I printed out the four sheets of paper....and had them framed....set top to bottom....39" x 10"....and displayed it in the Christian bookstore that we owned roughly twenty-five years ago. I have it here beside me right now....signed on April 20, 1996 by some of the top evangelical ministers of that day....it was called....The Cambridge Declaration....and it listed the Solas of the 16th century Reformation....Sola Scriptura....followed in the Declaration by....The Erosion of Authority....and so on.....Solus Christus: The Erosion of Christ-Centered Faith....Sola Gratia: The Erosion of the Gospel....Solas Fide: The Erosion of the Chief Article....and Soli Deo Gloria: The Erosion of God-Centered Worship. These were followed by....A Call To Repentance & Reformation.
These men....R. C. Sproul and Alistair Begg and Michael Horton and David Wells among them....titled that declaration in reference to an awakening that began in England....Cambridge University to be exact....a small pub....The White Horse Inn....to be more exact. From this came the English Reformation. So from this....essentially came you and I!Lord willing.....in a few days we hope to see the new film that is out on the Jesus Revolution from the early 1970s....and I hope to have some words describing my experience seeing the film shortly afterwards.
There have been numerous supposed revivals in the last few decades....in Canada and Florida and elsewhere. It's like a fad that appears occasionally....and then disappears....thankfully....for they are usually based on charismatic nonsense.
So there is a lot of talk today about something going on at a small Christian college in Kentucky....with similar gatherings at other Christian colleges. Will this turn out to be something such as what the famous Christian pastor Chuck Smith was involved in back in the 70s? Francis Schaeffer with his L'Abri in Switzerland...and R. C. Sproul with his....Ligonier Valley Study Center....along with Pat Robertson's 700 Club....(different as these ministries may be).....were part of something that God was doing that would positively affect the church in America in the 70s through the 90s. Actually you would have to go further back to Martyn Lloyd-Jones in London.....and Billy Graham.
I'm going to give a very strange anecdote here. It was about six years ago....and my wife and I were staying in a nice Bed & Breakfast....somewhere on the east coast. We like B&Bs because you meet people at the breakfast table....and we did meet a young couple. The husband worked in the government....and was directly involved in budgeting. I knew the answer already....but I asked him anyway....Donald Trump had recently signed an almost trillion dollar funding bill....much of which was headed to the military....and Trump....being Trump....had been shouting to anyone who would listen....that he had....rebuilt the military....past tense....as if it were already done. What was this young man's thoughts on Trump's statements? He laughed and said that it would probably be a year before any equipment arrived anywhere.
So....as this may pertain to claims of revival....we all need revived....awakened....humbled. That is the problem! Some movement begins as in Kentucky....and we....who need revived....who need humbled and awakened....celebrate as if revival had already happened! We missed a step. What about our own revival? Like Trump....we claim that the military was rebuilt....that there is revival...when in a best case scenario....the military may be rebuilt.
I would think that revival would not begin with the church celebrating revival. This was part of what happened in the Second Great Awakening.....which was not such a great awakening. I would think that revival....or awakening....would be more like what happened in Cambridge University where students and Dons gathered talking about....what Luther was teaching about God and His Word! A number of those young men wound up burned at the stake. As with R. C. Sproul....and Ligonier....it was not revival that was celebrated.....but the holiness and sovereignty of God!
