin their faith to them, and they do not realise that they are not only not successful, but that they cannot be because of the nature of the problem that is confronting them.

It is not enough that we should be aware of some general kind of need, because that is always there. When this man brought his boy to the disciples, there was an obvious need, but that had been true in the other cases in which they had been successful. The need is common to all, so that the mere fact that we are aware of it says nothing. The problem for us is the precise nature of this need, what is its exact character? And it is there that we have to think and to realise that we need a little subtlety and understanding in our approach, in order to make our diagnosis.

Let me give you an illustration to explain what I mean. Imagine that you are walking along a country road, and as you walk along you suddenly see a man lying on the side of the road. He does not make any move when you come along, so obviously he has not heard you, and you come to the conclusion that this man is in a state of unconsciousness. Very well – so far so good – everybody is agreed about that. Yes, but the really important question is why that man is lying in that state of unconsciousness. Because there are many possible reasons for this. One reason may be that the man has been taking a very long walk, and he has suddenly felt so tired that he cannot proceed any further. So he had just taken a rest and fallen asleep, and he is sleeping so soundly that he did not hear you as you walked along.

But there are other possible explanations. The man may be in that condition because he has suddenly become ill. He may have had a haemorrhage into his brain which has rendered him unconscious. Or, again, he may be in that unconscious condition because he has been taking some drug. He may have taken too much alcohol or some other drug. He is poisoned. I need not go into any other possibilities.

My point is that if you want to help this man it is not enough just to say that he is unconscious. You must discover exactly the cause of his unconsciousness. Even if it is the case that the man is just asleep, well, it may be raining and he may be in danger of getting wet and getting a chill. And so, if you want to help him all you have to do is to shake him and to shout at him and he will wake up. And when you tell him that he is endangering his health by lying there and sleeping in the rain he will be grateful to you and you will have solved the problem without doing anything further. But if the man has a drug in his system, if he is under the influence of some poison, then your shouting and your shaking will not help him. If this is true, then the situation is more serious, and if you really are going to do anything of value to help the man, you must take measures which will get rid of the poison in his system, and administer certain antidotes, and proceed to deal with him according to the particular necessity. Or if he is suffering from some disease then again, the treatment will be quite different.

There, I think, we see in a picture the importance of establishing a clear diagnosis. Oh yes, everybody is aware that there is a need, but the question is what is the need? This is the thing which demands our most urgent attention at this present time, and it seems to me that until the Christian Church, . . . Until Christian people as individuals in the Church, are aware of the nature of the problem, we cannot begin to deal with it as we should. And here I see a very great difference between today and two hundred years ago, or indeed even one hundred years ago. The difficulty in those earlier times was that men and women were in a state of apathy. They were more or less asleep. Going back, certainly two hundred years, there was no general denial of Christian truth. It was just that people did not trouble to practise it. They more or less assumed it. And in a sense, all you had to do then was to awaken them and to rouse them, and to disturb them out of their lethargy. That was also the position a hundred years ago and at the end of the Victorian era. All you needed at that time was an occasional campaign just to rouse people and to awaken them. And that seemed to be sufficient.

But the question is whether that is still the position. Are we right if we diagnose that to be the state of affairs at the present time? What is ‘this kind’? What is the problem that is confronting us? I feel increasingly that as we examine this truly, we shall see that the kind of problem facing us is altogether deeper and more desperate than that which has confronted the Christian Church for many a long century.

For the problem for us is not apathy, it is not a mere lack of concern and lack of interest. It is something much more profound. It seems to me to be a complete unawareness, even a denial of the spiritual altogether. It is not just apathy, it is not that people really have at the back of their minds what is right and true, but are not doing anything about it. No, the whole notion of the spiritual has gone. The very belief in God has virtually gone.

We need not at this point seek the causes of this, but the fact is that because of some supposed scientific knowledge, the average man today thinks that all this belief about God and religion and salvation, and all that belongs to the realm of the Church, is something that should be entirely dismissed and forgotten. He believes that it has been an incubus on human nature all through the centuries, that it has been something that has been preventing the development and the forward march of the human race, and that it should be got rid of. The modern man is impatient with it all. He dislikes it and he dismisses it in toto.

