Sự Phục Hưng Thật Sự: Bản Chất Nguyên Thủy Của Cơ Đốc Giáo và Cách Tiếp Nhận Nó

In the middle of the eighteenth century in France and Britain there were tremendous social inequities. It was the early days of the Industrial Revolution. The inequities between rich and poor was a powder keg. In France it went off, and there was the bloody revolution that we know a lot about. In Britain something else happened. Historians now pretty much concede that what happened instead of a bloody revolution was something that’s called the Great Awakening.

The Great Awakening. It really lasted a number of decades, and for the first few decades some of the leaders of this Great Awakening you may have heard of, John Wesley and his brother Charles, and the Methodist movement … In the first few decades of the Great Awakening, masses (nobody is sure how much), a fifth to a sixth of the entire population of the British Isles, found themselves converted and swept up into the churches.

After that, the next few decades saw a tremendous amount of social healing, and here’s why. The rich received a new force and a new set of thinking, a new power and a new truth that they never had before that moved them toward being just and generous with their resources. The poor also received a power and a truth, a force and a way of thinking, that moved them toward self-discipline that they didn’t have before.

As a result, in the wake of the evangelical awakening, in the wake of the Great Awakening, in the wake of this mighty sweep of power, there was a tremendous amount of social healing. As many of you know, the converts of the Great Awakening abolished the slave trade in the British Empire. As a result, the relationship between labor and capital improved. There was a reform of the child labor laws. There was a huge increase in literacy. Why? Because the rich and the poor were changed.

It’s because of that and because historians look at that that there are more and more calls today (and you can see them if you look carefully at the highest levels of scholarship) saying Western society and its breakdown can only really be saved through another Great Awakening. Well, what would such a thing look like? How would you know it? What would its impact be? The answer is there is only one place where we really can go to know and answer questions.

It’s an indisputable fact that there was one of these awakenings, there was a massive awakening that completely and utterly remade one of the greatest civilizations in the history of the world. It is an indisputable fact that about 2,000 years ago there was a tiny group of peasants and slaves who believed that Jesus Christ was the pre-existent Son of God, come to earth, became flesh, died and rose again from the dead. That little group, when it began, had no political power, no educational power, no cultural power, no economic power, and yet within two centuries it had swept up millions of people in the Roman Empire. It swept up millions of people into a joy and peace they’d never known.

It became the leading force in a Roman society that was falling apart, so that by the third century the emperor had to acknowledge that this was a Christian society, because it was the Christians and the Christians alone who were keeping that world together. Now there is only one historical document that we have written by an eyewitness of the early days of that awakening. Almost no one doubts, of all the historic critics … There are an awful lot of people that snipe about how much we can believe in the Bible. Virtually nobody doubts that the one who wrote this one document was actually there, was an eyewitness. It’s Dr. Luke, who wrote the book of Acts.

In there we see what an awakening would be like, what it would do, how it would come, how it could be sought, what its consequences would be. This fall we’re going to be looking at chapters 1 through 9, the early chapters, of the book of Acts. Now, what is a revival then? What is an awakening? What’s a revival? Whenever you use the word revival there is always two parts to it. If you have an architectural revival … Remember the Greek revival architecture we talk about?

Whenever a play is revived on Broadway there are always two things that happen. First somebody revisits the original genius. Someone revisits the original genius and the essence of some ancient thing. Then after revisiting, it’s reapplied and brought. In other words, a revival is something ancient received now, something ancient received now.

This very first chapter shows us what an awakening would be. It would be something ancient. It would be going back to the ancient genius and the ancient essence of Christianity and then receiving it now. I’d just like to look for the rest of the time we have here at what this particular chapter tells us. What is that original essence of Christianity? What is the essence of original Christianity and how can it be received now? Just two questions.

1. What was the original essence and genius of this Christianity?

What was Christianity all about? This text tells us. Give me a 60 second detour here. The average person today will say, “Ah, everybody knows what Christianity is about.” Yeah, maybe this isn’t a very religious society anymore, but the average person, most of you certainly have had some kind of religious background, most of you Christian. Sure, this is America. Most of you have had some kind of church background. Most of you had some Sunday school here or there.

