The Revival We Need a Call to Arms — David Legge

Well, good evening to you all. It's a privilege once again to be with you here in Lurgan. Thank you to your pastor for inviting me this Tuesday night. It's a delight to be here. But I must begin by a half-apology for such a thing.

The reason for it is that I'm not speaking on the subject that was announced. If it was announced, if it wasn't, then we don't need to worry about it. I retract the half-apology. But the reason why it's a half-apology is I believe the Lord has redirected me.

Due to the circumstances that have taken place over the weekend, and in your own Craig-Avon area last night, I felt last evening at about half-twelve, one o 'clock, that I just couldn't preach on what had been already arranged.

And more so this morning when I awoke, and even lying in bed, I felt the Lord impressing upon me to bring something else to you. And so I believe I have the message of the Lord tonight. I want you to turn to two texts.

The first is a very well-known one. 2 Chronicles chapter 7 and verse 14, please. 2 Chronicles chapter 7 and verse 14. And if you care to turn to the second, it's found in Romans chapter 13 and verse 12.

So 2 Chronicles 7, 14 and Romans 13, verse 12. And the title that I'm taking for what is not a Bible study really, but an exhortation, is a call to arms. A call to arms. Verse 14 then of 2 Chronicles 7.

Now this is God speaking. Of course, it's all God's Word. The Bible, we know that, but these are the very spoken words of God recorded. If my people, which are called by my name, shall humble themselves and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways, then will I hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin, and will heal their land.

Now I know there can be great dispensational confusion concerning a verse like this, but I feel at times that we relegate this verse to insignificance as New Testament believers because of that, wrongly so.

Turning then, please, to Romans chapter 13, verse 12. If you didn't understand what I just said there a moment or two ago, don't worry, it doesn't matter too much. You're probably better not knowing anyway.

Romans 13, verse 12. The night is far spent, or almost gone. The day is at hand. Let us, therefore, cast off the works of darkness, and let us put on the armor of light. Let us pray. Father, we are here tonight around your Word, and we do give you thanks for your Holy Word.

And Lord, we are conscious that we have, at least some of us, I'm sure, a desire deep within our souls to do more than study the Word. We long, O Almighty Living God, to meet with you. We long for a divine encounter.

We long to know that God is here, and that we are meeting. We feel like the psalmist who said, as the heart pants after the water brooks, so pants my soul after thee, O God. When shall I come and appear before the living God?

Lord, we want to appear before the living God. We want to meet with you. Lord, we know that every day, if we read our Bibles, sometimes we can read our Bibles, we can say our prayers, and we can miss God.

Lord, we don't want that to happen in this place tonight. We want to go out of this place with more than a mere increased intellectual knowledge of the Bible. O God, we want to go out different, changed, transformed, renewed, revived.

So, Lord, let us not waste our time, nor yours. We pray for the enablement of the Holy Spirit of the living God. O, we pray for an outpouring of the same Spirit upon us, as a gathering of your people, those you have called by your name.

So, Lord, hear us and meet us in our need. In this hour, for Christ's sake. Amen. Saturday night, two soldiers murdered. Last evening, here in Craighaven, a police officer murdered. And I'm sure, like myself, you have been following the progress of the reporting on these two tragic incidents.

And we've had, all day and all weekend, political reaction. We've had military reaction, religious reaction, and police reaction. The question that is burning upon my heart tonight is, what is the reaction of the Christian?

What should be the reaction of the child of God? And I do hope that we haven't, in some way, just said, oh, here it's all happening again, and stick our head in the sand, and hope that it will go away.

I hope that we're human enough, with hearts of flesh, enough to be able to interact, and to ask ourselves the question, what have we to say? What can we do in the light of the seeming resurgence of violence, which we've known for so long in our province?

After all, the Lord Jesus Christ, did he not call us salt? And salt is meant to make a difference. It's meant to preserve raw meat. And we are meant to have a preserving influence on society. Salt makes you thirsty.