Now surely, this is something which we should recognise. It is very difficult for us, because we are Christian people, and because we are interested in these things, to realise the mentality and the attitude of those who do not belong to the Christian Church, but that I would suggest to you is what they are thinking. Not only that, . . . the authority of the Bible is no longer recognised. In past times people did recognise the Bible to be the Word of God. They did not practise it or listen to it, but if you asked them what they thought of it, they would admit that, yes it was the good old book, God’s book, and, yes, they felt that they were sinners. But that is no longer the case. It is regarded as an ordinary book, to be treated like any other book. It is just literature, which is to be criticised, analysed and subjected to our knowledge, historical, scientific and everything else, just a book amongst books. No longer is it acknowledged as the divine, inspired Word of God.

Take the essential truths about our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. These are no longer believed as they once were. He is regarded as just a man amongst men, a great man, of course, but nothing more than that. His deity is denied, his virgin birth is denied and his atoning death is denied. He is just a social reformer, just a political agitator, merely someone who laid down certain ethical views with respect to life, which we would do well to practise.

Let me give you an illustration of this. A man like Bertrand Russell, for instance, has said that the Christian Church should be telling the nations and the governments what they ought to do, and not to do, about bombs, and yet he himself writes a book saying ‘Why I am not a Christian’. You see, that is the kind of thing we find today. All that is really of value to us about the Lord is denied, and he is reduced to the position of a mere human teacher or of some kind of great example. And then, over and above all that, we are confronted by the way in which people live. It is no longer merely a question of immorality. This has become an amoral or a non-moral society. The very category of morality is not recognised at all, and men and women are virtually in the position of saying ‘evil be thou my good’. Surely, we all see this if we read our newspapers with intelligent eyes. We find a defence, as it were, of immorality, a justification of it in terms of medicine, or a man’s constitution, or in terms of a denunciation of the taboos of the past. And things which should never be mentioned are even allowed to be presented on the stage, as long as they do not violate certain canons of decency.

Now, surely, it is time that we who are Christian people had a living understanding of the position which confronts us, that is, the state of society. Our terminology no longer means anything to the masses of the people. They are in a position of plenty, plenty of money, able to get everything they want, and they are unconcerned about spiritual things: no interest in the soul, no interest in the higher things of life, just eating and drinking and enjoying themselves. They have got what they want and all they are anxious to do is to hold on to it. There then, as I see it, is something of ‘this kind’ – the problem with which you and I are confronted. Now it is essential that we understand this because in the second place our Lord goes on to say that

II. ‘this kind can come forth by nothing but . . .’

There are certain things which are quite useless when they are applied to ‘this kind’. In other words what our Lord was saying to the disciples can be put like this. He said, in effect: ‘You have failed in this particular case because the power that you had and which was sufficient and adequate for the other cases, is inadequate and of no value here. It just leaves you utterly helpless and hopeless and it leaves the boy in his diseased and powerless condition.’ And surely this is the second step which we need to take at the present time. Is it not becoming obvious at last that so many of the things in which we have trusted and to which we have pinned our faith, are proving to be of no avail?

Now, do not misunderstand me. I am not saying that there is anything wrong in these things in and of themselves. The power that the disciples had was a good power, and it was able to do good work in casting out the feeble devils, but it was of no value in the case of that boy. That is the argument, so all the things that I am going to mention are quite all right as far as they go. I am not saying that they are wrong, what I am saying is that they are not enough, and until you and I come to see that . . . and until we see the greater need, we will just continue as we are in our utter ineffectiveness, in spite of all our efforts, organisings and endeavours.

What are some of these things that are proving to be useless? Let me just indicate some of them to you, because these are the things on which the Christian Church is still relying. These are the things to which Christian people are still pinning their faith.

A. Let me begin with apologetics – the belief that what we really have to do is to make the Christian faith acceptable to and commendable to the men and women of today. To this end books are written, lectures are delivered, and sermons are preached, in an attempt to produce and present the Christian faith in a philosophical manner to the modern man. And so you take the books which deal with the philosophy of religion . . . take the great works of past philosophers, the great Greek philosophers and others, and you say that Christianity fits into thi . . . that it is rational and so on, and so you show the utter reasonableness of the Christian faith. That is apologetics, presenting itself in the form of philosophy.

In particular, at the present time, we are interested in doing this in terms of science . . . reconciling science with religion. We argue that the people of today are scientifically minded, that they have this scientific outlook, and that, of course, they cannot believe the gospel and the Scriptures because they seem to them to dispute the scientific facts, especially as far as miracles and such things are concerned. The Church, therefore, argues that what is necessary is to reconcile science and religion, and so we clutch at any scientist who even remotely hints that in some vague way he believes in God.

