REMINDER: This is the first (and most detailed) of a three-part message in these three weeks leading up to Pentecost Sunday, May 31st. Typically, I write you just once every 3-4 weeks, but because I deem this series so important, I'm asking you to give each email your faithful attention. Thank you so much.
IT'S ALL GOOD until someone starts talking about repentance... Most of us are champions of doing the right thing until the personal costs exceed our predetermined "spending limits."
God says we are ambassadors of reconciliation,* His spokespeople for humankind's reconciliation to God through the atoning sacrifice of Christ. But that's not the full extent of it; genuine ambassadorship is much more all-encompassing. We're called to live a lifestyle of reconciliation--- continually bridging the disconnects between our professed beliefs and our failed actions through personal repentance, both before God and one another.
I'd say "Repentance in Unity" aptly articulates this spirit of reconciliation.
Without "sold out," quick-to-repent hearts of humility, our witness simply becomes too shallow to lead others into the deep waters of Christ's baptism. Oh, we may get a few evangelistic notches on our belts, but we'll never experience the "plentiful" harvest Jesus talks about.**
Looking Back
It was exactly one week-to-the-day past Thanksgiving 2000. I was out on an early-evening run through the back roads of Nipomo, a small town nestled between other small towns along Highway 101 on the central coast of California, where we rented a small house. Training for my fourth marathon, I was praying as I ran, weeping over the little town where we lived. It was in dire need of revival.
(How about your home town?)
AT THAT TIME, our nation, still recoiling from the worldwide shame caused by the highly inappropriate sin of the highest office-holder in our land, was now embroiled in a judicial battle over the election results to determine his successor.
I'm not adding historical expository to make my testimony more compelling. I'm providing this background because God's Spirit always compels us within the context of our circumstance. It's significant to remember where we were as a nation when God birthed this vision of Pentecost Walk.
Even though God foreknows the end from the beginning, the course of human history is determined by the obedience of His people. Our sovereign God is not mocked. Surely we reap what we sow. To put this in governmental vernacular... as the Church goes, so goes the nation.
Could our disunity as Christ-followers be the reason our nation is so polarized? ***
UP UNTIL THE DAY of that run, I'd counted myself among the "sold out" ones. I thought I'd given my life to the pursuit of genuine ambassadorship, no matter the cost.
But I had yet to break past my own predetermined "spending limits."
In those days, my ministry kept me on the road most weekends. When I was home, I'd go to church with Deanna and the kids in a neighboring town, miles away. We weren't invested in Nipomo. Still, my perception of its spiritual lack grieved me deeply. After all, it was home.
SO OUT RUNNING that day, I wasn't praying for my ministry. I wasn't praying for a better gig, some kind of "national vision." God had been faithfully attending our little itinerant ministry with signs and wonders. Though always hungry for more of His glorious touch, we were content. The spiritual condition of that little town was the full scope of my intercession at that moment...
Then God messed with me... He was actually answering my immediate prayers, but I don't think I've ever understood that until just now...
In a microsecond of epiphany, He gave me the whole vision for Pentecost Walk... or, I should say, what would become the first 3,400-mile leg of our 10,000 miles of prayerwalking thus far. The epiphany came with a promise spoken to my heart...
"If you do this, it will change the spiritual landscape of the nation."
My reaction? After literally being knocked off my feet by the out-of-nowhere shock of it all, I started to laugh out loud. I told God I wasn't laughing like Sarah (in unbelief), but because the whole thing was so outrageous: 1) He had the wrong guy, 2) There was no way anyone could do this, 3) And even if there were, I was still the wrong guy.
It took me two months of daily, on-my-face, knees-knocking-in-fear, tears-staining-the-carpet prayer to finally say "yes" to God's call. And then, only after I'd exhausted every ounce of His patience with me. It finally came down to a day when He spoke clearly to my heart...
"You're the third guy I've asked to do this. Shall I go to the fourth guy?"
Looking Forward
We're not done. God has told me to "walk until breakthrough comes."
In the next few years, if the Lord wills, we have a 10,000-mile "homestretch" ahead of us... I'll say more about that next week, because I want to invite you to join me.