The average person says, “I know what Christianity is about. We don’t have to go back and revisit. I understand. Christianity is God loves us, Jesus died to forgive us, so now God can forgive us if we ask for forgiveness, and now we’re supposed to be forgiving to others. We’re supposed to live lives of love. What’s the big deal? Everybody knows what Christianity is about.”

Listen to me. How could that be? What do you think of Christianity, the Christianity that you have seen over the years? Let me ask you something. Have you ever seen Christianity doing what it did to the Roman Empire, what it did to eighteenth-century Britain? Have you ever seen it sweeping up millions of people into a peace and joy they have never known? Have you ever seen it transforming society? Have you ever seen it running through the community? What do you see when you see Christianity today?

A lot of you are going to say, “At worst, I see a narrow, guilt-producing institution. At best I see a kind of comforting thing that you can use when you’re in trouble.” All right. That’s what you see, right? That can’t be the original Christianity. Don’t you see? Why would the Christianity that you see now and the Christianity that did these things, we know, indisputably, historically … Why would they be so different? It’s pretty simple. It means the average person today misunderstands Christianity.

The average person in New York misunderstands Christianity radically, because whenever the essence of Christianity has been understood on a widespread scale it has become a dynamic force. The only reason it’s not a dynamic force now in this country the way it was in other times is because people don’t understand it. So, what is that essential genius? Well, it’s here and I believe, in a sense, you can see it all in verses 1, 2, and 3.

It says, “In my former book, Theophilus, …” Because Luke wrote a gospel about the life of Jesus. “… I wrote about all that Jesus began to do and teach, until the day he was taken up to heaven … After his suffering, he showed himself to these men and gave many convincing proofs that he was alive. He appeared to them over a period of forty days and spoke about the kingdom of God.”

Now look, “I wrote to you all that Jesus began to do and teach.” There it is. First of all, the essence of Christianity is about something Jesus has already begun to do, something Jesus has already done, he’s completed, something that happened in Luke’s first book. The reason that’s so important is Christianity is about what Jesus has done, not about what you have done.

It is very common for the average person to say, “Well, I think Christianity is good for a lot of people. I think Christianity is a wonderful model of forgiveness and love … the cross, dying. It’s wonderful. But,” they say, “I believe that all good people, no matter who they are, can reach God whether you believe in Jesus or not. I think Jesus is good for many people and is a wonderful story, but all good people can come to God.”

That’s the normal way that most people and most churches in this country believe. That’s what most people think Christianity is all about. That’s the reason Christianity is dead to such a great degree in so many of these churches and institutions. Luke says, “Christianity is not about being good. It is not at first about anything you do at all. It’s about what he’s done. It’s all about what he’s done.” And, what has he done?

First of all, it says, “He suffered.” See that? He suffered. Eight little letters. This is a notion in a thimble. Eight little letters on the page, but you could get lost in them. Why did he suffer? Recently I had a chance to talk to some people about the sacrifices in the Old Testament. The Old Testament is filled with a lot of stuff about how to live. It’s filled with a lot of things about how to be a good person, but it’s also filled with a tremendous amount of blood and guts. You can never go into the temple to see God without something bloody in your hands. You’re always having to sacrifice things.

There is the question. Why? What’s wonderful is Judaism and Christianity are in complete agreement on one thing. Judaism and Christianity, total agreement on one thing. It’s not enough just to be a good person because we do things that are wrong, and the wrong doings leave a residue, a barrier between us and God. For example, the average person says, “Well, all good people, if you try your best and you ask forgiveness when things go wrong … God will receive all good people no matter who.”

Here’s the question that comes up. Could you do that in a court of law? If a judge found a man guilty, let’s say, and the man said, “I’m guilty, but I’m going to try to do better and I’m very sorry for what I’ve done.” Here’s what the judge says, “Great, but there is a residue. There is something leftover. You’re not free. You mean well. You’ve said you’re sorry. You’ve asked for forgiveness. You’re going to do a better job. That’s right, but you know what? I can’t just let you go free. There is something leftover that has to be paid for. There is a barrier. We can’t run a society if you do something and say, ‘I’m sorry. I’ll try to do better,’ and there is no payment. There has to be payment.”

