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September 15, 2005
Stacey
Campbell: Why Glory is
not Glory Without Wrath --Help in Discerning the Times
By Stacey Campbell
Revival Now Ministries
www.revivalnow.com
email: admin@beahero.org
|
 Reminder
of Day of Prayer
September 15,2005
by Aimee Herd :
Breaking Christian News
Last week, President Bush designated
Friday, September 16th as a "day of prayer and remembrance" for the victims of
hurricane Katrina, and the recovery efforts. (White House photo by Eric Draper)
As we pray for them we can also hold in prayer those dealing with the effects of
hurricane Ophelia on the East Coast right now. Some of those who are in the path
of Ophelia are evacuees from places hit by Katrina. . .
Read Full Story... |
September 15, 2005
Stacey Campbell:
Why Glory is not Glory
Without Wrath --Help in Discerning the Times
By Stacey Campbell
Revival Now Ministries
www.revivalnow.com
email: admin@beahero.org
How do we interface what we know about the love and mercy of
God, with the great tragedies we are watching unfold in our world -- tragedies
such as the tsunami last year, and Hurricane Katrina this year? Are we to
interpret these "acts of God" as divine judgments? If so, what kind of God wipes
out thousands of people at one time, including innocent children? As someone put
it to me last week, "Is the cure worse than the disease?"
The pursuit of God will lead you to ever-unfolding depths of the attributes of
His character. It is in the context of intimacy that I would like to speak about
what pursuing God or intimacy with God means, in light of the afore-mentioned
catastrophes, because I believe, the world will see an increase in divine
catastrophic judgments in the days to come.
Intimacy Leads to
Understanding God's Wrath & Judgment
If the love of God, according to the Bible (1 John 4:19), is the starting point
in a relationship with God, then the wrath of God is a culmination point that
believers will encounter as they pursue the depths of the person of God. The
maturation of intimacy will inevitably lead to understanding God in wrath and
judgment. How do I know this? Because all of the people in the Bible who have
ever seen God in His glorified state become acutely aware of the ramifications
of sin, whenever they encounter His presence.
For example, the description by the only person to ever even see the 'back' of
the glory of God (see Exodus 33:23, NKJV) wrote that the glory of God is His
nature. His glory is found in the attributes of His character. Moses, a man who
regularly talked with God face-to-face (Numbers 12:6-8) and had lunch with Him
on the sapphire sea (Exodus 24:9-11), had boldly asked God if he could see His
glory. God answers by revealing His nature by unfolding attributes, beginning
with those attributes that we humans love - mercy, grace, longsuffering,
goodness, truth, and forgiveness.
"And the Lord passed before him and proclaimed, 'The LORD, the LORD God,
merciful and gracious, longsuffering, and abounding in goodness and truth,
keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin . . ."
Yet, the glory of God was not complete without a clear revelation of His justice
through judgment:
"By no means
clearing the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children and
the children's children to the third and fourth generation." (Exodus 34:6-7).
Glory is
not Glory Without Wrath
Likewise, another description of God's passionate, unmerited love for His people
in Ezekiel 16 says God's nature, as a loving husband, ends with judgment because
of Israel's unfaithfulness. Again, in this description, God begins in love and
ends in wrath. A love so deep and jealous, as the love of God is, will produce
wrath on those that spurn it (Ezekiel 16:36-43).
This jealous love affects not only the unfaithful, but even the righteous. The
most righteous man on earth (see Job 1:8), when he gets into God's presence,
suddenly understands his 'righteousness' in a whole new light: "Behold, I am
vile. What shall I answer you?" He has nothing left to say (Job 40:4-5). Similar
to these are the experiences of Isaiah (Isaiah 6:3-5) and John (Revelation
1:17). To know Him is to fear Him, according to those who have loved Him the
most and pursued Him to the point of seeing Him.
A cursory reading of all of the prophets, in both the Old and New Testaments,
reveal that wrath and judgment are as much a part of the nature of God as are
love and mercy. Could it be that wrath is the corollary to love and that love
without wrath is not love at all? To be intimate with God must be to know the
fullness of who He is, not just the part.
I have been praying through the book of
Revelations for the past few years and have become conscious of the unfolding
depths of who God is. Those who actually see God are struck over and over again
with what appears to be the dominant attribute of His character: holiness.
Around the throne, they are not crying "love, love, love" or "mercy, mercy,
mercy", but rather "holy, holy, holy!" In fact, those who see Him never stop
saying that -- ever (Revelation 4:8).
Get Ready
Church!
The whole Bible tells us that wrath is the outflow of both love and holiness.
Holiness demands wrath, and that is the reason for the cross. Love and wrath met
there. And love and wrath are still meeting on earth. To put it in the words of
Revelation 14, I believe there will be concurrent grape harvests (wrath)
and wheat harvests (salvation).
In fact, perhaps the revelation of God's
wrath in judgment will actually precipitate millions of people coming to love
Christ in salvation (wheat harvest). For those pursuing intimacy, a fuller
revelation of who God is -- of His nature and glory -- will be seen in greater
measure as these two harvests unfold. If the knowledge of the glory of God is
going to cover the earth as the waters cover the sea (and judgment is part of
His glory), then those who are maturing in intimacy must expect this and be
ready.