You want a drink when you've had something salty. And we are meant to make people thirst after God, after the Lord Jesus Christ. We're meant to be light in a dark place. A light set on a hill, so that we stand out as different, shining forth in such a dark world.

So what ought our reaction to be? Well, can I be personal? My immediate reaction last night, personally speaking, when I heard this latest news of this murder of the police officer, was twofold. First of all, I had a deep sense that I, and we, as God's people, must urgently seek God for revival.

Now, I don't know whether any of you experienced that or not. But almost simultaneously to that thought, I was struck with a sense of my own sinfulness. I won't go into the details of that. But I sinned.

And a great sense of my own unworthiness and impotence in this hour of need to be anything of any worth, or to make any difference. I don't know whether you have ever felt those two things together. They're a strange mix, I know.

But they are, I think, in microcosm where we are as the church of Jesus Christ. I think you would have to be spiritually deadened not to think or desire that we need a revival. You only need to look at the moral scene, the social, political, financial, religious, spiritual climate of our province, our island, our island nations, our continent, to realize that, humanly speaking, if the church of Jesus Christ does not experience a spiritual revival, she is certainly on the way down, if not on the way out.

Now, revival history shows that genuine revival among God's people greatly affects a nation. So something happens among God's people, the church, and we ought to keep these definitions of biblical, I feel.

Revival, you cannot revive something that wasn't already alive. And the church of Jesus Christ is the only body that can be revived. But that often, and should always, have a knock-on effect to the community around what we might call awakening, whereby unconverted friends, loved ones, neighbors, and community in general are ignited by this great flame of Holy Spirit fire going through the church.

And there is a community effect. Edwin Orr, one of the greatest authorities on the history of revivals, claims that the evangelical awakening in the 18th century, and two characters that you will know very well who were used by God in that were George Whitefield and John Wesley, Edwin Orr believes that that great evangelical awakening saved Britain from the revolutionary experience that ravished the continent of Europe at that particular time.

Indeed, Wesley, the English evangelist, defeated Voltaire, the French philosopher and deist. And it was equally true that on the American continent, around the same period of time, from approximately 1800 on, that revivals, spawned by God's Spirit in that nation, saved the nation from the same godless French philosophy that had influenced, I believe, almost every intellectual college by the close of the 18th century.

Now, an example of how bad things were at Princeton University, a Dr. Green said during this period of time that he knew of only two professing Christians among all the students of the university college.

The College of William and Mary in Virginia was, and I'm quoting now, a hotbed of French politics and religion. And almost certainly the period of revival that swept across America during that similar period of great awakening saved America from the tragedy of the worst elements of the French Revolution.

So revival saved the United Kingdom. Revival saved the United States. But coming a little closer to home, in the 1920s here in Northern Ireland, there was, politically and socially, a state of chaos. Fear and uncertainty filled the minds of the people, and the politicians, as is often the case, were at their wit's end of what to do.

Murder and mayhem seemed to rule Ulster. But it was the Christian church, small, it may have been, in the remnant that were exercised to go this way, they believed that even amidst the hopeless darkness of the political and social scene, that there was hope in God, and they sought God.

And God sent a man, W .P. Nicholson. And he was used to preach Christ and his cross. And thousands of people were ushered into the kingdom of Jesus Christ, and many believe that a civil war, a potential civil war in our land, was turned into a mighty spiritual revival.

Now, God has done that. The great issue that faces us tonight and in this present age is that churches, do we believe that God can do it again? I'm not sure we do. Of course, this year, if you haven't already heard it, is the 150th anniversary of the 1859 revival.

What you may not be aware of, that as a result of that revival, there was a dramatic reduction in the crime rate in our province. The following statistics I'm going to give to you are from Dr. William Gibson's history of the 1859 revival, published, it's called The Year of Grace.

And he indicates the impact and effect that the revival had on public morals. And I'm quoting now, he says, The number of prisoners for trial in the quarter sessions for County Antrim in October 1859, six months after the commencement of the revival, was exactly one half of that the previous year.

