Messengers

We are in the midst of the Easter season. For professing Christians, this is a time celebration, of the telling again and anew the story of Christ's death on a cross and His resurrection from a tomb. Churches and pastors everywhere are preparing for Easter Sunday, expecting perhaps the year's biggest crowd. Surely there are so many expectations. What are yours and what are mine?

I'm moved to write on this because of quotes I came across from Leonard Ravenhill, one of the great revivalists of the 20th century. He said, "Once people went to church to meet God. Now they go to hear a sermon about Him....It takes living men (and women) to deliver the Living Word." For all those that we have such great hopes and expectations of seeing in our services on that great day, what are our expectations for them? Do we expect them to hear another message about the factual events of those three days during Christ's crucifixion and resurrection. A message they heard in some form the last Easter they attended? Or, do we expect them to encounter a living, risen Christ? Do we expect them to exclaim, as did Mary upon seeing Jesus in the Garden, "I have seen the Lord"? Do we expect them, and not only them, but all of the people present to excitedly tell anyone who will listen, as did the disciples, "The Lord is risen. He is risen indeed!"

I write this because I well know how easily we can get caught up in providing a great Easter Sunday experience for all who are present, one that will encourage them to return, and totally lose sight of ushering in the opportunity to experience, encounter, meet with the risen, living Jesus. To be preachers and people so immersed in His presence that His Spirit seems to overwhelm all who come together that day.

Am I being unreasonable, even foolish to ask these questions? Or is it even more unreasonable and foolish to think that these could never be? What is the key or keys for this to be our reality and experience? I think the greatest part is found in Ravenhill's latter point. It takes living messengers to proclaim His Living Word. Messengers alive with His Presence and Life. From the pulpit to the platform, to the sanctuary floor and out into the foyer and the very grounds of the fellowship, may His Holy Spirit come upon all who enter. May we be, in all of our fellowships, living messengers of the Living Word. 

Is this too much to expect? Too much to hope for? Yes, if we only hope to tell stories about something that happened 2000 years ago. Here's the truth. The glory of what happened then, His resurrection from the dead, is still unfolding 2000 years later. He's as real and alive and glorious as He ever was. May we be immersed in and behold His glory for ourselves. Then may we display His glory to each other and all who join us. And not just on Easter Sunday, but on every day of our lives. Living men and women sharing His Living Word wherever we are and wherever we go.

Blessings,

Pastor O