Recently as I've traveled in my car I've found myself listening again to sermons delivered at the 1965 South Carolina State Evangelism Conference. Our Director of Missions, Robert Dickard, transferred copies of old reel-to-reel tapes to CD for us pastors as our Christmas gift this past year. I must say it is a gift that keeps on giving. What I am struck by is the difference in emphasis regarding evangelism in 1965 and what we see today. These messages delivered by giants from our SBC past; Vance Havner, R.G. Lee and W.A. Criswell strike a decidedly different tone in what is needed to effectively evangelize the world than what we are hearing from our leadership today. I was particularly taken by Vance Havner's first message, "The Sequence of Evangelism." A few quotes from this message:
"The last words of our Lord to the church were not the "Great Commission," the last words of our Lord to the church were "repent." This is about the last thing the average church is willing to do."
"We're not ready to evangelize until we are right with God, and right with men, and that is revival."
"Our Lord said in the sermon on the mount, that if you bring your offering to the altar, and remember that your brother is at odds with you, don't make your offering until you are right with your brother. Now that might wreck alot of offerings on Sunday mornings, but it's what the Lord said to do. I do not believe that any church member is ready to do church visiting, or teach Sunday school, or sing in the choir, until they get right with God and right with people. It's just as simple as that. Evangelism, my brother, is not revival. Evangelism is the preaching of the gospel in order to win the lost, but revival is a work of the Spirit of God among God's own people whereby they get right with God, and with each other. What would you think of an orchestra that spent all it's time trying to recruit new members when the crowd it had wouldn't come out to practice. And those who did come wouldn't tune their instruments."
"D.L. Moody once said, I believe it may be time we gave up preaching to the ungodly and began to preach to professing Christians. I'd rather wake up a slumbering church than arouse a sleeping world."
"Gypsy Smith said I'm here to help the church get right with God. That would be revival and conversions will be the fruit of revival. He also said the world knows the condition of the church and listens to the man who is frank and honest about it. He wins the outsider by preaching to the church."
"I'd rather wake up 500 church members than 500 sinners. Because if you wake up 500 church members they will go after 500 sinners. We must begin at Jerusalem."
"'I heard of a woman who was running for office in politics who came home one day, and the house had been sort of neglected, and turned to her husband and said we're going to sweep the state! He said good, why don't you start in the living room.' I believe in the gospel sweeping the world, I believe in it sweeping the state, but I think we oughta start in the living room. It's an inside job."
"R.A. Torrey once said I've preached in many a church that says it is praying for a revival, but it really does not want a revival. For to many revival means an increase in membership, an increase in income, and an increase in reputation among the churches. But if they knew what a real revival meant, what a searching of hearts on behalf of professing Christians would be involved, what a radical transformation of individual, domestic and social life would be brought about, and many other things that would come to pass if the Spirit of God was poured out in reality and power, if all this were known, the real cry of that church would be 'Oh Lord keep us from having revival'"
"When the church membership grows but the church members don't grow, you may have a statistical but not a spiritual growth. And unless the extensive is matched by the intensive, and unless while we lengthen our chords we strengthen our stakes, and unless while we increase the size we improve the sort, we are going to discover that we've stretched the tent pegs out so far in every direction that the center pole wobbles."
"Revival is not mentioned in the New Testament, it is an Old Testament word. The message of the New Testament is repent. But it is repentance that brings about revival."
"Joseph Parker said, the man whose sermon is repent, sets himself against the age and will be battered mercilessly by the age of the moral tone he challenges. Their is but one end for such a man, off with his head. You had better not preach repentance until you have pledged your head to heaven. That's good advice from a great preacher."
"Before we can evangelize we must confess and repent of our sin, we must follow the Lord, we must be filled with the Holy Spirit, our worship and our preaching should aim therefore at revival."
"David prayed restore unto me the joy of thou salvation, and uphold me with thy free Spirit, and then will I teach transgressors thou ways and sinners will be converted to You. There I believe you have the proper sequence of revival and evangelism, and they are literally distinct, one from the other."
"I have done my best and I must confess that I get a little discouraged sometimes that we have a blind spot in our eye generally among our people today, we somehow do not see, that the proper sequence of evangelism is after revival."
"The greatest hindrance to a real work of God in America today is Sunday morning Christianity."
Believe me, Havner goes on, and on, and on. As do Dr. Lee and Dr. Criswell. The message is the same. Revival must precede effective evangelism, as the only effective evangelism is done in the power and the Spirit of God. Yet today, and for most of the recent past, we hear of the need to reach the world, which is a genuine need. Yet we live in Jerusalem where 80% of the people in South Carolina are nowhere near a church on any given Sunday. Jerusalem is dying and going to hell more than ever before, but our whole convention's focus is now the "Great Commission Resurgence," to change our methods in taking the gospel more effectively to the whole world.
But if we are to believe, I believe, the very sound biblical preaching of these giants from our denominations past, we can never effectively take the gospel to the whole world until we are first right in Jerusalem. I've been saying for a year now that we as Southern Baptists will never fulfil the "Great Commission" until we first recover the "Greatest Commandment."
If we practice the "Greatest Commandment," that is essentially the genesis of revival. What would our denomination look like if instead of squabbling about our methods, the cooperative program, styles of worship, what we wear? What if instead of chasing non-essentials, we instead dwelt upon the most essential; Loving God with all that we are and our neighbors as ourselves? What if we as a denomination resolved that in our pulpits we would preach repentance, holiness, being a living sacrifice? What if our message resounded week after week that we must deny ourselves, pick up our cross and follow Him, and in doing so we regain our "first love" above all else?
If this were to happen, if this would be our heart, our denomination would surely shrink in number as Jesus pruned the vine for real growth. The casual Christian would want no part of convicting preaching or the expectation of Godly living. We'd lose political influence. But how would our fruit, our influence with the lost be transformed, if we became a true "holy priesthood." As I write this according to our own statistics, 87% of Southern Baptist Churches are plateaued(stagnant) or in decline. Of the 13% that are adding members only 3% are doing so through winning the lost rather than swapping sheep. Where should our focus be, on the church, or on the lost, first and foremost?
As Havner said, "Jesus said you will know mine by their fruit. If their is something wrong with your fruitfulness, their is something wrong with your faith. If their is something wrong with your faithfulness, their is something wrong with your fellowship. If their's something wrong with your fellowship you'd better even check your faith. Worship maintains the faith, and the fellowship, and the faithfulness, and the fruitfulness is the consequence. As we abide, we abound...for he that abideth in Me and I in him bringeth forth much fruit, for without Me you can do nothing. Beloved, this is the note that has been uppermost on my heart for these 25 years on the road and 50 years in the ministry, that before we can see the evangelism that needs to occur, their must be a revival within the church."
For those who have an ear, let them hear! Sadly though, I'm reminded of the words of the prophet, "Who has believed our report?" As long as the cart is before the horse, the wagon will never steer straight. Luke 24:47 says the spreading of the gospel across the world will begin in Jerusalem. If we want the GCR, or any plan, to work; revival must occur among God's people first. Reaching the world will supernaturally flow from a Jerusalem on fire for God.
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