At the Ballymena quarter sessions held in April 1860, after the revival had been in existence for over a year in that locality, there was not one single criminal case on the records. That's staggering.

Indeed, a Coleraine magistrate declared, again, I quote, When I look into the calendar for the last three months, I find but one new case which is, in some respects, very unimportant. I am greatly struck at the appearance of this.

So small is the number of cases. I formerly had calendars filled with charges for different nefarious practices, pocket picking and larcenies of various sorts. How is such a gratifying state of things accounted for?

Now listen to what he says. It must be from the improved state of morality of the people. I believe I am fully warranted now to say that to nothing else than the moral and religious movement which commenced early last summer can the changes be attributed.

Revival. A prominent Roman Catholic magistrate in County Down affirmed that the wholesome moral results produced throughout the community was due to the religious movement and expressed his wish, these are his words, that it would extend over the whole country and influence society to its lowest depths.

That is what revival does. As I could say, O that thou wouldst reign the heavens and come down, that the mountains might flow at thy presence. And he's picturing almost that the heavens are severed and riven and it's as if God steps out of heaven and puts his divine footprint on earth.

Robert Murray McShane reported of Dundee in 1839 that the revival spread a sweet influence over the place. Another could say when revival hit a vicinity that God was everywhere. My friends, I ask you this evening, is that not what we need?

Is that not what you desire and you long for? Now we must thank God tonight for the 1859 revival but can I say to you sincerely from the depths of my heart that a new revival in our province would be different, marked different from the 1859 revival.

And sometimes I fear that when we reminisce, whether it's 1859 or 1920s that I mentioned with Nicholson or in more recent years when we've known times of blessing, it is a mistake to expect God to repeat himself.

Indeed, I think it's wrong to want God to repeat himself. God is not going to reverse time and put us into the past to revive us. He doesn't have to do that. And it may well be that God as he is wont to do will do a new thing for a new generation.

I wonder if you considered that. You need to. And here's the reason why, and I need to as well, because revival often upsets some in the church because it's new. In fact, I don't think there's ever been a revival in biblical history nor church history that has not been opposed and often it is opposed by those who feel they're most biblically literate.

We need to be sure that we do not fight against God, whatever God is doing at present or whatever God will do. But one thing's certain, and I hope you agree with me, we need God to do something, do we not?

But if we want him to do something, we also have to face the fact that there's something for us to do. Judgment must begin at the house of God, and therefore we are responsible to look into ourselves.

Now, of course, there's an element of God's sovereignty in giving revival and breathing the breath of his Spirit upon us, but I am a firm believer that we are meant to set our seals and wait for the breath of his Spirit.

And it is personal revival, individually, that any of us can have at any time at the foot of the cross that will affect corporate revival ultimately in the future. Now, please don't misunderstand what I'm saying.

I'm not saying this evening that the conditions of this world are the church's fault. That clearly cannot be the case. Because you look at Scripture, the church went through dastardly, diabolical persecutions in their freshest age in the acts of the apostles.

It wasn't the church's fault that the Roman emperors were so pagan and godless and hated Christianity so much. And equally, I'm not saying tonight that the problems we have known and our troubles in Ireland and Northern Ireland are the church's fault.

But what I am saying, as I've said from my very introduction, is we need to waken up to the fact as a church that we do have an influence. We should have an influence for good and for God. So I'm asking, what influence have we had in the past?

But let's leave it there, whatever conclusions we come to. But what influence do we have now? And I want to suggest to you that the events of the past weekend, and I do hope that you always look at things through spiritual glasses, is a wake-up call to the church.

Some politicians have said, we are staring into the abyss, we're on a knife edge. This is a watershed in Irish politics, etc., etc., and that could be blown out of proportion, and I don't want to do that tonight.

But what I am saying, are you concerned, believer? Do you have a prophet's heart? You know the prophet? He had a heart pulled in two directions. One was toward God, the other was toward the people. And that's why he was so often in a dilemma.

