June
/ July 2017 -
Vol. 92
.
Pope Francis joined with more than 50,000
Catholic charismatics and a number of Evangelical
Pentecostals at the Olympic Stadium in Rome June 1,
2014. (CNS photo/Paul Haring)
.
We
Must Stand
Together
by Dr.
Vinson
Synan
I am often asked
the questions: What is God doing
now? What is the now word for the
church? What is the Lord trying to
say to us today? Such questions
seem to imply that I have a direct
pipeline to the Lord, but it is my
belief that it is possible for
anyone to look around and discern
what the Lord is saying.
Conferences, world events, and
prophecies given by tried and
proven spiritual leaders are all
sources of God's word to us.
Of course, what the Lord is saying
today is not, as some critics
suggest, claimed by Christians as
new revelations on the same level
of the Scriptures. But through
word gifts God can inspire us,
warn us, and draw us to his
purposes for us. These gifts of
the Spirit must have been in the
Lord's mind when he said to the
seven churches of Asia Minor, "I
know your works" and then ended
each message with the admonition
"let him that has an ear hear what
the Spirit is saying to the
churches" (see Rev. 2, 3).
The Lord knows the condition of
all the churches in all ages, and
this scripture further indicates
that the Holy Spirit is
continually speaking to the
current condition of the churches.
It is through the gifts of the
Spirit that we can "hear" and
communicate what the If God knows
our works and is speaking to us,
we desperately need to hear what
he wants us to know.
What many have been hearing in
recent months is summarized in the
name of the New Orleans
Congresses: The Holy Spirit and
World Evangelization. This title
encompasses the whole purpose of
God in raising up the Pentecostal
and charismatic movements of this
past century. For decades the Lord
has been pouring out his Spirit
"upon all flesh" (see Joel 3:1)
with a veritable explosion of
charismatic gifts and graces. The
restoration of such gifts as
healing, speaking in tongues,
prophecy, the casting out of
demons, and so on, has galvanized
the churches into new growth,
excited Christians in all
denominations, and led to
tremendous evangelistic
breakthroughs in many nations of
the world.
If God has said anything in this
century, it is that he intends to
pour out his Spirit "upon all
flesh" in these days. And when the
Holy Spirit comes, he distributes
the charismata to believers as
loving benefits for the body of
Christ. We should never allow
these gifts to become common or
"old hat" to us. Paul warns us
against "quenching the Spirit" by
lessening the importance of the
gifts in the church. He also tells
us not to forbid speaking in
tongues and not to despise
prophesying. Evidently there were
already some people in Paul's day
who did just that.
Another thing God has said clearly
in the last few years is that he
wants the church to find a unity
in the Holy Spirit that responds
to Jesus' prayer in John 17:21. He
prayed, "that they all may be one
as I and the Father are one." In
Kansas City, Missouri, in 1977,
the hearts of the great throng at
Arrowhead Stadium were broken by
the poignant prophetic refrain
stating, "the body of my Son is
broken." The tragedy of the broken
body is not so much in the broken
fellowship of those who ache to be
one in the Lord, but in the
millions of unbelievers who refuse
to accept Jesus as Lord because of
the multitudinous divisions in the
churches.
Jesus prayed to the Father that we
would be one "that the world may
believe that you have sent me."
The world indeed sees our
divisions and finds the Gospel
incredible, especially when so
many groups proclaim that they,
and they alone, are teaching the
truth. Unbelievers do not know who
or what to believe. Thus the
ultimate goal of Christian unity
is not fellowship, as wonderful as
that may be, but evangelization. I
believe that the most important
thing that the Lord has been
saying lately is that we must take
our gifts out of the churches and
prayer rooms and into the streets
of the world's great cities, using
them to convince unbelievers that
Jesus Christ truly is Lord.
The goal of winning a majority of
the world's population to Christ
in our time is a wonderful and
worthy vision. This tremendous
goal will not be reached, however,
if the churches continue to use
only the traditional methods of
evangelizing that have been used
in the past. Missiologists such as
David Barrett predict that at
present growth rates, an even
smaller proportion of the world
population will be Christian at
the turn of the 21st century than
in 1987. Dramatic breakthroughs
for Christ are needed into the
Muslim, Hindu, and communist
worlds for us to change that
direction. Unbelievers among these
peoples will not be won merely
through theological arguments,
social programs, or traditional
church-planting of forts. It is
only through signs and wonders by
the power of the Holy Spirit that
these breakthroughs can occur.
Furthermore, Jesus said that these
results come only as a result of
"prayer and fasting" (Matthew
17:21).
God has also been speaking a word
about righteousness and holiness
to the religious leaders of the
world. The scriptures still cry
out, "be clean, you that bear the
vessels of the Lord" (Isaiah
52:11). The Lord seems to be
cleansing his church and its
leadership for the great
evangelistic thrust of the next
decade. He is reminding us that
his soldiers should travel light
and not be burdened down with the
materalism and sensuality that
characterizes this age. Holier
leaders will make the church
better able to minister to the
lost and dying peoples of the
world.
In the end, all Christians share
in the call to holiness and
righteousness and as individuals
have a responsibility to discern
the signs of the times in the
light of the Scriptures. We all
need now to redouble our efforts
to win people to the Lord.
While reflecting on God's word for
us, my mind has repeatedly
returned to a word I received
while ministering in Ridgecrest,
North Carolina, at the National
Leadership Conference. It was: We
must stand together, or we will
fall apart!
[This article was
originally published in the
July/August 1987 Issue of New
Covenant Magazine.]
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Dr. Vinson Synan is one of
the leading authorities on
the history of
Pentecostalism. Writing and
editing more than 18 books
in his lifetime, he has
contributed works such as The
Holiness Pentecostal
Movement in the United
States, The
Old-Time Power, and
his most recent major work,
The Century of the Holy
Spirit. In addition to
these publications Dr. Synan
released his memoirs titled
An Eyewitness Remembers
the Century of the Holy
Spirit in 2010. His
work and writings are
authoritative resources on
the history of
Pentecostalism and various
other topics in the church.
In addition, he was one of
the founders of the Society
for Pentecostal Studies
(SPS) in 1970.
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