What excitement there was when a recent Reith lecturer, a scientist, even seemed to indicate that he believed that after all there may be a God who may have created at the beginning. And we find this wonderful! You see the pathetic state we have got into, that we should become excited when a man like that . . . a great scientist though he may b . . . seems even to allow the possibility that there is a God and there is a Creator.

And we are so pleased about it, and we all mention it to one another, and say that this is marvellous! It shows, you see, that we are pinning our faith to this kind of thing. What we really ought to say is, ‘Does he really? How kind of him! How nice of him!’ And then perhaps we should pause for a moment and say, ‘Why has it taken him all these years to come even to that nebulous conclusion?’

But it is indicative of our whole attitude that we should clutch at these men, whoever they are, and however vague their statements. It shows that ultimately we really believe that the way to deal with the modern situation is through our apologetics. Ah, we want to show that, after all, the Bible does not deny science. Science is the authority and the Bible has got to be fitted in. And we think that by that kind of effort and endeavour we are going to deal with the present situation.

B. Then again it is done in terms of archaeology. Do not misunderstand me, archaeology is very valuable – thank God for everything that it produces which does confirm the biblical history – but if we are going to depend upon archaeology, well then, God help us all. There are different schools amongst the archaeologists and they have their different interpretations. But there seems to be this tendency to clutch at every straw, feeling that this is what is going to prove that the Bible is true.

C. And in the same way we clutch at well-known men. What excitement there was when the late Professor Joad wrote a book in which he acknowledged that the war had driven him to believe in evil and to believe in God! But, why all this excitement? It indicates our pathetic faith and belief in these methods which are nothing but apologetics. It was exactly the same way at the beginning of the eighteenth century, when people were pinning their faith on Bishop Butler and his great analogy of religion, and the Boyle lectures, and so on. These, they taught us, are the things that are going to show the truth of Christianity, but they did not do that. ‘This kind’ can come forth by nothing along that line.

D. Then let us come to methods. How tragic it is to see the way in which men are pinning their faith upon particular methods.

1.One of these is the excitement about new translations of the Bible. This is based on the belief that the man of today, who is not a Christian, is outside the Church because he cannot understand the Authorised Version. These technical terms, this Elizabethan language, justification, sanctification: this means nothing to the modern man. What he wants, you see, is a Bible in modern language, in modern slang, in the modern idiom, and then men will read it. Then they will say, ‘This is Christianity,’ and they will embrace it. And so we are having fresh translations, one after another. Everybody buys them because all we need is the Bible in modern up-to-date language. Is this not tragic? Is that what is keeping people from Christ? Do you think that people two hundred years ago knew anything more about justification and sanctification than they do today? Were those the common terms of a thousand years ago? Is that the difficulty? No, it is the heart of man, it is the evil that is in him. It is not a question of language, it is not a question of terminology, yet we pin our faith to this. Do not misunderstand me, there may be some value in modern translations, though nothing like as much as people think. You have got to go a long way to improve on this Authorised Version, and we need to be careful with the modern translations, they may mislead theologically. But, whatever their value, that is not going to solve the problem.

2. What else is there? Oh, the belief in the radio and the television. We must make use of these media, we say. Everybody is listening. Take the gospel to their homes. Give them these short snappy messages, that is the way to do it. So we pin our faith on it.

3. Then there is advertising. Big business succeeds because it advertises, so we must advertise the Church, and set up our publicity agencies in the Church. in this way we will tell the people what the Church is and what she is doing, in the belief that if we only tell them the truth they will jump at it and want it and take it, as they do the various commodities that are advertised in these ways. And people seem to believe this. They think that ‘this kind’ can come forth by such methods as this. What we need, they say, is new magazines, new literature, new tracts, and off we go and distribute all these. We write articles in a semi-popular form – now people will get the message, we say.

4. And then of course there is popular evangelism, in which all this is put to practice. Everything that can appeal to the modern man, the last word in presentation is used, in the belief that when it is done, and you do it with a modern technique, then you will get hold of the modern man. But I think that the time has now come to ask this simple question: what are the results? Is the modern problem being touched at all?

