All right, let’s have another word of prayer.
Lord, it is always such a great privilege to be able to take the table with one another, knowing that we’re with saints throughout this earth. It is a fresh reminder, Lord, of the glory of Who You are and of Your worthiness.
And Lord, as we consider You this morning, we’re thankful that, as we’re looking at this matter of history, it is the testimony of Jesus. Lord, it is Your story. Lord, that’s what we’re looking at: Your life and the way You have used so many different ones.
We stand here today privileged to stand on the shoulders of so many who have gone before us. There has been quite a variety of people and many different ways You have used them, but all with one end in view: to magnify Your Son. This is what we desire to see today as we come in Your precious name. Amen.
Let’s turn first to 1 Corinthians 12:4-11. This will give us a little overview for the day.
Now there are varieties of gifts, but the same Spirit.
And there are varieties of ministries, and the same Lord.
And there are varieties of workings, but the same God, Who worketh all things in all.
But to each one is given the manifestation of the Spirit to profit withal.
Then, in verses 8 through 10, it speaks of various manifestations of the Spirit. That is not an extensive list; it is a partial list. Throughout the Scriptures, you will see other manifestations added.
But one and the same Spirit worketh all these things, dividing to each one severally even as He will.
The reason we have this Scripture for today is that the New American Standard uses the word varieties, while some other translations say diversities. If we are all honest, most of us are not comfortable with diversities. We like our little way and our little set standards of doing things.
But in the Lord, He wants us to become comfortable with the diversity of gifts, ministries, and effects that He uses to accomplish His purpose, because it is all of the same Spirit, the same Lord, and the same God.
It is good for us to remember that He has given these manifestations of the Spirit to us for the common good. We focus so much on our own good, but He wants it for the common good. The common good is the building up of the testimony of Jesus, that the life of Christ might be seen in a real and wonderful way.
Today, we are going to look at great varieties in the ways the Lord used different ones—from very fundamental ways, to more Pentecostal and charismatic ways, and a little bit in between. You will probably find ones today with whom you are comfortable, and you will probably find ones with whom you are not comfortable.
But remember this: it is the same Spirit, the same Lord, and the same God working everything for the common good and for His testimony.
Just briefly, we are going to look at some of the gospel outreach works that the Lord started during the latter part of the nineteenth century: the Salvation Army, the YMCA, and the Gideons.
We will also look at something called divine counterparts, and we will get to that in a second. We will consider those who encouraged us in the matter of rightly dividing the Word of God.
We are here today, and we have so many helps in the Word of God. But during the latter part of the nineteenth century, the Lord used a handful of men to provide a foundation for understanding the Greek New Testament. Many have built upon those foundations, and so we go back to them.
During this time there was also a recovery of the reality of the kingdom of God by brothers who were particularly given to that matter. The kingdom of God had not really been emphasized before this. Most people were thinking, “Well, we’re saved and we’re going to heaven.” But there is an age to come, and that truth was recovered during this period.
There was also the beginning of the Pentecostal and holiness movements. We are only going to touch on those this morning because they were preparatory works. They laid the foundation and groundwork for where many of us came to know the Lord in the Jesus movement.
The way the Lord worked at the turn of the century through Azusa Street, the Welsh Revival, and the holiness movements was really a preparatory work for what impacted much of us during the 1960s and 1970s. We will touch on that some other time.
As we begin, we want to look at the Salvation Army.
In this, we have two dear saints: William and Catherine Booth. William Booth was born in poverty. He worked as a pawnbroker’s apprentice because his father died early. Praise God, at the age of fifteen he was saved in a Wesleyan chapel.
Right after he was saved, he wrote in his diary:
God shall have all there is of William Booth.
How about a fifteen-year-old saying that? I mean, that’s something. He lived his life like that. He was burned out for Christ.
William and his young friends lived in the poorer section of town—we would probably call it a ghetto or the slums. They began evangelizing, helping the poor, and reaching out to them. As these people were touched by the Lord, William wanted to bring them to church.
One Sunday, he brought a whole group of little ruffians into a very prim and proper Wesleyan church. After the meeting, they were promptly rejected. They were told that if they wished to bring that group back, there was a special section in the rear, hidden away from everybody else, where they would be welcome.
That impacted his life significantly. When you are saved, you have a certain naïveté: you assume that other believers welcome all believers. Sooner or later, you find that maybe all believers are not welcomed everywhere.
William found out that these ones who were coming to the Lord were not welcome. But that did not hinder him. He remembered it and used it.
Later, he was ordained as a Methodist minister in what was called a settled ministry. That simply meant you had one place and were settled there. But that never fit his character and nature.