Miracles Occur Amidst Persecution
The way I see it is this: according to all of the biblical texts about the last
days, God's wrath nature will be increasingly revealed from Heaven
through catastrophes. At the same time, His mercy nature will be revealed
from earth through His Church. The greatest miracles in the Bible all occurred
in contexts of crises. Under Moses, the miraculous was released in times of
captivity or in the wilderness; the phenomenal rescues of Daniel, Shadrach,
Meshach, and Abednego occurred while the people of God were under judgment in
Babylon.
In the New Testament, the great miracles
occurred because the Church was under persecution or because people were blind,
crippled and even dead! The great sin or sorrow provided a context for great
grace -- "Where sin abounded, grace abounded much more" (Romans 5:20 NKJ).
The incredible miracles that have occurred in
the Church in China in the last decades happened while the Church was in severe
persecution under an atheistic government. The miraculous does flow more regular
in Africa simply because there is more famine and disease there. I believe that
global crises and release of divine judgments over nations will give birth to
the greater works (John 14:12) and the greater love (John 15:13)
that Jesus spoke of. SO GET READY CHURCH! ! !
Wrath and Mercy Abound
The numerous passages about the end-times in the Bible all point to a coming
time where the wrath of God will be revealed from Heaven (i.e., Romans 1:18).
There is no getting away from this. In the end times, wrath is coming to earth,
and nations will be judged (Daniel 9:26; 12:1; Luke 21:34-36; Acts 3:21;
Revelations 6). Of course, the individual believer is spared from personal
wrath, through faith in the blood of Jesus.
But national wrath will come on the nations
of the earth, and we will all be subject as citizens to it when it hits our
various countries. In summary, according to the Bible, wrath is:
-
Actively initiated by God (Genesis 6:5-7;
Genesis 18:20-21, 19:25; Jeremiah 50:9,18, 51:1-2, 20)
-
Passively allowed by God when He lets evil
become His instrument of judgment (Habakkuk 1:6; Jeremiah 50:9,18; 51:1-2, 20,
24; Romans 1:21-29)
-
Or, worst of all, God entirely withdraws His
covering, and the devil takes over, when people go beyond His grace (Luke
19:41-44).
In practical terms, the knowledge of the glory of God covering the earth will
look like wrath and mercy, at the same time. Only God knows when the perfect
combination of sin, knowledge, kairos time, and prayer (see Revelation 8:3-7)
has occurred in a nation for judgment to be released.
When it hits, it will look like what happened
when the tsunami struck Bandi Aceh in Indonesia (a center for radical Islamic
terrorists). These terrorists had massacred thousands of Christians through
jihad the previous years; yet, the first people in to help them, when the
tsunami struck, were the Christians -- the same Christians who had seen their
friends and families slaughtered by the Muslims. Mercy triumphed over judgment.
God's glory was manifest through natural disaster (wrath) and through His Church
(mercy) at the same time.
Or when judgment hits, it will look like
Hurricane Katrina hitting a city like New Orleans, home of the 34th annual
Southern Decadence festival, where 100,000 mostly homosexual men gathered
annually for 5 days of unrestrained, public sex! This was welcomed and
sanctioned by the New Orleans' mayor, as it brought in $100 million for the
city. Yet, in the aftermath of the hurricane, many of the churches left standing
in the city opened their doors to shelter the homeless and provide food, water
and care for the suffering amongst them. Again, wrath and love met.
Prepare for
the Manifest Glory of God!
Maturing in intimacy has profound implications on how we should live. We need to
expect that tribulation will come. And we need to be prepared to manifest the
glory of God within us, by rushing to areas of trouble and disaster.
Supernatural miracles will flow as natural disasters happen. We worship with the
host of Heaven when God's nature is revealed in wrath (Revelation 11:17-18;
15:1-4; 16:4-6; 19:1-2).
With the angels we say:
"You are righteous, O Lord."
The One who is and who was and who is to be.
Because You have judged these things.
For they have shed the blood of saints and prophets,
And You have given them blood to drink.
For it is their just due. (Revelation 16:5-6 NKJV)
And then we rush to the affected areas to
reveal His mercy on earth, through acts of goodness, grace, forgiveness and
compassion. We love Him in Heaven by loving them on earth (John 13:34, 35; John
14: 15, 21-24; John 15:10,12; 1 John 3:14-15, 23; 4:7-8,11, 20-21). It is the
way we must live as the future unfolds. It is the way those who know Him have
always lived, because it is the way He lived.
"A disciple is not
above his teacher, nor a servant above his master. It is enough for a disciple
to become like his teacher, and a servant like his master" (Matthew 10:24-25,
NKJV).
By Stacey Campbell
Revival Now Ministries
www.revivalnow.com
email:
admin@beahero.org
~~~~
Stacey & Wesley Campbell's Upcoming
Itinerary:
September 22, 2005
Wesley will be in England
September 28-Ocober 1, 2005
Wesley will be in Abbotsford
October 14-16, 2005
Rising the Canadian Prophetic Voice
Spruce Grove - the Glory of the Father's House
Phone: 780-962-5699 Email: info@watchman.ca.
October 26, 2005
Stacey
will be in Redding, CA
|
C.
Peter Wagner is the founding president of Global Harvest Ministries, a
ministry that brings together prayer networks for the purpose of focusing prayer
power on world evangelism. He is also chancellor of Wagner Leadership Institute,
located in Colorado Springs, Colorado. Peter and his wife, Doris, were
missionaries in Bolivia from 1956 to 1971. Peter then served as professor of
church growth at the School of World Mission of Fuller Seminary from 1971 to
1999.
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