Conventional Thinking with Al Mohler

There are two or three areas that need to be addressed with reference to the future of the Southern Baptist Convention. One is prayer for a visitation of God like that of the First and Second Great Awakenings. We need to plead the promises set forth by Jonathan Edwards in his Humble Attempt which inspired Carey and others in the origins of the Great Century of Missions. It is likely the promises were also pleaded by those who prayed for that visitation which we call the Second Great Awakening. Could not the promises be pleaded now for a Third Great Awakening which might reach and win the whole world in one generation and perhaps for 1000 more generations in order that Christ might truly have a number no man can number? And I mean win them by persuasion – not manipulation. And then there is te matter of knowledge of the Awakenings which are two of the most unusual events in world history since the first coming of our Lord and Savior. What knowledge lies in our local church and associational records that we might really bnefit from, if we had that knowledge at our finger tips so to peak? And then there is the issue of working on how to deal with theological differences. Could we benefit from an analysis of our beliefs, if they were examined by using a johari window type of instrument? Could we work out new parameters for cooperation so that people will cease the sandbox practice of bopping one another on the head every time they disagree? Another area is that of understanding Sovereign Grace Evangelism. Surely, it would be the part of wisdom to make a historical study and develop materials for implementing such a witness in soul-winning, evangelistic and missionary efforts. We have the other methods taught and practiced along with thir excesses. Since Sovereign Grace was the view of the founders of the Convention and the flagship seminary, it seems that it would be advisable to have a methodology of soul-winning appropriate to such a theology taught in our schools. One of the things thatI utterly dumbfounded me in my research and studies of the Bible and Baptist History and theology was to discover that all of the doctrines of grace were preached evangelistically by our Lord Jesus Christ, even as invitations to salvation. Consider ho our Lord preached particular redemption to the woman of Canaan in Matt.15:21-28. He said, “I am not sent but to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.” Now that is limited atonement, unconditional election, prdestination. Her response was worship and to continue to plead for his help. (His neighbors in Nazareth responded rather violently to the thought that God might look on Gentile with favor while passing by a Jew – LK.4:18-30). When our Lord spoke of the total depravity and even reprobation (“It is not meet to take the children’s bread and cast it to dogs.”), the woman responded with acceptance and even argued for help, “Truth, Lord, but even the dogs eat of the crumbs that fall from their masters’ table.” He never got that far with his neighbors of Nazareth; they tried to murder Him. The woman got the highest compliment to her response to His seeming paradoxical intervention, His antinomy (J.I. Packer, Evangelism & The Sovereignty of God). They turned out to be invitations to salvation and deliverance. Psychiatrists, psychologists, and other professional counselors have sometimes made use of paradoxical interventions as ways of helping people with problems. If human care-givers can make use of such therapies, surely our God can do it even more effectvely.. here is another area that needs to be addressed, one I hesitate to take up due to our history of anti-intellectualism. Even so, we need to remember that the Christian Faith has been in times past in the forefront of the most avant garde thinking. Just consider the development of our government which has far more of a biblical basis than most Americans realize. I was stunned to hear a Moslem on the news speak of that fact, when most citizens, including our scholars, are ignorant of that fact. Also, there is the influence of one of the leading political philosophers of the modern era on our view of the Bible. I refer to John Locke whose exact words are used in our Baptist Faith and Message to describe the Bible. My source for this observation is drawn from the late Dr. James Bulman’s work, It Is Their Right, which was published by Rev. Gerald Primm in Greensboro, NC, in the 70s. Our anti-imtellctualism has deprived us of so much, but the restoration of sense and reason will do much to relieve us of our difficulties. I MIGHT BE WRONG, BUT I THINK WE ARE ON THE ERGE OF ANOTHER AWAKENNG. I have been praying for one since 1973. Others are praying for the same. I know of one minister who has been praying for such a revival since the fifties. A Great Awakening will affect all of society, every level of it, and the effect can be with wisdom and caution a benefit unbelieveable. Remember the last time such visitations occured, the greatest nation in world history was born and streams of blessing went forth into the whole world. Now we are facing a time, when the forces of fear want to get rid of the excess of population (it is to those who so fear a threat to their security). The answer has to be in the Lord, and perhaps te opening of the starry heavens for settlement. After all, the elect are gathered from one end of the heavens to the other or as a more literal rendering might be put, from the ends or extremities of the hevens to the other ends or extremities of them (Mt.24:31b). C.S. Lewis’ sci/fi work, That Hideous Strength, identified one of the factors in that awakening. The conpiracy had succeeded in gaining control of mankind so they could brainwash them to do whatever they pleased, when the cetral character, Ransom, a symbolic representative of Christ, perhaps, says, “They draw down deep Heavenupon their heads.” And Heaven comesdown to earth. Evil cann’t survive in the heavenly presence. The bad ones commite suicide. The rest of civilization are converted. The presence is a reality of a great awakening or so the records indicate. The theology of a great awkening is Sovereign Grace, and the effect of the two is humility. All three are well summed up in the most popular hymn of all times, AMAZING GRACE HOW SWEET THE SOUND THAT SAVED A WRETCH LIKE ME. I ONCE WAS LOST BUT NOW I AM FOUND, WAS BLIND BUT NOW I SEE.
.-= Dr. James Willingham´s last blog ..The Climax of the Reformation =-.