He married Catherine Mumford, and they had eight children. Several of those children continued in the Salvation Army. William resigned from the settled ministry, and he and Catherine became itinerant evangelists, serving the Lord throughout Wales, Cornwall, the Midlands, and the burned-out districts where nobody else seemed to care.
The people were burned out from their work and from everything around them, but the Booths had an aim in life: to go for souls and to go for the worst. William said, “There are plenty of people trying to reach the rich. We’re going to go for the worst.” He was always for the down-and-out.
Because of the way he shared and his desire to reach the down-and-out, he was banned from speaking in Wesleyan Methodist churches at that time.
Catherine was, by some people’s estimation, an even better preacher than William. She was invited to London to preach a series of meetings. The Lord captured their hearts there, and they settled in London for the rest of their lives, particularly in East London.
One person described East London at that time as “a squalid labyrinth” with half a million people—290 per acre. Every fifth house was a gin shop, and most had special steps to help even the tiniest children reach the counter.
That shows the condition of the atmosphere in which they were living. This was where they chose to live and minister. They opened what was called the East London Christian Mission.
In 1868, they changed their name. At first, William said, “We need to call this the Volunteer Army,” because they saw themselves in a battle. They said, “We’re the Lord’s army. We need to be called a volunteer army.”
But Booth’s son said, “Dad, these aren’t volunteers. They’re regulars. We’re in the regular army.” William responded that they were in the army for God’s salvation—the salvation of souls. So they called themselves the Salvation Army.
They made much use of bands. The first Salvation Army band began with three brothers, including William Fry, who served as Booth’s bodyguards. At that time, if you were an evangelist, you needed bodyguards. People would do everything possible to disrupt the meetings—not only throwing rotten tomatoes and garbage, but running cows through meetings and starting fistfights.
I am trying to remember the name of one evangelist—perhaps Bill Bray—who literally came off the platform and knocked somebody out because the person was distracting him so much. It was a tough time and a difficult crowd among whom to share the gospel.
These brothers brought along their trumpets and brass instruments, and they began to play. Booth noticed that people were attracted to the music. He said they were not very good, but the music attracted people and drew them together. So they started the Salvation Army band.
Booth’s thoughts on the band show something of his character. He said:
If I thought I could win one more soul to the Lord by walking on my head and playing the tambourine with my toes, I’d learn how to do it.
You know, that is devotion.
Often, Booth would take secular music that people were accustomed to and change it into gospel songs. He was criticized for this, just as Wesley and others had been criticized over the years.
Booth said:
Secular music, do you say, belongs to the devil? Does it? Well, if it did, I would plunder him for it. For he has no right to a single note of the whole seven. Every note and every strain and every harmony is divine and belongs to us.
He was going to redeem that unrighteous mammon and use it for the Lord’s sake. That shows us something of his character.
I ended up leaving my notes at home, so I had to borrow Josh’s tablet to pull this up. My notes have other things in them, which is why I am kind of fumbling around. It shows you how weak I am—I prepared all these notes and then left them at home. I realized it about two minutes before I was ready to stand up here. So, praise God.
Catherine eventually died tragically from cancer. In 1890, William published a work in England called In Darkest England and the Way Out. It was a wake-up call for England to begin addressing the social inequalities it was facing at that point in time.
When he brought people to the Lord, many of them were down-and-out and were not very disciplined. That was one reason he structured the work like an army: they needed discipline, helps, and tasks to do.
He would put them in a band or give them various tasks. He had homes for them. This was also the origin of the modern thrift store. He saw that wealthy people often had extra clothes and simply threw things away, so he opened thrift stores where people could bring things and where others were free to receive what they needed.
He did not merely preach the gospel; he cared for individuals and for their lives. He tried to train them in trades so they could earn an honest living. He provided homes where they could return rather than spending every night on the street drinking.
One criticism of the Salvation Army was that Booth never desired to establish a church. His work was a mission and an outreach. At first, when they met, they would have the Lord’s table. Then Booth saw that there was such a mixture in the meetings, because they were gospel meetings, and they stopped having the Lord’s table.
Some critics thought that he did not value the Lord’s table because they did not take it. Actually, it was because he did value it. He saw the group they were in and recognized that a gospel outreach was not the appropriate setting for the Lord’s table.
William Booth died in 1912. By then, the Salvation Army was in fifty-eight countries. Forty thousand attended his service, including Queen Mary.
Queen Mary entered the service through a side door incognito, dressed as an ordinary person. She found a seat beside a woman who had been a prostitute. The queen was overwhelmed by the woman’s testimony of the impact Booth’s ministry had made upon her life.