If you can’t run a society that way, how in the world can you run a universe that way? If we would impeach a judge who would say, “Fine, you’re sorry. You never have to pay. There is no payment. There is no residue. There is no payment for the wrong.” You’d fire a judge like that. How in the world do you expect to have a God like that? Why would you have lower standards for a God then you do for a civil magistrate? God says, “Look at your inhumanity to your neighbor and your unfaithfulness to your Creator.”

Maybe you are sorry for it. Maybe you’re trying to do better, but there is a residue. There is punishment. It’s has to be paid for. “… the wages of sin is death …” In this little word, “He suffered,” we’re told what Jesus has done. The Bible uses a lot of metaphors, but this is one of the ways it paints the picture.

He stood before death and destruction. Apolluon. Tartaros. Justice. It has a right for us. Death and destruction. It has a right to take us. The nameless terror. But Jesus stands between us and it, and he says, “I won’t let you have my brothers and sisters.” So all the malice of that death and destruction comes down on him, and as a result, he pays. The barrier is gone. It’s what he’s done. He suffered.

Secondly, we’re told he showed that he was alive. Isn’t it interesting how it says he proved to them he was alive. “After his suffering, he showed himself to these men and gave many convincing proofs that he was alive.” There is a tremendous kind of chauvinism of modern people toward ancient people. There is a tendency for people to say, “Oh yeah, of course they believe Jesus was raised from the dead. Of course they believed in miracles. Primitive people believed in those things.”

Look what it says. He showed up. The disciples did not say, “We knew it.” They say, “This can’t be. This is hallucination. This is a hoax. This can’t be.” If you know a little bit about history, you will know that the believing Jews of that time were much less likely to believe in the miracle of the resurrection than anybody here.

The Jews of that time believed in a transcendent God who could never become human. The Jews of that time also … By the way, many of them didn’t believe in the resurrection at all. But the ones who did believe in the resurrection believed in the general resurrection of all people at the end of time. Nobody in the Jewish religion then believed that an individual could be resurrected.

When Jesus showed up to say, “I’m resurrected.” He had a far harder audience than I have today, right now. He had to convince them, but he did. Why? Why was it so important to convince them? A lot of people say, “We have his teaching. Why did he have to convince them that he was raised from the dead?” Do you see, though? If you’re saved by Jesus’ teaching, by being a good person, then you’ve saved yourself. It’s what you have done, but the essence of Christianity is what he’s done.

Jesus comes and he shows himself to have been the one who suffered and the one who rises from the dead. As a result, he has accomplished your salvation for you. It’s what he began to do, but notice the word began. The other part of the essence of Christianity is this. It’s what Jesus began to do and teach. What a wonderful word. Luke is telling us something. The founder of every other major religion has already done all the things he’ll ever do. He has already taught all the things he’ll ever teach. But Jesus has just begun. Jesus is not finished.

Part of the essence of that original genius of Christianity was that Jesus has not just died and risen, he’s ascended. He’s been taken up. He’s sitting at the right hand of the Father. Now what does that mean? Jesus goes up not to get away from us. What’s beautiful about this text is it shows us that Jesus goes up to continue. He’s only begun. In other words, why did Jesus go up?

In John 16, he says, “I have to go up so I can send the Holy Spirit to you.” He says in the book of Matthew, “You will do greater deeds than I.” Do you know what this is talking about? The ascension does not mean that Jesus is no longer here. The ascension means Jesus is here all over. The ascension does not mean that Jesus Christ is no longer present.

When he was on earth he could only do his works, he could only do and teach, through one human body, and now he can do it through millions of human bodies. When he was on earth, he rebuilt souls and bodies, but he could only do it where his body was. He goes to heaven, not to get away. The ascension of Christ means that now he is present in us. He is present through us. His power radiates from the throne out into the whole world through us. The essence of Christianity is that he faced the nameless terror for us and now he works from heaven through us.