I HAD NO IDEA that I would still be at this mission 8½ years from the day of that run in Nipomo. But I'm starting to "get it," at least a little bit. What we're doing matters.
Don't get me wrong; I'm not thinking more of myself (or "my" mission) than I ought to, but still...
- I BELIEVE our mission of Repentance in Unity is part and parcel to a nationwide awakening coming to America.
- I BELIEVE this much-needed revival of the Church is the best hope for our country's socio-political, economic, military and homeland-security challenges.
- I BELIEVE that in the "fast food" culture that pervades our churches today, it is clearly God's intention that this mission will have taken over a decade to complete, if the Lord wills.
Looking Foolish
Most of us want to be regarded as possessing at least a modicum of sophistication...
"What does Pentecost Walk do?"
"They walk."
"Is that all?"
"Well... they walk... a lot."
"And?"
"Uhh... they pray, too."
"Wow. What amazing gifts they must posses to accomplish such formidable tasks!"
"For you see your calling, brethren, that not many wise according to the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble, are called. But God has chosen the foolish things of the world to put to shame the wise, and God has chosen the weak things of the world to put to shame the things which are mighty... that no flesh should glory in His presence....'He who glories, let him glory in the Lord.'" (1 Corinthians 1:26-27, 29, 31b, emphasis added)
MIGHT YOU be foolish enough to help us see this mission to its intended finish-line?
MIGHT YOU see the need for revival in your own home town as merely part of the deeper need for revival throughout the American Church? Might such a public awakening be the answer to your private prayer... for your family, your friends, your church, your town?
We believe our "common liturgy" of repentance ( National Prayer of Repentance) will lead to a "common lifestyle" of repentance. Is this not "ground zero" for true ambassadorship?
Be Foolish for God
The object of this message and its next two installments is not, ostensibly, to raise funds, but to raise awareness, while answering the obvious question, "Why is all this taking so long?" (More on that in next week's email.)
However, we cannot advance without your help. People often tell me they appreciate how "real" my preaching style is. If indeed that has been God's grace to me, let me be "real" with you right now... Mostly, we need your prayers, but not only your prayers, we also need your support.
PENTECOST SUNDAY, May 31st, will mark the eighth anniversary of the first steps of our first cross-country prayerwalk. Since, Biblically, the number seven represents the completion of a season, it would follow that the number eight represents new beginnings. I believe that's true for us.
So here's what I'm asking you to do...
If you believe in this vision, please sow into it, sacrificially, as an act of faith in obedience to the Lord's leading. Further, I ask you to give in these three weeks leading up to Pentecost Sunday, May 31st.
Our needs are substantial; our God is sufficient. His provision will be "immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to His power that is at work within us." (Ephesians 3:20 NIV, emphasis added) There's that "us" word again. As we go, so goes the nation.
MY ADVISORS have counseled me to be very clear and specific in my appeal to you. So please allow me this suggestion... whether it's the 10,000 mile behind us, or the 10,000 miles yet ahead (if the Lord wills), you might make your Penetcost-season gift accordingly: One cent times ten thousand miles equals $100; two cents makes $200; five cents, $500...
I THANK YOU in advance for your faithful response to seek the Lord on our behalf of today's special request for support. And I thank you for your attention to this very detailed message.
Your brother in His grace,
Tom
tomdemaree@pentecostwalk.org
deanna@pentecostwalk.org
* "...if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new. Now all things are of God, who has reconciled us to Himself through Jesus Christ, and has given us the ministry of reconciliation... Now then, we are ambassadors for Christ..." (2 Corinthians 5:17-18, 20a)
** "Then He said to His disciples, 'The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few. Therefore pray the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into His harvest.'" (Matthew 9:37-38)
"Do you not say, 'There are still four months and then comes the harvest?' Behold, I say to you, lift up your eyes and look at the fields, for they are already white for harvest!" (John 4:35)
*** "Do not be deceived. God is not mocked; for whatever a man sows, that he will also reap. (Galatians 6:7)
"...if My people who are called by My name will humble themselves, and pray and seek My face, and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin and heal their land." (2 Chronicles 7:14) |