This woman had been hopeless, with no hope in life, but there had been a whole change in her countenance. Queen Mary said she would have had no idea that the woman had been a prostitute, simply from her face and the change in her. She saw the glory of the Lord in this dear one.
That is just a small testimony of the impact Booth had upon one person.
Here are a couple of other quotes by Booth. Again, they show his intensity:
While women weep as they do now, I’ll fight.
While little children go hungry as they do now, I’ll fight.
While men go to prison, in and out, in and out, as they do now, I’ll fight.
While there is a drunkard left, while there’s a poor lost girl on the streets, while there remains one dark soul without the light of God, I’ll fight. I’ll fight to the very end.
That was his fighting spirit. I mean, what a heart. That characterized him throughout his life.
Because of the intensity Booth had for people to be saved in the Lord, not everybody liked him. He was driven. He was not a compromiser or a politician. He had one goal in life: to bring people to Jesus Christ and to see their lives turned around.
If you got in his way, he would say, “You go your way; this is the way we’re going.” He had detractors during his life, but he was faithful to what the Lord had called him to do.
A couple of quotes from Catherine show something of her life. I love this one:
The waters are rising, but so am I. I am not going under, but over.
The waters are rising, but so am I. I am not going under, but over. It reminds me of something Brother Johannes Vasius shared with us years ago. He spoke about being in a battle for life, with a whole group of rocks in a lake before you. How are you going to get to the other side?
We want to talk about getting the rocks out. But he said what you do is raise the level of the water. It is the level of life that rises over the troubles and carries us through. That is the testimony of what we call an overcomer—overcoming and not being overcome.
Catherine’s testimony sounded a little like Mary’s:
I know not what He is about to do with me, but I have given myself entirely into His hands.
Praise God. She was really given to Him.
Booth also proved to be prophetic. He shared this during his life, and when you look around today, much of it has come true:
The chief dangers which confront the coming century will be religion without the Holy Ghost, Christianity without Christ, forgiveness without repentance, salvation without regeneration, politics without God, and heaven without hell.
That sounds a lot like what gets shared today. He saw ahead. He saw the dangers of religion without the Holy Ghost, Christianity without Christ, forgiveness without repentance, salvation without regeneration, politics without God, and heaven without hell.
May we learn from that. This is a precious testimony of one who was used mightily to bring hundreds of thousands to the Lord during a time of great despair in England. We are very thankful for him.
During this period, the Lord also raised up other ministries in the late nineteenth century.
The first was the YMCA. It was founded in London by a young man named George Williams, who was twenty-two years old. I am always touched by the age of people God uses. We have been praying lately about young adults and youth, and it is encouraging to see how the Lord has used various ones at such young ages.
George Williams was in London and saw how many people came there for business, while sailors also came into the city. There was not a suitable place for them to stay. They did not have Hampton Inns and other fancy places. Most places you stayed back then were not places where you would want to stay as a believer.
He said, “Let’s create a place—a refuge for young men from the hazards and temptations of city life.” Basically, they opened what we would call hotels, places where people could come and stay.
They still have them today. I do not know about around this country, but many of us who have gone to Far East conferences in Hong Kong have stayed in a YMCA right in downtown Hong Kong—nice and away from much of the worldly stuff.
The YMCA first came to the United States in 1851. A sea captain named Thomas Sullivan wanted a home away from home for sailors and merchants, and that is how these facilities were used.
In 1853, another brother opened a Y for what was then called “colored men,” because of segregation. Thankfully, in 1946, all the Ys were desegregated.
Because there was so much division then, there were also special Ys for Jewish people and for Indian people. It is amazing how divided things were, but there was still outreach to various ones, and the gospel was shared with them.
In 1869, someone came up with the idea of opening a gym for recreation. The residents needed something to do when they returned to their rooms at night. So, they opened a gym.
Today, we think of the Ys mainly as recreation places, and that is what they have evolved into. They do not use the word Christian much anymore. But during a season, these were works used of the Lord.
It touched my heart that this little George Williams, of whom we know very little, saw a need. He had a burden, took it to the Lord, and the Lord met him.
When the Lord opens our eyes to needs, do we say—as Enoch started this morning—“O wretched man that I am, I cannot do anything”? Or do we see the possibility of God and take it to Him? He can still use these things.
A similar group used by the Lord was the Gideons. They were founded in Wisconsin in 1899 by a couple of traveling businessmen. They had much the same burden as the YMCA. They saw that there was not much mutual encouragement or outreach among traveling businessmen at that time.
As they organized the Gideons, in 1908 they developed the Bible Project. Their purpose was to place a Bible in every hotel room in the United States. The first Bible was placed in a hotel room in Superior, Montana.