Christian friends, when you come to church what do you expect? Let me confess a sin. If I write a sermon and I show up and in my heart, basically this is my attitude. I’m saying, “Well, another week. I hope I don’t forget my lines. I’m going to say the things I’ve written and some people will like it and some people won’t. I hope there are a few more people here this week. I hope things go well. I hope everything goes smoothly.”

If I have that attitude I have forgotten the ascension. If you have that attitude you have, too. When you open the Bible to read it, when you sit down to pray, when you come to worship, when you open your mouth to talk to somebody else about Jesus Christ, when you open your heart to feed and help somebody in Jesus’ name what do you expect? If Jesus is ascended, you shouldn’t expect a little inspiration. You should expect revolution. You should expect transformation. You should expect to change the world. You should expect him, to meet him.

Every time you come to worship, if Jesus is ascended, not just suffered and died and risen somewhere, but ascended, he’s up there to continue what he started. It’s what he began to do and teach. Now see what Luke is saying? I’m now about to tell you what he continues to do and teach. That’s the essence of Christianity. He faced the nameless terror for you. He works his power out from heaven through you.

If you understand that, Christians (I’m talking to my Christian brothers and sisters now), give up your small ambitions. Repent for your low expectations. Stop looking at your problems like they’re things that will always … Stop looking at your bad habits like things you could never, ever, ever expect to get over. How dare you. Stop looking at the problems of New York as mountains that could never be moved. How dare we.

2. How can the original essence Christianity be received?

Okay, now then we have to ask ourselves, “How does this come to us now?” That was the original genius. “Oh, see?” People say, “Well, I think Christianity means living a good life. It’s not what you do; it’s what’s been done for you. I think Christianity is trying your best and asking forgiveness.” That wouldn’t be enough. Christianity is to see because of what Jesus Christ has done, God welcomes us, God embraces us, and God pours into our life with his own power and glory.

Now how can we receive that now? How can that become a living reality now? It’s just two principles that you see here. The first principle I’ll do very briefly, but you can’t get by it. I’ll show you why I’m doing it briefly because the second hour we’re together here, after the worship service, we have ample opportunity for those of you who take this principle seriously to follow out.

You cannot receive the awakening power of Jesus Christ unless you believe that the facts of Christianity are objectively true. You have to believe that Christianity is objectively true for everyone. Look at verse eight. What does Jesus Christ say? “You will receive power from the Holy Spirit and you will be my witnesses.” To whom? To all the people who Christianity will help? I mean, some people will be helped, some people won’t. You need to go out there and kind of lay it out and see who’s helped.

No. He says, “I want you to be my witnesses in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria and to the uttermost parts of the earth. This is true,” Jesus says, “for everyone.” The average person, I’m finding in New York, who is kind of spiritually searching, when they come and they say, “I’d like to find out whether Christianity is true for me. I would like to find out if it works for me.” Now friends, let me be pragmatic for a second before I’m principial.

How in the world can you be sure that Christianity will work for you? What does that mean? Always be happy? Don’t you know if you decide that you’re going to be a musician that there are many places in which being a musician is extremely impractical, extremely unfulfilling? And yet, if you work on through, very often, if you do your discipline eventually it becomes enormously fulfilling and so on? How will you know when it works for you?

Being a Christian will not work for you if you find out that in order to be true to Christ and tell the truth you lose your job. Is Christianity working for you that day? Dear friends, don’t figure that out. Don’t try to figure out whether Christianity works. That’s not what Jesus says. Figure out if Christianity is true.

If Jesus really is the Son of God who existed before and came to earth, if he’s really ascended, and if he’s going to come back, as it says right there (the little angels came up and said you know, “He’s coming back”), if he’s coming back to judge the world, if what Jesus said about himself and about the nature of the universe, is true, of course Christianity would work, because to serve him will to be to find your Designer and your design and you will be utterly fulfilled in the end.

But, what if Christianity isn’t true? What if Jesus’ claims aren’t right? What if right now his bones are rotting in some grave somewhere? What if the disciples were wrong, deluded or liars? Then Christianity can’t work except in a short run as a placebo. Don’t even try to figure out if Christianity is relevant for you. You won’t know. You can’t tell.

