Scotland Revival and Missions

Revival and Missions

“Repent, then, and turn to God, so that your sins may be wiped out, that times of refreshing may come from the Lord…” Acts 3:19


“Religious fervor is not a constant. When it flames most brightly, it transforms not only individuals but history; yet among the same people it may die down into smoldering ashes that give no heat to personal life nor any energy to national life.” This was a description of what historian James Leyburn made of the of the religious life of the Scottish people in book on the Scotch-Irish.

I wonder what was the mysterious work of God that emblazed hundreds of Scottish men and women to become missionaries? Why did so many from one small country go into uncivilized lands to suffer hardship and loss of life during the 19th Century? What was it about the land of thistles and heather that was different? How did Scotland from its pagan history come to be won by Christ through the preaching of St. Columba on the isle of Iona and send out missionaries that converted the Angles and perhaps much of Europe? In the ages of smoldering ashes when the gospel light was dim, once again God sent a revival through the preaching of John Knox and other preachers that resulted in a national transformation that still impacts our lives as Presbyterians.

Consider all the great missionary servants whose legacies now stand in the halls of Christian fame. In one decade alone from 1850’s to the 1870’s we find great missionaries like Mary Slessor go as a pioneer missionary in Africa and become known as the White Queen of Africa. She came from a poor working class family in Scotland, never married, but became a woman greatly loved by her converts and orphan children in what is now Nigeria.

We also read about James Gilmore, who in this same period left Scotland for Mongolia to preach the Gospel and never looked upon his homeland ever again. Also, John Paton sailed for the cannibal islands of New Hebrides, another Scot sailed for the Cook Islands. James Chalmers preached Christ to the islanders and eventually traveled to New Guinea and there he was killed by cannibal tribesman in 1901.

We cannot forget Alexander Mackay who like Moffat and Livingston before him, took the Gospel of our Lord into Africa with the watchword “Africa for Christ.” He never took his hands off the plow, nor looked back to his home. He spent his years in Uganda in a time of great persecution and killing of Christians. He would die of malaria in 1890, but the Church would live on.

What was it about these men and women that captured their souls and hearts with such unmitigated devotion? What do they possess that I do not have? Why cannot we experience that same visitation of holy devotion that rained upon Scotland in their days? Might the Spirit of God blow upon the smoldering ambers of our hearts for true revival? How I long for such a reality to happen in our day.

The Light of the Gospel @ Ft. Hood And the Darkness of Evil

PS 139:11 If I say, "Surely the darkness will hide me
and the light become night around me,"

PS 139:12 even the darkness will not be dark to you;
the night will shine like the day,
for darkness is as light to you.
We have a PCA church family serving the men and women of Ft. Hood, called Hill Country Church. Rev. Lou Best is the pastor (retired Col.) and some of our own are a part of that church. Thank God no one from that church was directly affected by the shootings.
Can we make sense of the rampage on our military within their home post? Can we understand the tragedy of these honored warriors who have fought for our country and sacrificed in foreign lands only to be gunned down at home? No we cannot. There are many questions and far few answers. Who can know the human heart where evil resides? Yet, we are people of faith and hope because of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Even as the Psalmist declares, the “darkness will not be dark to you” because while tragic and sinful events can enter our lives they do not destroy us. This is the hope we can share with the hurting world.
When I was in high school in Texas I attended a JROTC camp for a week at Fort Hood, the largest Army post in the world home of the 1st Calvary Division. This is a place where if you thought one would be safe, it would be there. There is great shock and pain. It is time we look to the Cross of Christ where sin and evil was destroyed and the only hope of the world can be found. This is our glorious Gospel shining its light in the dark places and the dark times.
Let us pray for the victims of the tragedy at Fort Hood, Texas and for the people of Hill County Church as they share the Gospel in love and confidence to that community.

Book Review

The Other Preacher in Lynchburg: My Life Across Town from Jerry Falwell. John Killinger
I could not resist reading this book with a keen interest, since I was in Lynchburg as a student at Liberty University during part of the timeline the book covers. I was expecting a candid and yet objective reflection. Upon reading the book, anybody ready to jump in delight upon any insider scoop against Jerry the Fundamentalist would find more fodder for the cannon. If you are searching for truth, one would find this personal memoire sad and at times pedantic or in a word, just arrogant. Large gaps of knowledge are quickly filled up with innuendo and third party gossip.
John Killinger is a prolific author and well known preacher among mainline pulpits having criss-crossed denominational lines at ease at the call of tall steeples and academic professorships. It is surprising that one so educated and esteemed in his circles would write a book that is on the level of a cheap “kiss and tell” narrative of sour grapes.