And what I want to bring to you this evening is a call to arms. Spiritual arms. You see, the Word of God says that we are soldiers. Spiritual soldiers. Turn with me, please, to 1 Timothy 1, verse 18. 1 Timothy 1, 18.

This charge I commit to you, son Timothy, according to the prophecies which went before on you, that you by them might war a good warfare. A spiritual soldier. In chapter 6 of the same book, verse 12, Timothy is exhorted by Paul, Fight the good fight of faith.

Lay hold on eternal life, whereto you are also called, and have professed a good profession before many witnesses. We are meant to be spiritual soldiers. Now, yes, we are not fighting for victory, as is so often said, and rightly so.

We are fighting from the victory and in the victory. But we are fighting nonetheless. Does that reflect our experience as Christians? Are you in a fight? Spiritual fight, now. We are meant to be spiritual soldiers.

We are in, the New Testament says, a spiritual battle. Turn with me to Ephesians 6, please, and verse 12. Ephesians 6, 12. For we wrestle not against flesh and blood. This is not a physical battle, a national battle.

It's not a political, nor a cultural, nor religious battle, but against principalities, against powers, against rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places. We are wrestling, or at least meant to be, with the demonic, diabolical forces that are behind the scenes of all that we see on the political and historical stage.

We are meant to be engaged in a spiritual battle, and as Peter said, therefore we are to be sober, be vigilant, because our adversary the devil is a roaring lion, walks about seeking whom he may devour.

Believer, are you a spiritual soldier in a spiritual battle? Come with me again. We are to use spiritual weapons. 2 Corinthians 10. 2 Corinthians 10, verse 4. Paul says, in parenthesis, For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, they are not fleshly, they are not physical— that's what that means— but mighty through God to the pulling down of strongholds.

Spiritual weapons are the weapons that we are to wield as spiritual soldiers in spiritual battles. Now, I know what I'm about to say is controversial, but I have to say it. Our Lord Jesus Christ did not engage in politics.

Now, I know he spoke to political issues, and we ought to as well from a biblical standpoint, but he did clearly reiterate, My kingdom is not of this world. If my kingdom were of this world, then would my servants fight that I should not be delivered to the Jews, but now is my kingdom not from here.

The disciples did not engage in politics. That's interesting, isn't it? Did they miss a trick? There was a political scene in their day. Paul the Apostle didn't use politics either. He said his citizenship was a heavenly citizenship.

Peter himself also said that he was a pilgrim and a stranger in this earth. None of the apostles nor the disciples put their tent pegs too deep in this earth. Now, of course, I know the New Testament teaches that we are responsible to obey the government, and we have a right to use the judicial processes as Paul the Apostle even did himself, but the Bible does not say that the answer to this society's problems is in becoming part of the system and fighting the same way as everyone else fights.

No, no, no. We are not to own this system that the Bible calls the world, which John says lies in the lap of the wicked one. And so politics, whilst it may have measured success for a period, and democracy might be the best of a bad bunch as far as human beings are concerned, politics will always only be a band-aid covering a cancer.

For politics does not get to the core of the problem. The only thing that can get to the core of man's problems anywhere is the gospel of Jesus Christ, because it is the power of God unto salvation, to the Jew and to the Greek.

So the weapons of our warfare are not political, but they are spiritual, and we are exhorted by our Lord to seek first the kingdom of God. Spiritual soldiers in a spiritual battle with spiritual weapons.

But come with me to Ephesians 6, please, because God has given to us a spiritual armor. Now, I'm not going to read this whole passage, but verse 10 is very important. Finally, my brethren, be strong in the Lord and in the power of his might.

Our strength comes from the Lord. This armory comes from the Lord. There's that verse 12 that we read, what we wrestle against. And verse 11, we are exhorted to put on the whole armor of God that we may be able to stand against the wise.