Almost for sure, it’s never relevant on Friday, for example. It’s certainly doesn’t work on Saturday night, almost never. Figure out if it’s true. Was Jesus the Son of God? Did he really rise from the dead historically, in time, in space? Is it true? If it’s true, of course it will work for you. If it’s not true, it won’t work for you. But the one thing it couldn’t possibly be is it just works for some people. Don’t you see?

It’s either useful for everyone or it’s useless to everyone, but it can’t be useful for some people. The nature of the claims, they make it impossible. Well, how do you figure that out? You have to think. I love the place in Matthew 9 where Jesus is talking to the Pharisees. I’m going to be talking about this later, tonight actually, or next week (I forget when it is). In Matthew 9, Jesus says to the Pharisees, “… go and learn what this means: ‘I desire mercy not sacrifice.’ ”

“… go and learn what this means …” I’m not trying to preach on that text right now, but do you know what I love about it? Jesus doesn’t say, “Here’s what to do.” He says, “Think about that. Go and learn.” He says, “If you can’t figure it out then go think.” Ah, Christianity. Jesus Christ says, “Think about it until you figure it out.” Now if you say, “Oh, I can’t believe all these things. I’m a modern person. I don’t believe in miracles and so on.” Go and think.

We have classes afterwards. I’ll mention them right as we conclude. We have a class called Discovering Christianity that Jeff White teaches. Today it will be talking about why we believe in God, and that sort of thing. Every week it talks about how you know that Jesus is the Son of God. How you know the Bible is true. Go and think.

Lastly, the way we receive this now is not just by seeing that Christianity is objectively true for everyone, but that it’s personally true for you. Jesus Christ says, “You will be my witnesses.” That’s truth. You know about the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. See, they knew that. They were witnesses. They had the truth. They knew he’d suffered. They knew he died. They understood that.

But Jesus says in verse 8 that’s not enough. You need power. Now here’s the pragmatic secret I try to put into every single sermon. Here it is. Real Christianity is always an intersection of truth and power, never one without the other. It’s not real Christianity if you just have a general belief. Paul says, “There are people who have a form of godliness but they deny the power thereof.”

It’s possible to have a kind of subscription to general Christian belief and no power. Well, how do you get power? Do you just go pray for it? Oh, it looks like that, doesn’t it? In verse 14, the last verse of the text, it looks like they had truth and they went and they prayed and said, “Oh, Lord send us power.”

If you actually read the prayers in the book of Acts, if you actually read the prayers all through the Bible, you’ll see nobody ever prays for power. Never. Paul says, in Romans 1:17, “For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ: for it is the power of God unto salvation …” The Bible says the truth that we’ve been talking about of Jesus’ suffering and death and resurrection and ascension, the truth about Jesus Christ does not bring power, it does not result in power, it does not lead to power, it does not have power. It is the power.

If you don’t have power in your life you don’t have the truth. You haven’t grasped it. You don’t get it. Paul doesn’t say, “Well, you have the truth. Now pray for power.” If you read the prayers of the Bible, you’ll see they’re always praying the truth in it until it explodes. Daniel Rowland was one of the greatest preachers in the history of the world. You’ve never heard of him because he was Welsh and he preached in Welsh, and as a result almost none of his stuff has come down to us.

In 1735, he was a curate in an Episcopal church in a little town in Cardiganshire in Wales. His ministry was dead. He thought Christianity was being a moral person. Nobody really enjoyed any of his sermons. Everything was pretty crummy in his parish. He went to hear a man preach named Griffith Jones. Griffith Jones said the determining factor in your relationship with God is not your past but Christ’s past. You can be made right and holy and blameless in God’s sight by grace alone through faith alone because of Christ alone.

Daniel Rowland thought about that for a month. He was at a Communion service, and suddenly he realized his righteousness could not save him. He realized what Christ had done for him, and the truth became a power. Now what does it mean when the truth becomes a power? I’m telling you that if you believe that you have the truth and you understand Christianity but there is no power in your life, you don’t understand it.

