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Showing posts with label Repentance. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Repentance. Show all posts

Saturday, August 20, 2011

Review -- Why No Revival


Why No Revival? is a tract available from Chick Publications. Chick Publications designs and publishes tracts that are like mini comic books but they deliver a powerful message. All Chick tracts end with a presentation of the Gospel. Tracts themes cover everything from bikers to gunslingers to convicts to Halloween. There are also tracts written for children and tracts written particularly for African-Americans.
            Why No Revival? answers the question, why have we not had a revival in our land in such a long time. Jack Chick, the author and publisher of Chick tracts wrote in the foreword, “Many pastors are unwilling or unable to say the things that appear in this book.  Many things will make you angry and upset (I hope so), but I pray it will lead to repentance and to revival.” The tract then proceeds to illustrate why there is no revival. It depicts church members praying for new TVs instead of God’s presence. It depicts self-righteous attitudes. It depicts the selfishness of “Christians”. There are a host of other humorously depicted reasons, though the reasons themselves are not humorous. One thing the tract does succeed in illustrating, though, is that we have our priorities mixed up. In that way, we are like the world. Entertainers who add little to our society make millions while those who do contribute positively eke out a living. In the same vein, Christians care more about the newspaper and the TV Guide than they do the Bible. They spend more time in choir rehearsal than they do in prayer meeting. Want real revival, then I recommend every born again Christian read this tract.
Chick tracts are simple and easy to read, reminding us that the Gospel is not complicated. At the end of the tract is a prayer the reader can say to receive Christ as Lord and Savior. Chick Tracts can be ordered either individually or in bulk. I’ve also found that you can click on a tract on the website. When it opens up, you can print the whole thing. The only negative of that is that it all prints on one page instead of the booklet format the tract comes in.

Monday, September 6, 2010

America's Lost Legacy (Part 5)

A Church with Passion (Part One)


God told the church at Ephesus that they had left their first love. They were once hot for God. They were once on fire for Him. They had great zeal and great fervor for Him, but now, they’ve cooled. He encouraged them to return to their first love. When church members returns to the zeal and enthusiasm they once had for their Lord, they will again be able to positively affect and influence their families for the Kingdom. Godly children become godly adults who will use godly wisdom to affect positive change in their families, on their jobs, in their churches, in their communities, and in their nation.

When the Church returns to her first love, she, too, will be able to affect positive change. Jesus told the church at Ephesus to remember from whence she fell. She was to remember the love and zeal she once had. She was to remember the power and strength she once had. She was to remember the favor of God she once had. Once she remembers where she fell from, she is to repent and go back to it. To repent means to die to a sin or a sinful way of life. For what does she have to repent? She is to repent of allowing worldliness to enter into her. She is to repent for compromising with the world. She is to repent for her disobedience to the commands of Christ. She is to repent for her idolatries. The church at Ephesus was to repent and die to the life she was now living, the sins she was not committing, and to return to God. She was to turn her back on what she was now doing and return to her zeal and her passion for her first (and only) Love.

To those churches that do not repent, He “will come to you quickly and remove your lampstand from its place.” That means that He will remove His blessing from her. He will write Ichabod on her. He may even kill off her members or just let the church die off through natural attrition. He may even give them over to a strong delusion that they may believe the lies of false teachers. If a church repents of growing cold towards Jesus, then He will restore her. He told the Ephesian church, “‘To him who overcomes I will give to eat from the tree of life, which is in the midst of the Paradise of God.’” He would bless those who repent with eternal life.