Before we get started talking about church revivals, let’s establish just how common a thing it is in our culture.
If you do a Google search for [church revival], you get 192,000,000 returns. (In case you aren’t familiar with this sort of search, that’s a lot. To put it in perspective, if you search [NFL], you get 330,000,000 returns, and if you search [Iraq war], you get 61,600,000.) Suffice it to say, therefore, that the idea of churches needing some sort of revival is a very common idea in our culture. Indeed, there are over 31,000 web pages with the words “revival” (or “revive”) and “church” in the page name! Meanwhile, Amazon.com shows over 15,000 returns on a book search on the terms: [church revival]. So let’s face it, church revival is a big business.
If it’s that common, what does it tell us about the effectiveness of the average church revival initiative? In other words, if so many churches are being revived so often, why do they so frequently need yet another revival? How long should the effects of a revival last?
Well, here’s yet another related question, that I think runs even deeper: What should the effects of a church revival be?
It would seem that no matter how one chooses to answer this question, hardly anyone has a model of understanding that suggests that a church revival’s effects should be only temporary and fleeting. Indeed, I’ve never heard anybody list “temporary” on the list of goals while planning a revival! So why do the effects seem to be short-lived?
Well, again, that comes back to the question of just what effects were targeted. That is, what are you trying to revive? Is the church in question simply looking for growth in attendance numbers? For a spike in weekly financial contributions? For a surge in enthusiasm among the congregants? What is it, and how do they know when they’ve met a goal?
As a trained choral director, I can tell you about a well-known trick of the trade that is often used by visiting clinicians. If you want a chorus to perk up and sing better, one of the easiest things to do is to change the seating arrangement. Move the altos over there and the tenors over here, or mix up the chorus so that no two people of the same part are standing together. This “change of schema” is famously effective for producing a spike in how the members pay attention to the business of singing. And what’s the downside of it? Well, it simply doesn’t last. The singers grow accustomed to the new circumstances, and once again tend to become somewhat dulled in their approach to making music. As it turns out, the seating arrangement was likely not a problem that needed addressing; instead, it was the way that the members of the chorus were thinking about the details of what they are doing—-or rather, were not thinking! The changing of the seating arrangement, therefore, is just a temporary trick—a poor substitute for affecting long term performance, yet a surefire way to excite the members for a time.
So, is this what most church revivals are? Just a rearranging of the routine, aimed at getting a temporary breath of fresh air? I suppose that in some congregations, this might indeed be the goal—as lightweight and superficial a goal as that may be. For these, it’s an exercise in changing the perception, and not the reality. Meeting for a week or two on a special and enhanced schedule, making a special effort to get new people to attend, pushing to get former members to come back, and so forth—these certainly produce the perception that the congregation is “doing something”, but they don’t really change anything where it really matters: in people’s hearts. Sure, some congregants might undergo paradigm shifts of their own in the course of some revival event, but such shifts don’t seem to be the goal of the typical revival—-and no such shifts are seen to be made on a congregation-wide level.
And that brings us back again to the temporary nature of most revival initiatives.
What If?
What if, however, the goal of a revival effort were to address the hearts of the congregants in a very real and practical way that has implications in daily life? What if the initiative were aimed at that very most fundamental of human activities? Do you know what activity I’m pointing to? Is it prayer? Is it love? Is it evangelism?
No, it’s deeper even than each of these. It’s even deeper than faith. The activity that I’m getting at is our human thinking. There is nothing that’s more “you” than the way you think about things. There is nothing more fundamental about you than this. What goes on in your mind (or your “heart”, to use a scriptural way of talking about the same thing), is the most important thing about who you are.
The Creator knows this about us, and for obvious reasons. And he seems to have always been concerned with how people think, having set the standard fairly high throughout the scriptures. Consider these one-liners plucked from among the 66 books of the Bible (emphasis added):
- Haggai 1:7 Give careful thought to your ways.
- Isaiah 1:18 Come now, and let us reason together, says the Lord.
- Proverbs 23:7 As a man thinks in his heart, so is he.
- 1 Corinthians 11:28 Let a person examine himself.
- 1 Corinthians 11:31 If we judged ourselves truly, we would not be judged.
- 2 Corinthians 13:5 Test yourselves to see if you are in the faith; examine yourselves!
- Proverbs 18:17 The first to plead his case seems right, Until another comes and examines him.
- James 4:8 Purify your hearts, you double-minded.
- 1 Corinthians 14:20 Brothers, do not be children in your thinking. Be infants in evil, but in your thinking be mature.
- Romans 12:3 Do not think of yourself more highly than you ought, but rather think of yourself with sober judgment.