The title itself gives one an inkling that this book is about ego- pure and simple. Lynchburg had more than two preachers, several who never were in the spot lights, but nonetheless faithful preachers of the gospel. While one was famous for a television ministry, the founder of a university and the major inspiration of the Christian Right’s political activism, Killinger was one who seems to sulk in the shadow of one greater.
I do not and cannot defend everything about Falwell or Liberty. It was a mixed bag of experiences for me. Some bad, but some really good – which is pretty much a commentary on most things in life. In fact, overall, coming up as a Fundamentalist is not the worst thing to experience in life. Liberals and progressives can be just as mean, deceptive and duplicitous as any fundamentalist ever thought about being. The book brings together a line-up of disgruntled professors and students ready to expose the dark interior of life at Falwell’s school. I laugh at some of the examples attributing a Nazi like atmosphere to the school with its strict rules, which is like saying West Point is too regimented and uptight about hairstyles. Some of its legalistic trappings are long gone and good riddance, too. One did not go to Liberty during those days expecting it to be like Berkeley or even Lynchburg College, for that matter. The metal buildings that looked “like chicken houses” as, Will Campbell called them, were embraced by forward looking students who believed in the kind of education they would receive at such a school fully committed to conservative Christian beliefs. While some may have relished the grounds and buildings at the University of Virginia, they did not covet the content of the classrooms. Of course there is always the disgruntled minority forced into the school by hook or by crook. There are parents who think Christian Colleges are the answer in a last ditch effort of redeeming a botched up job of parenting.
I became a Presbyterian while at Liberty, not in any way thanks to the likes of Killinger (his well known pointed jabs from the pulpit were part of campus discussion), but because of what historic Presbyterian theology stood for: a cogent, intelligent belief in the Bible as the Word of God. That was something of which a nondenominational liberal fashioned in the style of Emerson Fosdick would never be accused of. For him, Fundamentalism was the social ill on the fabric of an open-minded free society. From Lynchburg to Birmingham, John Killinger recounts the victimization of a “progressive thinker” by exploitive mean- spirited fundamentalists who made his life less than a dream. His days at Beeson Divinity School also come into play as another case where Falwell and cronies undermine and discredit his work and ministry. This is a sad tale of hubris offended. It will be especially sad that people will even believe it.

On Not Laughing with the World

1 Peter 2: 16
16Live as free men, but do not use your freedom as a cover-up for evil; live as servants of God.

“They were on their way up to Jerusalem, with Jesus leading the way, and the disciples were astonished, while those who followed were afraid. Again he took the Twelve aside and told them what was going to happen to him. 33“We are going up to Jerusalem,” he said, “and the Son of Man will be betrayed to the chief priests and teachers of the law. They will condemn him to death and will hand him over to the Gentiles, 34who will mock him and spit on him, flog him and kill him. Three days later he will rise.” Mark 10:32-34
A phrase oft repeated in Mark’s Gospel is “on their way.” There is an unmistakable movement in this Gospel. The geography and place names are not just window-dressing for the story. Jesus is really going somewhere and the destination is part of his vital mission. Here in this verse Jesus is going “up to Jerusalem.” This is the key essential destination for Christ. This trip to Jerusalem is the reason why Christ was born.
We also notice that the direction is going up. While we don’t notice the topography of Judea, the writers of Scriptures knew Jerusalem was on higher elevation.

Why were the disciples astonished and the followers of Jesus afraid?
Both responses may have been related to the previous encounter Jesus had with the rich young man, who sadly turned away from following Jesus, because of his wealth. Upon seeing the impossible task of pleasing God on our own, the disciples may have been astonished, and some even afraid.
Another explanation is that the astonishment came with the direction of the journey. In Mark 8:31, while they were in Caesarea Philippi, Jesus told them he would “suffer many things and be rejected by elders, chief priests, and teachers of the law and that he must be killed and after three days rise again.”
Peter, remember, tried to talk Jesus out of this. Peter did not understand that this was the whole purpose of Jesus life. He was going to suffer and die.
The glory of Christ is the Cross. His inauguration and coronation of his kingly rule is his passion. His crown is not the jeweled crown of a monarch, but a crown of thorns. The Roman soldiers did mock Jesus as he foretold. Each aspect of his kingliness was mocked and ridiculed. His throne was to be the rough hewn timbers of a Roman execution. But the mockery of men is the wisdom of God. The way of suffering by the Servant, was the way of his triumph over all his enemies, so that even death was conquered- in three days he rose again.