Now the Gideons are in 180 countries. From 1908 to 2001—nearly one hundred years—the first billion Bibles were distributed. But in just the next thirteen years, from 2002 to 2015, the second billion was reached.
Praise God for the way they are handing out and giving out Bibles throughout the world. If anybody has questions about the Gideons, you can see our brother Glenn. In a couple of weeks at prayer meeting, he will share a little more about that. We are thankful for the work they have done and continue to do.
Now, I want to move to another matter: divine counterparts.
I actually stole this phrase from DeVern Fromke. He shared at the conference, and a couple of other times, about what he called the divine counterparts of the Christian life.
These are two parts of life that can appear almost contradictory, but which are essential and must be related together. He illustrated it with a violin, or any stringed instrument.
How do you get a stringed instrument to play its most beautiful music? You have two ends. The strings are tied at both ends, and you bring them to the right tension. When both ends pull against each other at the right tension, you hear the best music.
If the string is too tight, it can break. If one end outpulls the other, it breaks. If it is not tight enough, it makes a sloppy sound.
Some people call this the balanced life. If you do not like the phrase divine counterparts, it is the balanced life. There are matters within our lives that pull in different directions, almost, but in the Lord they work together for the fullness of His testimony to be expressed.
Consider objective truth: the foundation of the truth of Who God is and all that He has done. Then consider subjective experience in life. Some people lean more toward foundational truth, while others lean toward subjective experience.
But for the fullness of Christ to be expressed, you need both of those to come forth.
It is like individual life and corporate life. They can feel as though you are being pulled one way or another, but in balance, there is a fullness of Christ coming forth.
Another apparent contradiction is waiting on God and working with God. We are called to wait on God. Some people love to wait on God, while others are working with God. But both belong together. That is when it works in a beautiful way.
Notice that it is not working for God. I remember dear Sister Margaret Barber. Someone asked her one time, “What is the secret of Christian service?” She said:
The secret of Christian service is not working for God.
Do not work for God. Just give your life to Him and work with Him. Allow Him to lead you and guide you.
We also encounter divine counterparts between evangelism and edification. Are we to build the house of God, or are we to evangelize? At times, these can seem to work against each other, because some are more focused one way and others another way.
But when they work together properly, that beautiful sound comes forth. Many are brought in, and at the same time they are being built up. Praise God for that.
There is also the indwelling of the Holy Spirit—the life within that does the transforming and conforming work—and the empowering of the Holy Spirit for service and for what He calls us to do.
Some focus more on the indwelling, while others focus more on the empowering. But for the fullness of the testimony of Jesus to be expressed through our lives, these vital matters must work together.
I wanted to look at some of these this morning because you see them expressed through history during this period.
First, we want to consider the matter of rightly dividing the Word of God. I want to introduce you to some men. Perhaps some have heard their names: Westcott, Lightfoot, Moule, and Alford.
These names are not familiar in many circles. But in the late 1800s and early 1900s, these men poured themselves into studying the original Greek and laid a foundation for effective study of the Greek New Testament.
Most of us do not understand Greek. By the time you spend years studying Greek, you will be dead by then, because there is so much to learn. But thank the Lord, these ones did the work.
You will notice that men such as F. B. Meyer, G. Campbell Morgan, T. Austin-Sparks, Brother Nee, and Brother Kong referred to these sources. These are the original books to which they went back. They are what, in Bible study, we call source books.
B. F. Westcott was professor of divinity at Cambridge, and later, for a couple of years, Bishop of Durham. He wrote several books on history and gave attention to the canon of Scripture. One of his best-known works is A History of the English Bible.
He also wrote numerous commentaries on the Gospels. Along with J. A. Hort, he published The New Testament in the Original Greek.
That publication became controversial because there are different Greek manuscripts and manuscript traditions. The King James Version had one focus, while Westcott and Hort focused on another. Much of their opposition came from King James supporters who would say, “If King James was good enough for Paul, it’s good enough for us.”
Sometimes you may run across claims that Westcott was a heretic or that he was involved in occultism. People came down hard on him in that way. I do not believe those claims.
I appreciate these quotes from Westcott:
Great occasions do not make heroes or cowards; they simply unveil them to the eyes of men. Silently and imperceptibly, as we wake or sleep, we grow strong or weak. At last, some crisis shows what we have become.
That is it. Some people say crisis builds character. No, crisis reveals character. It shows what is already there.
Westcott was a man of many titles, and I appreciate this perspective:
Great thoughts go best with common duties. Whatever, therefore, may be your office, regard it as a fragment in an immeasurable ministry of love.
