I am saddened, very saddened,
when I follow the narrative of many believers.
How do we call a pastor who dares
to believe that God can heal corona careless? How dare we call those who decide
to put their faith to practice reckless? And how come we are the first to shame
a believer who decides to question the running narrative on this virus?
How does the worship of a few
believers under the open heavens become criminal when the consistent and almost
daily meeting of hordes of politicians for their own stupid political ends is
alright? Why is it normal for politicians to hop all around the country to
politic yet criminal for a pastor to hold a counseling session with someone
drowning in spiritual morass?
Since when did we become
accomplices to those who have demonstrated time and again that they have no
interest at all in what we believe? When did we all of a sudden start doubting
that what we have always believed is false?
Can God heal? Does God heal? Why then
do we speak as if He doesn’t?
A few years ago I wrote a burden
God gave me in a book I called ‘A Hart Athirst’.
In it I was asking where the
miracles Jesus promised would be greater than those He performed went, among
other things. It is a cry that has been in my heart for a long time as I have
tried to internalize the Bible even as I read it.
God has not changed, and never
will. We are the ones who have changed. We have lost contact with God, if truth
be told.
Medicine has its roots in the
people of faith, just like education. It was the people who believed in the
healing power of God who were able to develop the medicine that we now use to
prove the ineffectiveness of faith. The Red Cross is not a simple decoration. The
founders believed that only in the cross of Christ can true healing happen. That
is the reason Muslims rushed to include their sign on the same as it was clear
it was a faith emblem.
Why have we all of a sudden started
pouring scorn on what we have always proclaimed?
I will say something I have said
elsewhere. The church is dead! And I am a member of that church and so am also
speaking about me.
The saddest part is that we are
not willing to admit that simple fact. A simple fact to note is that a living
church has never been docile. A living church is a church that is actively at
war with the world and its systems because it serves another kingdom.
The submission to authority that
most church leaders speak of today makes one wonder why Paul and other apostles
were in prison or prophets were killed. It makes one wonder why Jeremiah was
thrown into a well.
Of course a living church has the
world keenly listening to what it is saying because there is immense power behind
whatever that church says. The church is God’s prophetic proclamation. That is
the whole reason for persecution. You simply can’t persecute a dead church.
Church gatherings were not
stopped as persecution. They were stopped to demonstrated to all that the
church is dead. Online preaching, instead of being an alternative ministry
outlet, was simply compliant submission. If it was as many want to paint it, it
ought to have started long before the virus struck since the church does not
react to situations but precedes them. Or isn’t the church prophetic?
The good thing is that in
acknowledging that we are dead we can open ourselves to be revived. And God
longs to revive us, only that He will not revive someone who is not already
dead as He does not get glory in doing first aid especially to someone who wants
to decide the kind of help they need.
The church is at the Ezekiel 37 valley.
And yes, we can live. But only when we agree with God that we are dead to Him
and His agenda for a lost world.
You see, inasmuch as God is the
God of miracles, He does not perform them at our whim. He does them for His
glory. He does not perform miracles as a demo. He does them to point to who He
is.
I like the way John calls Jesus’
miracles, signs. Each of the miracles recorded in John pointed to one attribute
of the risen Christ.
Yet we know the devil was on His
case from the beginning. At the temptation He challenged Him to prove who He
was and at the cross He did the same.
Yet that is what we have turned
God’s miracles to, a show of who has more faith or prayer. It is the same with
any other ministry.
Our prayer is not different. We pray
for a miracle but already have plan B to K.
I am talking about trusting God
for a good school for my child when I have a pool of favorable principals on
the other side. I ask for prayer for a job when I already have enough
connections in all the right places.
In short I simply want God to
rubber stamp those deals. And you are offended when I say we are dead as a
church!
God is everything to us or He is
nothing. Like I always say Christ is Lord of all or He is not Lord at all. There
are no two ways about it.
Revival is coming. Miracles are
coming. And I believe it is very soon.
Are we ready?
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