In pagan lands, far and near, there are ancient customs of dealing with death. In Latin America, there is a festival of the dead, where people dress up in costumes to disguise themselves from the deceased spirits. They believe if they make fun of death, then death will not bother them. There is in these cultures a strong emphasis on death, because they do not have the hope we have in Christ’s Resurrection. As the light of the Gospel loses its grip on our culture, I see the same emphasis upon death. Just look at the amount of decoration and seemingly harmless fun people engage in around Halloween. We see more decorations than on any other holiday and it’s all about death, sorcery and evil. Are we are not moving towards a neo-paganism with the kind of things we see today? As believers in the risen Savior we are moving in a different direction than the rest of the world. The world tries to deal with death by making fun of it. Jesus conquered it and broke its power and those in Christ live in the freedom of that triumph. There is in the Eastern Orthodox Church a tradition known as the Easter laugh. Christians can laugh in joy about Christ’s redemptive victory over sin and death. But, we don’t laugh with the world that lies in the grip of the fear of death and the darkness of sin.

True Worship

“Guard your steps when you go to the house of God.” Ecc.5:1
God centered worship is aimed at the satisfaction of God – the One to whom all worship is due. Man centered worship is aimed at the satisfaction of the worshipper.
In the Bible we find that Canaanite worship of Baal was extremely engaging of the passions and the emotions so that the individual would always come away with a satisfying experience. Today, our culture defines worship according to the old pattern of the Canaanites. Baal worship is making a comeback under the new guise of freedom.
What is true worship? Biblical worship engages the whole person, heart, mind and body in a God-mandated, God-directed form for the corporate display of praise and satisfaction of our Triune God who is revealed as the Father who loves us, the Son who died for us, and the Spirit who fills us.
Weekly corporate worship of the called out ones (the church) is not optional, but the mark and vital sign of true authentic faith. We can no more absent ourselves from worship than we can cut off the vital beating of our heart or refrain from breathing. “You are not our own, you have been bought at a price…” (1 Cor. 6:19). Daily communion with God is always the daily supplement to the weekly essential sustenance of our souls.

Young Calvin

John was just 24 years old when he wrote a preface to a French translation of the New Testament by his cousin Olivetan. Such work was illegal at the time and considered heresy by the Church of Rome and treason by the State. Calvin makes no apology about the necessity of the Bible - which for him is the message of the Gospel.

“Without the Gospel, we do not know what God requires of us or forbids us to do; we cannot distinguish good from evil, light from darkness, or the commandments of God from the institutions of men. Without the Gospel we are all helpless and ineffectual; without the Gospel we are not Christians.” From the second preface of the French Bible translated by Olivetan

Go young Calvin!

Samoan Tsunami

Isaiah 42:12 (KJV)
Let them give glory unto the Lord, and declare his praise in the islands.


The Samoan Islands were hit Tuesday by a large tsunami triggered by an earthquake centered between the islands of Samoa and Tonga. Apia is the main island of Samoa, an independent island nation, which is the burial place and former home of Robert Louis Stevenson, who wrote the classic Treasure Island. The islands of American Samoa, a territory of the U.S., are a beautiful group of islands where the largest concentration of people lives on the main island. Pago Pago (pronounced Pango Pango) is on the main harbor overlooking beautiful Rainmaker Mountain and served as a naval port during the Second World War.

I have a special interest in this place, because I lived there for 6 weeks while on a short term mission back in my college days. The history of missions in this part of the world is inspiring and a testimony of the power of the gospel to transform lives and whole nations. Like most Polynesians, the Samoans were fierce, warring cannibals. Men like John Williams, John Paton and a host of other Presbyterian and Congregational missionaries brought the gospel to this region of the world. Many paid with their lives or the cost of their families. In one decade of missions in the 19th Century Samoa would bow to the Sovereign rights of Jesus Christ. It became one of the most Christianized nations ever in history. Every village had a church and Sabbath observance was strictly and joyfully enforced. Today, many Samoan men end up playing NFL football in this country, because of their legendary size. The sport of choice in the islands is Cricket; one of the influences still seen from British missions.

The city of Pago Pago which is the home of Starkist Tuna, was badly damaged, as well as many villages. The island is essentially the top of a mountain and so most villages surround the island along the coast. We still don’t know the numbers who have perished. Pray for these dear people. Pray for a renewal of the Christian church, which because of nominalism (Christian in name only) and the advancements of cults (Mormons have built a temple there) there is a great need for the Gospel to be proclaimed in power and in Biblical faithfulness. Pray for a Tsunami of God’s power and truth to claim this part of the world as in olden days.