That word means schemes or trickery of the evil one. Now, from these pieces of armor, we can glean quite important information. You see that we're exhorted in verse 17 to put on a helmet of salvation.

Now, right away, what God's Word is telling us, that the battle we are engaged in is a battle for the mind. That is the field on which the devil wants to gain a victory, and if he can gain a victory in our minds, he will get the whole man.

So we're to put on what we are in Christ, on our heads, the helmet of salvation. We're also told to put on a breastplate of righteousness, verse 14. If the helmet is to protect in the battle for the mind, the breastplate is the battle for the heart to keep the fiery darts away from the internal organs, the seat of man's affection.

We so often can be mentally attacked by the devil and emotionally. It often starts in the mind and then travels down to the emotions, and it's not long before it actually manifests itself then in the will.

In fact, it's what we do, what we say. A helmet for the mind, a breastplate for the heart, and then there is a belt of truth. A belt of truth around the waist, verse 14. Girt about the waist. Now, that belt is holding everything together, and it is truth.

It is girting the whole man and the whole armor. And there's not only a battle for the mind, a battle for the emotions today, there is a battle for the truth, the truth that will possess men and women.

But also we see that the Christian soldier is exhorted in verse 15 to put on his feet gospel shoes of peace, prepared to preach the gospel and take the good news wherever God sends. So there's a battle for men's minds, for men's hearts, for the truth that will bind men, and there is a battle for the souls of men and women.

Are you in that battle, believer? That is what the battle is for. But the other items of armor give us an indication as to how the battle is fought. It is fought by faith. We are told above all, verse 16, to take the shield of faith.

Now, that could mean covering all the rest of the armor, but it seems to be also an indication of the importance. We must have faith in God. Without faith, it is impossible to please God. And we cited at the beginning of our meditation the fact that sometimes we don't believe that God can do this again.

It is the shield of faith that will quench all the fiery darts of the evil one. Have faith in God. It's not only a battle fought by faith, but it's a battle fought by the Bible. For we are to take the sword of the Spirit, which is the Word of God.

You can see it there, verse 17. Now, please notice that in the original Greek rendering here, the word that is used for Word of God is not logos from John 1, verse 1 and following, but it is the Greek word rema, which means the spoken Word of God, the uttered Word of God.

And we are meant to be speaking, proclaiming, testifying God's Word. Now, we're not to do it arrogantly, as often we do. And we shouldn't be doing it angrily, as sometimes it comes across. But nevertheless, have we backed into our corner and shut our mouths, and in the face of moral, liberal, theological, political persecution, we have silenced?

It's a battle that is fought by faith, fought by the Bible, and last but definitely not least, fought by prayer. Verse 18, praying always, with all prayer and supplication in the Spirit, and watching thereto with all perseverance and supplication for all the saints.

Now, please note that this is the seventh piece of armor. Yes, it's a piece of armor. John Bunyan called it all prayer, number seven being the number of completeness and perfection in the Word of God.

And what this is showing us is we could go arrayed in all the panoply of God into the battle, but if we do not have prayer, we are powerless. We're impotent. For prayer is the soldier's communication with HQ.

Prayer is what effectively brings God onto the battlefield. That is why Paul exhorted Timothy. It's 1 Timothy 2, verses 1 and 2. I exhort, therefore, that first of all supplications, prayers, intercessions, and giving of thanks be made for all men, for kings, and for all that are in authority.

Why? That we may lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and honesty. Believer, do these pieces of armor, do they reflect our lives presently? How we live, how we engage, how we exist as soldiers, spiritual soldiers of Christ in a spiritual battle using spiritual weapons with spiritual armory on.

I fear, and I'm speaking to my own heart, that I, as a spiritual soldier, am not fully realizing the power of prayer. Are you? A friend of mine, Trevor Knight, wrote, I suppose it's a poem in a way, but it doesn't rhyme, about prayer.