Keep things in perspective. Do not think more of yourself than you ought.
J. B. Lightfoot was also Bishop of Durham. Westcott took his place after Lightfoot died. Lightfoot wrote numerous commentaries on New Testament books and on Acts. One of his most important studies is The Apostolic Fathers.
If you really want to look at the apostolic fathers of the first few centuries, when many Christian truths were battled over, Lightfoot’s work is valuable. There were many truths and heresies coming out, and a faithful group of men battled for the truth of the Lord.
Lightfoot did a wonderful job going through and testifying about who those men were. One of his quotes is this:
There is no persuasiveness more effectual than the transparency of a single heart from a sincere life.
In other words, it is not so much the words. It is the character of the person sharing them. That is what God is after. He is after that character, and that is what we are jealous for.
I have different slides than are up here, which is why I keep looking back and forth. Another brother was H. C. G. Moule.
One thing I should point out is that all of these men were bishops, rectors, or ministers within the Anglican Church. They were faithful right where they were.
Often, when we look back, we say, “Oh, these were Anglicans,” or, “These were this,” or, “These were that.” But the Lord has His treasures everywhere. These ones were greatly used by God. They never left the Anglican Church, and they faithfully shared Christ and presented the truth concerning Him.
Many of us have grown up around non-denominational settings. But the so-called non-denominational movement did not really begin until the 1960s or 1970s. We need to be careful not to use our present light to judge people from previous generations, when that light had not been revealed to them.
They were faithful to walk in the light they had. Praise God, because of them, we are standing here and are being enriched. They were faithful to the light.
That is all God ever looks for: faithfulness to the light you have. Some can see this part, while others see that part. Be faithful to what He is showing you today.
Some in history did not have the great light or fullness of light that has been recovered today, but they were so faithful that it puts us to shame. In the little bit of light they had on a particular matter, they were utterly faithful and utterly given to it, to the Lord, and to His faithfulness.
That is what He is calling us to. In these last days we are entering into, as things intensify, we will be called to even greater faithfulness to Him.
Moule became a Keswick speaker. He had been a teacher and professor at Cambridge, but when he attended the Keswick Convention, he entered into what we shared last time concerning the exchanged life—Hudson Taylor’s testimony of “not I, but Christ.” He became a frequent speaker there.
He was also noted for writing many hymns and poems. We have three of his hymns in Christ and Song.
This is one of Moule’s quotes:
There are only two kinds of men: the righteous who believe themselves sinners, and the rest, sinners who believe themselves righteous.
That sums it up, doesn’t it?
Another encouraging quote from Moule is this:
There is no situation so chaotic that God cannot, from that situation, create something that is surpassingly good. He did it in creation. He did it at the cross. And He is doing it today.
There is no situation so chaotic that God cannot create something surpassingly good from it. He did it in creation. He did it at the cross. He is doing it today. Praise God, He is. Oftentimes, we do not see it.
Finally, there is dear brother Dean Alford. To me, his most significant writing is Alford’s Greek New Testament, because it contains many exegetical and explanatory notes. It is a great resource.
If you are studying and run across these names, I am not saying they are the easiest books to read. They are study books. You have to work your way through some of them. They can be challenging.
But it is like anything good: you work your way through it, and you find yourself reaping resources from it. If you hear other brothers refer to these writers, you should recognize that there is validity to what they are saying.
Spurgeon said of Alford:
He is indispensable to the student of the original Greek.
Spurgeon gave compliments sparingly. He did not simply throw them out flippantly.
Another matter recovered during this time was the kingdom of God. I am using this broad title because the truth of the kingdom was recovered during this period.
Before this, many believers focused only on being saved and having their sins forgiven. Praise the Lord and praise God for that. But between this age and eternity, there is an age to come: the kingdom age.
There are varied interpretations concerning this, but these brothers looked into it deeply. You might not agree with all their interpretations as you read their works, but you will appreciate the depth of their study and the background they provide.
The names are Robert Govett, D. M. Panton, and G. H. Pember.
Robert Govett was an Oxford graduate. Originally, he was a curate at St. Stephen’s Anglican Church in Norwich, England, in 1841. After a few years, he met other believers in town and came to see what he regarded as the error of infant baptism.
He resigned his curacy and his position in the Anglican Church, then started his own meeting place called Ebenezer Chapel.
When he made that choice, he lost his salary, all his income, and his position. His family became upset with him, and he was cut out of part of his inheritance. It cost him something to take that stand.
But the more he saw in the Scriptures, the more he felt that he could not continue to participate in infant baptism. He saw that only believers should be baptized.