- John 7:24 Do not judge by appearances, but judge with right judgment.”
- James 1:26 If anyone thinks he is religious and does not bridle his tongue but deceives his heart, this person’s religion is worthless.
- Luke 8:15 As for that in the good soil, they are those who, hearing the word, hold it fast in an honest and good heart, and bear fruit with patience.
- Jeremiah 37:9 …do not deceive yourselves…
- 1 Corinthians 3:18 …do not deceive yourselves…
- James 1:22 Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says.
I could go on and on, but these few examples are more than enough to give us a clue as to the importance God puts upon the way humans think. It seems fairly clear from scripture that humans are able to examine themselves and their ways justly, as well as to do it in a corrupt way, deceiving themselves. It is fairly obvious that we have a choice in the matter. Otherwise, what would be the purpose of so many passages that urge people to take the high road in their thinking?
So what if revivals were about this? What if revivals focused on improving the way that believers think, decide, and believe things? Would that turn out any differently from the typical temporary revival effects?
I think it would, but it does get a little bit “radical” for the sensibilities of some. And why do I say that? Well, if you change the way you think, you will also change the way you act—and I don’t know of any church on the planet that doesn’t need some reform in the way it acts. This is especially obvious with the way that churches tend to handle facts and logic. If you look into such things, you see a great deal of intellectual cheating when it comes to the way that they spin the scriptures in order to support their own habits.
Here’s a famous example: It’s fairly common to hear a Sunday morning speaker use 1 Corinthians 16:1-3 as a scriptural “proof” or support for the weekly collection of revenues into the local church treasury:
1 Corinthians 16:1 Now concerning the collection for the saints: as I directed the churches of Galatia, so you also are to do. 2 On the first day of every week, each of you is to put something aside and store it up, as he may prosper, so that there will be no collecting when I come. 3 And when I arrive, I will send those whom you accredit by letter to carry your gift to Jerusalem.
Here we have a humanitarian initiative aimed at easing the strife of the Christians in Jerusalem, who, as we know from other passages, were suffering a famine. Here are the facts:
- This initiative was authorized by an apostle,
- it was temporary,
- no particular percentage of one’s income was designated,
- the members were to save up the money in their own homes,
- and it was to be handed to Paul whenever he would arrive.
This is considerably different from the weekly contribution that today’s churches collect for the local church treasury, and yet this very passage is brazenly used as a “proof” of that the weekly revenue collection for the local corporation was initiated and approved by the apostles.
This is simply dishonest. The fact of the matter is that we do not know from the Bible whether such a thing was ever taught or not; it simply doesn’t say. But that’s not nearly as convenient for churches as they would prefer, so they “solve” the problem by spinning the passage and hoping that not too many people will notice that they’ve done it.
If there were a revival regarding the reformation of how believers think, this particular nasty habit would be eradicated over night. If an honest church wants to justify a weekly collection from the Bible for the support of the local church corporation, it’s going to have to find some other passage than this one. And if it cannot find one that actually supports the practice, then it’s going to need to admit as much and apologize for saying that this practice is “biblical” when in fact, no example of such is found in the Bible. Indeed, for some churches, they’re also probably going to need to admit that their habitual claims that all their practices are right out of the Bible is a false claim. (Some don’t claim this, which itself raises all manner of intriguing questions that lie outside the scope of this particular article.)
There are many examples of similar abuse of the scriptures, and if you pay attention to such things, it doesn’t take long to figure out that this sort of intellectual dishonesty is rampant among today’s churches. You’ve seen it yourself when the Sunday School teacher twists a passage in order to pretend that it supports some pet theory or idea, when actually, no evidence exists that the author had no such thing in view. This is the sort of everyday dishonesty that runs amok in institutions. It’s the sort that boldly assumes that “The Great Commission” was given to all believers for all time, even though the scriptures only show it as having been given to Jesus’ apostles, with no account of them ever passing it on to anyone else. It’s the sort that assumes that “we” are “Christ’s ambassadors”, even though a careful study of the text and context (2 Corinthians 5:20) shows that Paul was speaking of his apostolic team when he penned that, and not of the Corinthian congregation. It’s the sort that insists that the Bible was written “to us”, even though not one document in it is addressed to any person or persons after the First Century. It’s the sort that pretends that Jesus’ prophecy in Matthew 24 wasn’t about things that were supposed to happen in that very generation, even though he explicitly said that it was—or worse, it’s the sort that admits he was talking about that generation, but then pretends that it’s no big deal that it seems (to many) that he got things wrong.
