National news reports indicate that many young people are returning to church in the wake of the Charlie Kirk assassination. This is an encouraging sign but there must be a realization that God is calling this generation to more than "church." Church can be the means to the goal but "church" is never the goal. Listen to the testimony of John Wesley.
"I
who went to America to convert the Indians had never been converted
myself," wrote the Rev. John Wesley. Despite having been baptized,
confirmed, and ordained in the Anglican Church, he came to the startling
conclusion that he had never been truly converted to Jesus Christ.
He came to realize
that he had put his faith in the “externals” of Christianity—church membership,
baptism, receiving communion, good deeds, etc.—rather than in Christ Himself. It
wasn’t that these things were useless, but he came to realize that of
themselves they can never make one a true Christian.
Only a genuine faith
in Christ will bring the new birth and Wesley experienced this shortly after
his failed mission to America. As he sat in a Moravian meeting listening to someone
read the words of Martin Luther in which Luther described what happens when someone
puts their faith in Christ and Him alone, something happened. He later wrote,
I
felt my heart strangely warmed. I felt I did trust in Christ, Christ alone for
my salvation and an assurance was given me that He had taken away my sin, even
mine, and saved me from the law of sin and death.
Wesley always considered
this to be the time when he became a true Christian. A fire was ignited in his
heart and he, along with his brother, Charles, and George Whitefield, ignited a
fire of revival that transformed the British Isles and jumped the Atlantic
Ocean and impacted colonial America.
George Whitefield
came to America in 1739 and became the firebrand of the Great Awakening. He too
was an ordained Anglican minister and like the Wesley’s he had experienced a
dynamic conversion that alerted him to the fact that adhering to the mere “externals”
of Christianity does not make one a true Christian.
Dressed in his traditional,
clerical Anglican garb, Whitefield challenged the masses in America to overturn
the faulty foundations on which they had built their faith and put their faith
in Christ alone. In one of his
sermons, preached to several thousand gathered in the open air, Whitefield
mimicked a conversation with Father Abraham whom he pictured as looking over
the banister of heaven at the gathered multitude consisting of many sects and
denominations.
Whitefield cried out, “Father Abraham, are there any Anglicans in heaven?” The answer came back, “No, there are no Anglicans in heaven.” “Father Abraham, are there any Catholics in heaven?” “No, there are no Catholics in heaven.” Are there any Presbyterians in heaven?” “No, there are no Presbyterians here either.” “What about Baptists or Quakers?” “No, there are none of those here either.” “Father Abraham,” cried Whitefield, “what kind of people are in heaven?” The answer came back, “There are only Christians in heaven; only those who are washed in the blood of the Lamb.” Whitefield then cried out, “Oh, is that the case? Then God help me, God help us all, to forget having names and labels and become Christians in deed and in truth” (Hyatt, America's Revival Heritage, Second Edition, 60-61)!
In America, Whitfield became friends with the Presbyterian pastor and
revivalist from New Brunswick, New Jersey, Gilbert Tennant. Tennant, whom many
called a “son of thunder” because of his excoriating preaching, published a
sermon entitled “The Dangers of an Unconverted Ministry” In it, he compared
many colonial church leaders to the Pharisees of Jesus’ day—pious and proud in
their own righteousness but having never experienced a true conversion to Jesus
Christ.
Most people in colonial America considered themselves to be Christians,
but under the searching preaching of Whitefield, Tennant, Jonathan Edwards and
others, they came to the conclusion that they were Christians in name only. Many were like Nathan Cole of Middletown,
Connecticut who attended one of Whitefield’s outdoor meetings. After
hearing Whitefield preach, he wrote, “By God’s blessings, my old foundation was
broken up, and I saw that my righteousness would not save me.”
The Christ-centered preaching of Whitefield, Tennant, Edwards, and
others broke down racial, cultural, and denominational barriers. Colonial America was transformed. The people
began to see themselves as Christians—followers of Jesus Christ--before anything
else. So great was the impact that a British-appointed governor wrote to his
superiors in England,
If you ask an American who is his master, he will tell you he has
none, nor any governor but Jesus Christ (Hyatt, 1726: The Year that Defined America, 81).
As many young people today are returning to church, pastors and Christian leaders must have the humility and dexterity to avoid drawing these seekers to themselves and their church institution but pointing them, instead, to Jesus Christ. We must remember, not only the words of the revivalists of the Great Awakening, but also the words of C.S. Lewis who wrote,
The Church exists for nothing else but to draw men to Christ, to
make them little christs. If they are not doing that, all the cathedrals, clergy, missions, sermons, even
the Bible itself, are simply a waste of time.
The First Great Awakening had a direct bearing on the founding of America, which means that such Christ-centered revival is in our national DNA. This is why we could witness such a Christ-honoring event as the Charlie Kirk Memorial Service, in which President Trump declared, "This is like an old-time revival."
I thank God for all the good churches in America, but we must offer this generation more than our church. We must offer them a living, dynamic relationship with our Creator through Jesus Christ. It is time to stand up and proclaim Jesus Christ to this generation!
This article by Dr. Eddie L. Hyatt was derived from his books, 1726: The Year that Defined America and America's Revival Heritage, Second Edition, available from Amazon and his website at http://www.eddiehyatt.com
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