He started Ebenezer Chapel, which later became known as Surrey Chapel because it was on Surrey Road. He remained there for the rest of his life. He wrote numerous commentaries, and his most notable work is his extensive two-volume commentary on Revelation.
If you ever have trouble sleeping at night, just pull out Govett on Revelation. It will take you out of the road. But it is an extensive study.
Wilbur Smith, another reputable believer, said of Govett:
In my own opinion, he brings to his interpretation a more thorough knowledge of the Scriptures in their bearing on the last book of the Bible than any other writer of his generation.
Many who do not agree with Govett’s final interpretations still appreciate the study and effort he put into it, because there is much to glean there.
Govett was a close friend of Spurgeon, and they wrote back and forth to one another. One thing Spurgeon liked about Govett was that he would never use the word Reverend. He would say, “Don’t call me Reverend.”
Spurgeon did not like that title either. He said Govett was off to a good start, and he always called him Mr. Govett because he respected him so much. Spurgeon said:
Mr. Govett wrote a hundred years before his time, and the day will come when his works will be treasured as sifted gold.
There is treasure in there. We have some of his books available.
The next person is D. M. Panton. He was also educated at Cambridge. He heard Govett preach on the Sermon on the Mount, and that is when he was saved.
Panton succeeded Govett at Surrey Chapel and served there for forty years, from 1901 to 1941.
When Margaret Barber returned from China for the first time—we will talk more about her in the next session—she made her home at Surrey Chapel. She and Panton were attracted to one another and planned to marry.
But after prayer, they called it off to fulfill what they believed was their higher calling. Panton wrote the hymn “Nearest of All Is He” to express his feelings. That hymn is in our hymnbook.
Margaret Barber said:
Lord, I am willing to break my heart in order that I may satisfy Thy heart.
That is a precious testimony.
From 1924 to 1955, Panton edited a magazine called The Dawn. He also wrote several books. The Dawn was an evangelical magazine that came out once each month.
Here is Volume 1, Number 1, dated April 15, 1924. You talk about nothing new under the sun. That is almost a hundred years ago exactly.
He always had a section called “The Outlook of the Hour,” dealing with what was going on in the world. He also had little articles, including material concerning Govett and other subjects.
He wrote about the Japanese earthquake that occurred on September 1, 1923, in which 165,000 people died, and gave his assessment of what God might be doing through it.
He also wrote concerning Bolshevism. The Bolsheviks were communists, representing modern communism after the Russian Revolution. A wealthy Russian sister who had moved to England possessed an issue of a Bolshevik publication.
On its front page was a picture of a workman with his sleeves rolled up, holding a huge hammer and sickle at the foot of a ladder he was about to climb. Underneath was written:
I have already smashed all earthly thrones, and I am now going up to shatter the throne of God.
That is the heart of communism. It was a hundred years ago, and we still see it active today.
Another article concerned transitions in Turkey and Arabia. The Habsburgs, Hohenzollerns, Romanovs, and Glücksburgs were collapsing, but what was rising was the caliphate.
The caliphate of the Arabs, representing Muslim belief, was being resurrected as an Arab institution throughout much of Arabia. Its purpose was to bring everything under Muslim control.
That was written a hundred years ago, and it is still rather relevant today. These matters continue.
The magazine also included gospel articles and testimonies from missionaries around the world. One contributor was a sister named Helen Ramsay, who wrote wonderful children’s picture books. I think we may have carried some in the bookstore.
One missionary testimony in the magazine touched my heart deeply:
A young Christian girl in South America was seized in the woods by a savage enemy of her father’s, who cut off both her hands.
Many years passed before the poor girl recovered from her wounds. One day there came to her father’s door a poor man asking for alms. The girl recognized him as the man who had cut off her hands.
She ordered the servant to bring him in, feed him lavishly, and take care of whatever needs he had. She sat down with him and watched him eat.
When he had finished, she dropped the coverings that had hidden her handless wrists from view. Holding them up before him, she uttered one sentence: “I have had my revenge.”
She had forgiven. She had her revenge. Man’s revenge is one way; she showed the love of Christ in a whole other way.
We have a precious heritage.
Concerning the Japanese earthquake, Panton wrote that it was God’s way of trying to awaken the Japanese people to their national sin of idolatry.
The final person is G. H. Pember. He was another writer of this period. One of his classic works is Earth’s Earliest Ages. If you ever want to consider creation and his studies, it is excellent.
He was also one of the early advocates for animal welfare. He wrote a book about animals, their past and present. If people ask, “Are there animals in heaven?” you can get his book. He will let you know. You may be surprised by what you read. I am not saying I agree with everything, but it is precious material.