“Well,” you say, “what do you mean by power?” You can take a look. I could give you hundreds of examples, but what happened to Daniel Rowland? First of all, there was a revolution in his identity. That always happens when the truth becomes the power. You say, “I no longer look at myself the way I did before. It changes the way I look at everything about myself. Now I’m a Christian first, and I’m black or white second. I’m a Christian first, and I’m a male or a female second. I’m a Christian first, and I’m British or I’m African second. I’m a Christian first, and I’m rich or poor second.” It utterly changes your attitude toward yourself.

Secondly, all the things that used to control your life and drive you and scare you no longer do. They don’t scare you because they’re not the main thing in your life anymore. They used to drive you. They used to scare you. Now you have a freedom and power. You sense that there is a force that’s come into you and is remaking you and changing your habitual personality.

Now that is what happens to a person who says, “I am not ashamed of the gospel. It is the power of God to salvation.” Have you seen that? Do you have power like that? Has there been a revolution in your life? If you say no, then you can tell me you understand the truth of Christianity, and you don’t. This is also true for Christians who understand it, and yet right now you feel stagnant.

I knew a woman who was married to a missionary, and the missionary was about to go to a very uncomfortable country. She was pretty mad. She went to a Communion service. During the Communion service the gospel became a power to her again. It wasn’t that she wasn’t a Christian, She prayed it in, she thought about it, and it started burn. She said, “I suddenly realized if what Jesus Christ had done for me, if he’s done these things, then he can ask me to live the rest of my life in a cardboard box on the streets of Calcutta, and it would be nothing compared to what he’s done for me and what he’s going to promise to give me. It would be nothing. Why in the world am I worried?”

Now, what happened there? Where did the freedom come from? You know what? The gospel becomes a power. You don’t sit there and say, “Well, I know the truth. Now, O Lord, just give me some kind of power.” That’s an abstraction. That’s a mechanical thing, absolutely not. The truth is the power, and if it’s not the power you don’t have the truth. How is this going to change the world? You say, “How’s this going to change society?”

I was just spending some time this week with a couple of people, some white middle-class families who had moved into a poor inner-city area of one of our northeastern cities and had been living there to try to partner with the poor to rebuild their cities. I remember thinking, “Why are they there?” And I’ll tell you why. If they were only there through altruism and hadn’t had an experience of power, they would never stay there. People don’t stay there because of ideas. There has to be power with the idea.

But on the other hand, if they’d only had this experience of God, but they weren’t theologically oriented, if they hadn’t thought it out … A Christian who has this experience of power starts to say, “If it’s true that Jesus Christ, though he was rich, became poor, so that through his poverty I could become rich.” You think it out and you say, “I should be willing to give away everything. I should be willing to move into an inner-city community.” Nobody does what they have done unless they have truth and power. Not power without truth, not truth without power.

In 1859, there was a major revival in Northern Ireland. There was a whole slew of prostitutes. Most of the prostitutes in the cities of Northern Ireland were converted. Do you know why? A man, a reporter, sat down with one of the prostitutes and said, “Why are all of you girls coming to church?” She said, “Well, sir, there are two problems. First of all, business completely fell off during the revival.” Then she said, “Secondly, for the first time in our lives, people on the street are treating us with kindness and respect.”

You know what was going on there? There are a lot of people today who say what this country needs is a return to traditional values. Look, the irreligious people were giving those girls business, so they were exploiting them. But the religious people were treating them with contempt and spitting on them, and they were exploiting them too.

So you had irreligious people and religious people and they were both exploiting the prostitutes of urban Northern Ireland. Do you think if you had just made the religious people stronger, more religious, more conservative, that would have converted them, that would have taken them out of their bondage? Heck no. Truth without power means more spitting. My dear friends, what changed those women’s lives was not that people became more religious, but they received the gospel.

The irreligious didn’t have God’s law. That’s why they went to them, but the religious didn’t have God’s love. That’s why they felt superior to them. They didn’t see that they were sinners saved by grace. But when they become sinners saved by grace, Christians see the law by God’s love fulfilled and that changes the world. That changes the community. That changes you and me. Truth and power. “You will receive power to become my witnesses to the uttermost parts of the earth.” Let’s pray.