Revival (eBook)

Chapter 2

Hindrances to Revival

This incident in the life of Isaac has much to teach us in our consideration of the whole question of revival. The picture, is one of Isaac in trouble, in a difficulty. If you read the context, you will find that he had been living in another part of the country, and God had blessed him in a very striking manner. So much so that Isaac had become the object of envy of those who were living round and about him, and they had forced him to move. ‘Abimelech said unto Isaac, Go from us; for thou art much mightier than we…’ (26.16). And so Isaac was compelled to move with his family and all his servants, possessions and belongings. Then he came to this valley of Gerar and decided that he would dwell there. Of course, the moment he arrived he was confronted by an urgent and a very desperate need – and that was the need of water. I do want to emphasise that, because the need, in other words, was the need for something that is absolutely essential to life, in addition to being essential to well-being. He was not merely confronted by the problem of seeking some beauty spot where he might pitch his tent, or erect some kind of dwelling place for himself. He was not looking for entertainment, or for luxuries, he was not looking for any kind of accessory to life. The whole point of the story is that he was looking for something that is an absolute essential, and without which life cannot be maintained at all.

I emphasise that because as I have already indicated, the first thing we must realise about the situation we are in today is its desperate character. It is urgent. In other words, the trouble, as I see it, with the Church today is that she does not realise, as she should, that her primary need, and her urgent need at the moment, is the need of life itself. The problem confronting us is not a problem of methods, or of organisation, or of making a slight adjustment here and there, or improving things a little bit, or keeping them up-to-date, or anything like that. It seems to me that we are really down to this basic issue. The problem of society today is not a superficial problem, it is a very radical one. The whole outlook upon life is involved. And serious observers, as you know, are appalled as they contemplate what is really taking place. A well known medical authority, charged with being behind the times and old-fashioned, said recently that he almost wished that he were dead as he contemplated certain things that are taking place. So appalled was the man at the whole trend of life and of living that he was even capable of expressing himself in such sentiments. Now that is the situation, and it is the situation confronting the Church. There is no doubt that we have been living on the capital of the past – as you go round this country and look at the congregations, you will see that very quickly. You can carry on for a certain length of time on tradition, and by custom, and habit, but the point is bound to come when you cease to have any capital left and then you realise that you are facing something absolutely ultimate, something which is fundamental. And that, as I say, is the whole situation today of the Christian Church. We really are in the position of this man Isaac. And the problem confronting us is the need of life itself, the need of that fundamental power and vigour in every activity of the Church which really can make an impact upon the world, and do something vital and drastic with regard to the whole trend of affairs at the present time; the need of life, the need of power, the need of the Spirit himself.

There are times in the Church when what is needed is some sort of line or adjustment here or there, but that is not the trouble today. This is not a minor matter, it is not a third-rate or a fourth-rate matter that is in the balance at the moment. It is the whole life of the Church. It is the whole question of a spiritual outlook upon life, over and against everything that is represented by the world.

Now, the great lesson taught us here is this. What did Isaac do when he was face to face with this particular need? Here is our message. And you notice, first of all, what he did not do. It is so significant, and so important for us to understand this. He has been driven out; he has been forced to move. He has a family, possessions, servants and animals, and if they do not find water soon, then life itself will come to an end. They will perish. What then, face to face with this urgent need, does he do? Well, you notice that he does not send for the prospectors, he does not send for the water diviners, or for men who are experts in seeking and discovering fresh supplies of water. No, the whole message is that ‘Isaac digged again the wells of water which they had digged in the days of Abraham, his father’. Here again, is a message, that surely is sorely needed. Because when one looks at the Church in general the whole outlook today seems to be the very reverse of that of Isaac.

The kind of thing you read constantly in the books and the religious journals is this. What we need, they say, is a message for this atomic age, or a message for this second Elizabethan period. And, therefore, we must all be engaging in a quest for truth, a search for the message that is needed. So we call in the prospectors, we look to the scientists, we look to philosophy, and then psychology has its contribution to make. We call for the latest knowledge and learning, we want the very last advance in science and in culture in every shape and form. The whole idea is that the world is in a very serious predicament and therefore it behoves all men of understanding to come together and pool their resources, call a congress of world faiths, bring in everybody who believes in any religion and worships any sort of god. At the present time, the thing that is most obvious about the life of the Church in general is the multiplicity of consciences, and there they are, trying to find the formula. Trying to discover some word, trying to discover some message. ‘It’s this atomic age we’re in,’ they say, ‘we must have a message for it.’ And so on. Instead of doing what Isaac did, we are calling in the prospectors, the water-diviners, trying to see if we can discover a source or supply of water somewhere that will enable us to continue.

No, the emphasis in these verses is, I repeat, that Isaac did nothing of the kind. But what he did was this: ‘Isaac digged again the wells of water which they had digged in the days of Abraham, his father.’ Why did he do this? Well, I think that the wisdom of this is perfectly clear, and quite obvious. Isaac realised that his situation was such that it was no time for experimentation. The position was so urgent that if they did not have water and that very quickly, they would all perish. And in such a position, he argued like this: ‘There is no need for us to prospect and send for the water-diviners. My father, Abraham, was once in this area, and if there was one thing that characterised Abraham above everything else it was that he was an expert on this very question of finding water and sinking wells.’ If you read the story of Abraham in the early chapters of Genesis, you will find exactly what I mean by that statement. Isaac knew that Abraham had found water wherever he went; he always succeeded and he dug his wells, and he had an abundance of water. So Isaac said ‘My immediate business is to make certain that we have got a supply. Then having got a supply, and being sure of it, if we like we can prospect, we may try to seek for a further supply, we may experiment.’ But the man who experiments in the midst of a crisis is a fool. The first thing to do is to make certain that you have a guaranteed supply, that you have that vital source which will enable you to live and to continue, and then perhaps allow you to do these various other things. That, it seems to me, was clearly the reasoning of Isaac. He said, ‘Ah, my father was here. Now then, where did he sink these wells? You can go there with confidence for you will find water there.’ So back he went to the wells of water which they had dug in the days of Abraham, his father.

This then brings us inevitably to our theme. I would like to lay it down as a principle that there is great value in the reading of Church history and a study of the past, and nothing, surely, is more important for us at this present time than to read the history of the past and to discover its message. I suggest that we should do so for the very reasons which impelled Isaac to dig again the wells which they had dug in the days of Abraham, his father. It is very foolish to ignore the past. The man who does ignore it, and assumes that our problems are quite new, and that therefore the past has nothing at all to teach us, is a man who is not only grossly ignorant of the Scriptures, he is equally ignorant of some of the greatest lessons even in secular history. Yet, I think you will agree, that is the mentality that is governing the outlook of the vast majority at the present time. The basic assumption is that our problems are new, that they are quite unique, and that the Church and the world have never been confronted by such problems before.

Now, there is one very interesting thing about...