It goes like this. Abraham prayed and lot was spared. Isaac prayed and Rebekah conceived. Jacob prayed and Esau was pacified. Job prayed and trials were ended. Moses prayed and Amalek was defeated. Joshua prayed and sin was found out.

Samson prayed and strength was regained. Hannah prayed and Samuel was born. David prayed and sin was cleansed. Solomon prayed and wisdom was given. Elijah prayed and the fire descended. He prayed again and showers fell.

Hezekiah prayed and invaders withdrew. Jonah prayed and was given another chance. Daniel prayed and lions were muzzled. Nehemiah prayed and a king listened. Peter prayed and was saved from drowning. A publican prayed and went home justified.

A thief prayed and went to paradise. Paul prayed and sight was restored. Stephen prayed and saw the Lord. Cornelius prayed and was told what to do. John prayed and gained a vision of the future. And my friend continues going through all of church history and it's too long to recite to you tonight about men of God like Whitefield and Wesley and Luther who prayed and he ends the whole poem with these words, there's more things are wrought by prayer than this world dreams of.

Yet people say, well, terrible situation at the moment in my life or in the province. Well, all we can do is pray. No! Everything we can do is pray. Have we given up on prayer? I know you pray. Or as Montgomery, I think it is, puts it, I often say my prayers, but do I ever pray?

Romans 13 and verse 12 says we must dress for battle. You can turn to it if you wish. We turn to it at the beginning. The night is far spent, the day is at hand. Let us therefore cast off the works of darkness and let us put on the armor of light.

We must dress for battle. Put on the Lord Jesus Christ. I believe if you study all the items in the armor of God, you will find out that each of them actually represents the word of God itself. And of course, the word of God is the manifestation of the incarnate word, the Lord Jesus.

We are to put him on by faith. To be a Christian soldier demands entire consecration. 2 Timothy chapter 2, verse 4. 2 Timothy 2 and verse 4. No man that wars entangles himself with the affairs of this life that he may please him who has chosen him to be a soldier.

Now, you know what happens. In times of prosperity, apparent peace, it's easy for the soldier to let his guard down, to go off the offensive, to even retract on the defensive. I'm talking of a spiritual battle now.

Peace, peace, when there is no peace, there will never be peace for us down here on earth in the spiritual realm. Our rest is not yet. We have not reached our heavenly home. We can see it time without number.

An illustration for us in the Old Testament that when Israel prospered, you know what happened, don't you? They forgot God. You only need to go to the period of the judges when there was no king in Israel.

Every man did that which was right in his own eyes. And we see this cycle of the judges' period. The people were in their ease. Wealth and economy was good. The crops were bumper. And they forgot God.

And God sent a chastisement upon them. And then they cried out to God. And God sent a deliverer. And they delivered them. And then there was an apparent repentance. And then they went back to their sin when things got good again.

Ruth is a great illustration of that, the book. During that judges' period, a little family, Abimelech, his wife Naomi, and their two sons, Mahlon and Chilion, and they go to Moab. And they disobey God.

What do you mean? They were told. We read it at the beginning of our meeting, 2 Chronicles 7, 14. If there's a famine on the land, it's a sign of my displeasure, my chastisement. And if my people, which are called by my name, humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then will I heal their land.

He didn't tell them to go and find another land. He told them to fall at his feet and to cry out, Lord, what's wrong? What's happening? They were told to stay where they were and ask, Lord, what are you saying?

Do you do that? Lord, what are you saying? Lord, what are you doing? You see, this was a wake-up call. Are you living as a soldier? Or are you AWOL, absent without leave? Well, there are plenty of wounded soldiers.

They need a whole different ministry altogether, but it's there for them. I haven't got time to go into this, but there's wonderful promises of ultimate triumph over the wicked forces of darkness. Luke 10 and verse 19, Behold, I give you power to tread on serpents and scorpions and over all the power of the enemy, and nothing by any means shall hurt you.

There are promises over the severest afflictions. Who shall separate us from the love of God and Christ? Shall tribulation or distress or persecution or famine or nakedness or peril or sword? Nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him that love does.