When you think about the kingdom, the rapture, and related matters, there are various interpretations.
There is pre-tribulation teaching, in which the church is raptured before the great tribulation. There is post-tribulation teaching, in which the church goes through the entire great tribulation. That is my least favorite.
Then there are multiple-rapture views, in which some saints are raptured before the great tribulation and the rest are raptured after it.
We are not going to go into all these interpretations today, and each one is supported by Scriptures. Brother Kong shared on these various interpretations at one Christian Family Conference under the title The King Is Coming. It is an excellent exposition.
Within the various schools of interpretation, there are men we all respect. It is not as though one group alone has everything right.
Among those holding pre-tribulation views are Darby, Kelly, Torrey, D. L. Moody, and Scofield. Among those holding post-tribulation views are George Müller, A. J. Gordon, A. B. Simpson, Spurgeon, and Benjamin Newton.
Among those associated with multiple-rapture views are Hudson Taylor, Chapman, Govett, Pember, and Panton.
Different ones have different interpretations, and they all use Scripture to support them. We are thankful that we can have different interpretations while maintaining the unity of the Spirit and the oneness we have in Christ.
I imagine that once the Lord finally comes and all of this occurs, it will not matter what school you are in—we are all going to be surprised. Maybe you got part of it right, but not all of it.
But all that will be behind us because our eyes will be on Him. We will see Him and dwell in His presence together. That is the end He has for us.
Pre-, post-, or pan-tribulation—I am going to pan out. There you go. Thank you, sir.
Just as an interruption, there are several resources for a basic library that also came about during this time: Strong’s Concordance, Young’s Concordance, and Smith’s Bible Dictionary.
Remember, when these men wrote these concordances, they did not have computers. Nothing was automated. They could not search and sort as we can today. It was manual labor—a labor of love.
Smith’s Bible Dictionary is an excellent Bible dictionary. There is one other concordance called Cruden’s Concordance.
Do you know how you can tell the difference between the concordances? Cruden’s Concordance is for the crude, Young’s Concordance is for the young, and Strong’s Concordance is for the strong. It is pretty simple.
Whichever one you like, whatever category you fall into, that is your concordance. You can tell I am losing it here. All right, let’s move on.
Throughout church history, there have always been movements that recovered the person and work of the Holy Spirit—from the early church through Montanism, Methodism, Irvingism, and the charismatic movement.
Keswick focused particularly on the indwelling Holy Spirit for transformation and conformity. These Pentecostal and holiness movements focused more on the empowering of the Holy Spirit for service.
Both are essential for a healthy testimony of Jesus. From history, this is one of the hardest balances for believers to keep. Some go more toward indwelling, and others more toward empowerment. But both are necessary.
The one who did a great preparatory work in beginning this whole process was Edward Irving. He was a charismatic preacher in England. The movement began well, but toward the end it went off the rails because it went too far in one direction. I am not going to go into all that today.
Praise God for the Welsh Revival of 1904 and 1905. The instrument used there was Evan Roberts. Again, notice his age. At twelve years old, he withdrew from school and worked in the coal mines.
He had come to know the Lord as a child. While in the mines, from the age of twelve until the revival occurred when he was twenty-six, he shared the gospel. He wrote gospel verses on the coal carts and walls, and he read the Bible to the men.
At the age of fourteen, he saw the value of being at every meeting to meet the Lord. He said, “If God says, ‘Where two or three are gathered together in My name, there am I in the midst,’ then whenever God’s people are together, I want to be there.”
Nobody was forcing him to attend. It was not legalistic. He simply saw something in his heart: “Every time God’s people gather, I want to be there.”
He also began seeking more of the empowering of the Holy Spirit as he heard about different things. We do not have time to go into it today, but there is a powerful testimony of how he received that empowering. There are biographies of Evan Roberts that you can pick up.
He prayed for revival for eleven years. Then, in 1904, the Holy Spirit swept through Wales, and over one hundred thousand people were saved.
It had such an impact on the community that the bars closed, the jails were empty, and the miners sang gospel songs at work. There are stories of people walking along and hearing Christian songs coming up out of the ground because the miners were singing below in the mines.
They even had to retrain the mules because the mules were so accustomed to the miners’ curse words that they did not know how to respond when the miners spoke to them nicely. The courts had hardly any work to do.
Praise God, there was much good. There were also some excesses that arose. But thank the Lord, Evan Roberts met Mrs. Jessie Penn-Lewis, and she helped bring matters into balance by the Word of God.