The fact of the matter is that it’s impossible to create a situation like today’s massive division between churches unless a great many believers are being personally dishonest in the way they handle the scriptures. If all believers were intellectual honest, there would be an amazing improvement in the unity with regard to how the Bible is handled. As it is, however–to give some examples–some heed Jesus’ command to his apostles that they should call no man on earth “father”, while others make a brazen habit of calling their priests “father”. Some continue to consider homosexuality a sin, while others pretend that the scriptures don’t condemn it. Some admit that miracles, prophecy, and angelic/demonic activity are not now happening as they were in the First Century, while others insist on pretending that nothing has changed to any degree worth mentioning.
To muddy the waters even further—and here’s where we really get down to it—it’s often the case that a church taking a proper position on one passage of scripture will itself spin the scriptures in some other way. They assure themselves that those other churches have really got it wrong on this or that, yet meanwhile, they harbor their own errors and refuse to correct them. Indeed, I do not know of any church that does not do this. Any why do such dubious practices continue? It’s because the members are OK with it, and fail to discern any problem with it. It’s doubtful that any Christian preacher could long sustain a condemnable message, such as that “Jesus did not really exist”, for no congregation would tolerate that. Yet the congregations do tolerate a great many false and twisted teachings week after week—things they could easily correct from the scriptures if they had that same paradigm about intellectual integrity, honesty, and authenticity that is found throughout the Bible. It is eerie just how much they become like this man:
Matthew 18:11 The Pharisee, standing by himself, prayed thus: ‘God, I thank you that I am not like other men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even like this tax collector.
There’s an interesting quotation in cognitive science, from a psychologist who has studied how people tend to view themselves:
“If you are like most people, then like most people, you don’t know you’re like most people.” [D.T. Gilbert (2006) Stumbling on happiness. New York: Alfred A. Knopf.]
If any particular congregation decided to conduct a revival with a view toward restoring the kind of thinking that is taught in the Bible documents as proper for God’s people, a major reform would be unavoidable, for people who are thinking honestly do not allow themselves to persist in an error. Rather, they correct it.
Why, then, are there so many revivals, and yet so little actual reform? What makes people think it’s worth it to go through the motions, and yet to accomplish so very little for the effort? I can’t help but to think that the answer is somehow related to this insight from Don Marquis (emphasis added):
“If you make people think they’re thinking, they’ll love you; But if you really make them think, they’ll hate you.” ~Don Marquis (1878-1937)
I think that the revivals are generally aimed at making people think they’re thinking—at making them think they’re really doing something of value when they are not. This seems to have been the attitude of many when Jesus showed up in the flesh. They had become hatefully complacent, and it showed when he began to “really make them think”. His message was so radical to his generation that he warned his apostles forthrightly:
John 15:18 “If the world hates you, know that it has hated me before it hated you. 19 If you were of the world, the world would love you as its own; but because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you.
And why did the world hate them? It’s because the message they preached was relentlessly contrary to the common beliefs of the day. The “blind guides” who taught as if they had it all together, were actually wrong about some of the facts and they were going to be corrected in quite an unapologetic fashion—again and again, by the apostles. That correction would be like a litmus test, for it would be instantly seen whether the hearers would heed the correction and submit themselves to the truth, or whether they could attempt to carry on as if nothing had happened. People either belong to one group or the other.
So, why are the churches so content to correct so few of their own errors? Why do they defend a right position on one matter, and then defend a wrong position on another? It’s hard to believe it’s because they belong to the first group—to the ones who submit themselves to the truth whenever they hear it. No, it’s much more consistent with a model in which the churches are as inhospitable to the full truth of the scriptures as was that very generation to which Jesus appeared in the flesh.
Indeed, I’m certain that these very words here will make many a reader quite angry. And this puts them exactly where the Galatians were in respect to this question of complete obedience to the truth:
Galatians 4:16 Have I therefore become your enemy because I tell you the truth?
These Galatians were already believers, yet they ran the risk of becoming hardened against the truth, as had many of Jesus’ followers during his own ministry. The difference between their thinking and that of the faithful apostles, however, was obvious:
John 6:60 When many of his disciples heard it, they said, “This is a hard saying; who can listen to it?” 61 But Jesus, knowing in himself that his disciples were grumbling about this, said to them, “Do you take offense at this? … 67 After this many of his disciples turned back and no longer walked with him. 67 So Jesus said to the Twelve, “Do you want to go away as well?” 68 Simon Peter answered him, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life, 69 and we have believed, and have come to know, that you are the Holy One of God.”
And so it happens that little has changed in this regard today. There are many who will walk away from the actual truth in the scriptures, in deference to some make-believe version of it that suits them much better. In doing so, however, they walk away from Jesus, whether they realize it or not. Who knows? Perhaps they walk away because they’ve got a “revival” to get to.