Of course these various methods, the apologetics and the others may indeed lead to individual conversions. We are all aware of that. Almost any method you like to employ will do that. Of course there are individual conversions, but my question is this – what of the situation, what of the bulk of men and women, what of the working classes of the country, are they being touched at all, are they being affected at all? Is anybody being affected, except those who are already in the Church or on the fringe of the Church?

What of the spiritual and religious condition of the country? What of the whole state of society? Is this being touched at all by all our activities? Well, my answer would be that it all seems to put us into the position of the disciples who had tried to cast the devil out of the boy, these men who had been so successful in many another case but who could not touch this case at all. And our Lord gives the explanation, ‘this kind’ can come forth by nothing like this. By what, then? ‘This kind can come forth by nothing but by prayer, and fasting.’

You failed there, he said in effect to these disciples, because you did not have sufficient power. You were using the power that you have, and you were very confident in it. You did it with great assurance, you were masters of the occasion, you thought you were going to succeed at once, but you did not. It is time you paused for a moment and began to think. It was your ignorance of these gradations in power amongst evil spirits that led to your failure, and to your crestfallen condition at this moment. You have not sufficient power. I did what you could not do because I have power, because I am filled with the power that God gives me by the Holy Spirit, for he gives not the Spirit by measure unto me. You will never be able to deal with ‘this kind’ unless you have applied to God for the power which he alone can give you.

You must become aware of your need, of your impotence, of your helplessness. You must realise that you are confronted by something that is too deep for your methods to get rid of, or to deal with, and you need something that can go down beneath that evil power, and shatter it . . . and there is only one thing that can do that, and that is the power of God.

And we too, must become aware of that, we have got to feel it until we become desperate. We must ask ourselves how we can succeed if we do not have this authority, this commission, this might and strength and power. We must become utterly and absolutely convinced of our need. We must cease to have so much confidence in ourselves, and in all our methods and organisations, and in all our slickness. We have got to realise that we must be filled with God’s Spirit.

And we must be equally certain that God can fill us with his Spirit. We have got to realise that however great ‘this kind’ is, the power of God is infinitely greater . . . that what we need is not more knowledge . . . more understanding . . . more apologetics . . . more reconciliation of philosophy and science and religion . . . and all modern techniques – no, we need a power that can enter into the souls of men and break them and smash them and humble them and then make them anew. And that is the power of the living God.

And we must be confident that God has this power as much today as he had one hundred years ago, and two hundred years ago, and so we must begin to seek the power and to pray for it. We must begin to plead and yearn for it. ‘This kind’ needs prayer.

Now, this is but the introduction to the theme that we are going to consider, but it leads me to ask this question: Are you really concerned about the present position? Are you desperately concerned about it? Are you praying about it? Do you ever pray for the power of God in the Church today? Or are you just content to read the weekly newspapers which tell us about all these various efforts and to say, ‘It is all right, the work is going on.’

‘This kind cometh not forth but by prayer and fasting.’ This word fasting is not in all the ancient manuscripts, but it implies not only literal, physical fasting, but concentration. The value of fasting is that it enables you to give your undivided attention to a subject. So what our Lord said to the disciples is this: you will never deal with this sort of problem until you have been praying, concentrating in prayer, waiting upon God, until he has filled you with the power. When you know you have got it, then you go out with authority. That is the way, and that is the only way. Surely no one should need to be convinced today that nothing short of a mighty outpouring of the Spirit of God is adequate to deal with our situation in this mid-twentieth century?

Are you really still trusting to these other things? Here is the vital question. Have you seen the desperate need of prayer, the prayer of the whole Church? I shall see no hope until individual members of the Church are praying for revival, perhaps meeting in one another’s homes, meeting in groups amongst friends, meeting together in churches, meeting anywhere you like, and praying with urgency and concentration for a shedding forth of the power of God, such as he shed forth one hundred and two hundred years ago . . . and in every other period of revival . . . and of re-awakening. There is no hope until we do. But the moment we do, hope enters.

Oh, when God manifests his power, it happens as it happened in the case of this poor boy. With apparent ease, in an effortless manner, the devil is exorcised, and the boy healed and restored to his father. When God arises, his enemies are scattered; that is the story of all the great revivals of history. But we shall not be interested in revival until we realise the need of ‘this kind’, the futility of all our own efforts and endeavours and the utter absolute need of prayer, and seeking the power of God alone.

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