There is the assurance of victory over worldly attractions. For whosoever is born of God overcomes the world, and this is the victory that overcomes the world, even our faith. And there is ultimate victory promised over the satanic powers.

They overcame him, Satan, by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony. The victory is secured. It's promised. How have you received the call to arms? Recently, I think the whole world has been reminded of Martin Luther King, Jr., at the inauguration of President Obama.

And, of course, he was charged as being an extremist in the Civil Rights Movement. And irrespective of what you think about him or what his beliefs were or some of his actions, he said an awful lot of very true statements.

And when accused of being an extremist, this was his reply. Was not Jesus an extremist for love? Love your enemies. Bless them that curse you. Do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you and persecute you.

Was not Amos an extremist for justice? Let justice roll down like waters and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream. Was not Paul an extremist for the Christian gospel? I bear in my body the marks of the Lord Jesus.

Was not Martin Luther an extremist? Here I stand. I can do no other. So help me God. And John Bunyan? I will stay in jail to the end of my days before I make a butchery of my conscience. And Abraham Lincoln?

Thus, this nation cannot survive half-slave and half-free. Listen to what he says. The question is not whether we will be extremists, but what kind of extremists we will be. Will we be extremists for hate or for love?

Then he delivered a powerful call to the church, which rings as true today as it did 40 years ago. And he said there was a time when the church was very powerful, and a time when the early Christians rejoiced at being deemed worthy to suffer for what they believed.

In those days, the church was, listen carefully, not merely a thermometer that recorded the ideas and principles of popular opinion. It was a thermostat that transformed the mores of society. Let me repeat that.

The church was not merely a thermometer that recorded the ideas and principles of popular opinion. It was a thermostat that transformed the mores of society. But the judgment of God is upon the church, he said, of his day as never before.

If today's church does not recapture the sacrificial spirit of the early church, it will lose its authenticity, forfeit the loyalty of millions, and be dismissed as an irrelevant social club with no meaning for the 20th century.

And on the 28th of August, 1963, King stood before the Lincoln Memorial and gave his most memorable speech. You know it. He said, I have a dream that one day the Red Hills of Georgia, the sons of former slaves and sons of former slave owners, will be able to sit down together at the table of brotherhood.

I have a dream that my four children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character. Now listen, whether you agree with his politics or religious convictions, he had a great dream, did he not?

And whether we agree with the ecumenical movement, and clearly we do not, their dream is sincere. They desire to unite a divided humanity. But the greatest tragedy of all is they don't know how to do it!

The greater tragedy is we do! But are we doing it? Go home and read Ephesians chapter 2 to see what God's dream is. Paul says it is one new man. A new people of God, free from enmity, united in Christ.

And listen, that is the only answer for Ulster. It is the only answer for Ireland. It is the only answer for the world. But we all need to ask of ourselves, am I a soldier of the cross, a follower of the Lamb?

And shall I fear to own His cause or blush to speak His name? Must I be carried to the sky in flowery beds of ease while others fought to win the prize and sail through bloody seas? This is God's message.

A call to spiritual arms, to spiritual soldiers in a spiritual battle, with spiritual weapons, wearing spiritual armory, with assured victory and triumph in Christ, and with the only answer that this world needs and can get in the gospel of Jesus Christ.

Let us pray. Father, what can we say? We receive with our ears what You have said, but oh, that all of us might embrace it with our hearts, whatever that means to us, each of us. Lord, help us not to ape the world, socially, politically, even religiously, but help us to follow Your agenda.

We remember the words of the Lord Jesus that He watched what the Father was doing, and He did it. Lord, help us to see what You're doing, and help us to do Your will, not lean on our own understanding, but oh, God, we cry for a mighty revival here in our province.

Oh, God, that people would be united in Christ, not under the banner of denominations and religious systems, but under the name of Christ Jesus and Him crucified. Oh, Father, this is what we need. Some think it's romantic.