You had the empowering of the Spirit and the Word of God working together. Out of Evan Roberts’s experience, and Mrs. Penn-Lewis’s work with him, came her classic book War on the Saints, concerning the spiritual battles people go through.
The coal miners in those old pictures are smiling and happy. Before, they probably were not so happy. But there was something that had come forth in their lives.
Evan Roberts ministered publicly for a little less than three years. He kind of burned out. After the revival, he lived with Mr. and Mrs. Penn-Lewis for about seven or eight years, and they tried to revive and restore him.
He burned out because every day he had totally given himself out to the Lord and served Him in this way. He lived a long life—seventy- or eighty-some years—but was publicly used for only about three years.
That does not mean he was not used in other, private ways that we do not necessarily know about.
In the United States, there was also A. B. Simpson. Many consider Simpson the father of modern Pentecostalism.
He had a fourfold gospel: Jesus Christ as Savior, Sanctifier, Healer, and Coming King.
When he said “Healer,” he believed in divine healing. He did not believe that physical healing was included in the atonement, but he believed that by faith in the Healer—not merely our faith, but His faith—healing power could come.
He served in Canada, Louisville, Kentucky, and New York City. He had a great work in New York, again among those who were more neglected. He had been invited to serve as pastor of a large Presbyterian church, but he eventually left that to work among many of the down-and-out.
Out of his ministry came the Christian and Missionary Alliance. He was also a great hymn writer.
Often, on Saturday, while studying for the Sunday meeting, he would write a hymn. He would take it home to his daughter and tell her to have music composed for it by the next morning.
I have no appreciation for that, but some of you probably do. What a challenge. If you read some of Simpson’s hymns and think the music is not so great, it may be because his daughter was under pressure that night to come up with the tune. But we have a good number of his hymns.
At Azusa Street in Los Angeles, from 1906 to 1915, a wonderful revival took place. On April 9, 1906, William Seymour and seven other men were waiting on the Lord. They were before Him, seeking His heart and desire.
The Holy Spirit fell upon them, and they said, “It seemed like Pentecost had been reborn in our midst.” The revival continued through Azusa Street and spread throughout Los Angeles, many localities in the United States, and beyond.
Out of this came many groups that we know today: the Assemblies of God, the Church of God, the Foursquare Church, and others. These ones focused much on the experiential side of the Holy Spirit.
Some were not as strong in the Word of God, so they had a tendency to swerve one way or another. That is why we need this balance. A great balance is needed.
The Azusa Street Revival began at the Apostolic Faith Gospel Mission. It was one of the greatest revivals to occur in the United States.
William Seymour is shown in this picture. What you notice among the people involved in the revival is that it was interracial. Praise God for that. God is not a respecter of persons. He is looking for hearts.
Seymour was used in a great way to bring the gospel to many, particularly in Los Angeles, that den of iniquity from which some people escape.
Well, anyway, excuse my scatteredness today. As I said, I did not have my notes as much. But in summary, let us be thankful and aware of the great diversity within the church, while remembering the one Spirit, Lord, and God behind everything He is doing.
Remember the fighting spirit of William Booth. Press on and fight on. One young man started the YMCA—what a wonderful gospel outreach.
Let us remain alert and aware of these divine counterparts, that we might live a balanced Christian life. Brother Nee has a book on that. It is a matter of staying on track and keeping the main thing the main thing.
Let us value the resources we have for studying the Word of God, and remember that the Holy Spirit both indwells and empowers. How vital both are.
We are thankful for the revivals of the early 1900s, because they prepared the way for the revivals of the 1960s—the Jesus movement. That groundwork ended up impacting many of us during that time.
We are thankful that the Lord continues to work. We want to be those who keep responding to Him, staying in a place of freshness with Him and being open to all that there is in Christ.
Sometimes we find ourselves uncomfortable with something. If you find yourself uncomfortable, seek to discover where the discomfort is coming from. Is it coming from you, or is it coming from God?
We are to test the spirits. We do not just accept everything. But sometimes the source of discomfort comes from ourselves. Sometimes it comes from the enemy, and we need to reject that.
Be wise. Do not automatically reject something simply because there is an initial discomfort. Seek Him and find the source of it, that we might stand together and allow His life to come forth in a fuller and greater measure among us. Praise God.
Lord, we are thankful for these dear ones who have gone before us. We are thankful for the ones who laid their lives down. They loved You. They sought the praise of God far more than the praise of man.
Lord, we want to be those who continue to have teachable hearts and teachable spirits for the days in which we are living, because we realize they are going to become more and more intense.
There is a great battle over the testimony of Jesus, and we want to continue to be trained and equipped to be faithful to what You are calling us to do.
In Jesus’ name. Amen.