The counter-cultural quality of great awakenings and spiritual revolutions “Already you have all you want! Already you have become rich . . . we are fools . . . but you are wise in Christ. We are weak, but you are strong. You are held in honor, but we in disrepute . . . Up to this moment we have become the scum of the earth, the refuse of the world. . . . But I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me.” – Paul the apostle. God has not called us to cultural relevancy. He has called us to counter-culture revolution. He has called us as a creative and prophetic minority to question the prevailing consensus and speak forth a better reality. For the kingdom of God is counter to all kingdoms of this world and is overturning their thrones. For this reason, Mary the mother of Jesus is still celebrating the revolutionary power of God’s reign: “He is bringing down the powerful from their thrones, and lifting up lowly; He is filling the hungry with good things, and sending the rich away empty.” For now is the Year of the Lord, and the kingdoms of this world shall become the kingdom of God. There are Christians who are “misfits;” “misfits who believe that the way things are is not how things are supposed to be. . . [but] History has taught us that it is when ‘misfits’ call for an end of the status quo, that the rumblings of revival begin.” – Jim Wallis, The Great Awakening: Seven Ways to Change the World. “I call upon you to be maladjusted . . . The world is in desperate need of such maladjustment. Through such maladjustment we will be able to emerge from the bleak and desolate midnight of man’s inhumanity to man into the bright and glittering daybreak of freedom and justice. . . . This hour in history needs a dedicated circle of transformed nonconformists. The saving of our world from pending doom will come not from the actions of a conforming majority but from the creative maladjustment of a transformed minority.” – Martin Luther King Jr. “Christendom adjusts itself far too easily to the worship of power. . . Christians should take a stronger stand in favour of the weak rather than considering first the possible right of the strong.” – Dietrich Bonhoffer, sermon on 2 Corinthians 12:9; executed by the Nazis who sought to make Christian churches “culturally relevant.” The Key to Global Prosperity At this very moment the rich nations of the world, the affluent peoples of the world, and particularly those in the world who believe the boundless wealth they possess is given to them by the mercy of God; all these individuals, communities, peoples and nations, have together in their hands the key to an era of global prosperity not known since the dawn of human civilization. The key is simple and is four-fold. First, all these peoples, or at least vast representations of their communities need only repent of their many extravagant indulgences which are destroying the world’s ecosystem and that even more so at the expense of the developing and non-developed nations of the world and world’s poor. Second, they must squarely resolve to adapt and find satisfied enjoyment in a far simpler lifestyle that is profoundly shaped by an awareness into how the crisis at hand further threatens the world’s poor. They must do so because it is they— the poor of the word in the two-third’s world, who face the greatest suffering by the coming ecological and humanitarian crises, which is rooted in the past and present mindless carbon footprints— not of the two-thirds world, but by the first-world people of the world. The crises of global poverty and impending ecological disaster are one and the same. And both crises threaten the present and enjoyed security of the world’s affluent. We all live on borrowed time. The poor of this world, the world’s oppressed, the hungry and the starving, they suffer not foremost because of those demonically-enslaved forces of terror now unleashed upon both poor and rich alike, but because of our own consumerist-driven extravagances. For it is our extravagance largely made available to us through wrong paradigms towards our entire created order, which has led and is now leading to a possible world-encompassing and cataclysmic ecological meltdown and financial ruin of many nations. At the top of this list is the United States, followed by the European Union, then China, and then India. This list is certainly even more astonishing as China and India are set to substantially lead the global economy over the next century. Furthermore, we must squarely acknowledge that if we take the high road, we must therefore know that in the short run, the rich nations of the world will need to make far greater, biting and painful changes in how we spend our wealth. It is they who are most responsible for the coming crisis, and it is they who must also make the needed sacrifices and monetary outlay to tackle the crisis. We must do so if we are to avert the coming ecological meltdown and security-threatening crisis of global poverty. To squarely acknowledge and embrace this cost however, is indeed a high road which can lead us into a new and profound era of global prosperity, not just for the affluent peoples of the world, but also for so many who are now living in abject poverty. We must find resolve towards this high road, for in one way or another, global poverty as it presently exists, directly threatens the economic security of every first-world community. This threat to our present security and seeming stability exists because everything we own is in some way tied, linked and connected to the destiny of every hungry child, man and woman throughout world. We are fools if we think our lives are lived in complete isolation from the “have-nots” of this world. The very forces of globalisation which have brought us all the wealth we now enjoy, are the same forces which threaten to destroy us if we cannot find a way to let go and invest the bulk of our wealth, towards redeeming the world’s impoverished. They are the ones who will first suffer from the follies of our material extravagances when the tides of natural calamity are finally unleashed upon the earth. But is also they who will rise up in judgment against us, against our folly and against our selfish squandering of God’s creation. Third, if this high road is taken by the rich, the affluent, the wealthy and the materially secure of the world, then let them give their wealth— let them invest without reserve to the creation of radically new technologies which will now free us from all carbon-based fuel and energy sources. For if we do so, then also we may well usher in an era of technological innovation and scientific advancement not seen since the Renaissance. And through the spirit of profound charity towards the world’s poor and economically oppressed, this 21st century Renaissance can be simultaneously parallel to the greatest spiritual awakening ever to cover the earth. What spiritual awakenings we have known in these past three centuries can well up into an even greater outpouring of the Holy Spirit upon all flesh. New gifts of the Spirit will be given. The earth shall be full of the glory of the Lord. Floods of emotions will well up from within the hearts of many when the Spirit is again poured out. What man had tried to achieve through all his managerial capacities, God will achieve in one day. Swords shall be laid down. Fourth, is perhaps the most crucial part of the key to global prosperity. This fourth aspect specifically concerns the largest religious grouping of our world— the professing Christians of the world, of whom I also represent. Even more importantly, it is the spiritually regenerate Church of our Lord Jesus Christ, who should by the very Spirit of Christ, want to lead the way out of the coming destruction. It is most damaging and irresponsible for you who are professing Christians, to forsake this earth in your belief that it is hopelessly doomed and must be doomed to destruction. For until the day He calls you to Himself, and until the day He returns in coming glory, the land where you stand is the garden He has called you care for and to till and to nurture. He has not called you to exploit and destroy for your own gratification, but to care for and he has called you to care and look after all the animals of the forest, the birds of the air and the creatures in the sea. Over all these, He has made you steward and ambassador in His behalf. Therefore, we can argue that on the global scale, the ecological meltdown that threatens our entire human existence is also to some dire extent, caused by wrong past ideologies, mindsets and doctrines held, propagated and practised by vast communities of Christians throughout the world, especially by first-world Christians. These doctrines are doctrines touching on matters towards wealth, consumerism, material possessions, creation, the material universe, and our human role on earth as God’s steward. Therefore, the fourth key implies that repentance must be begin with the household of God. As a matter of conscience, we must turn from our preferred eagerness to identify ourselves primarily with the rich of the world, rather than with the poor of the world. Or have you forgotten the word of our brother James, who was the Lord’s brother: “Come now, you rich people, weep and wail for the miseries that are coming to you. . . . Listen! The wages of the laborers who mowed your fields, which you kept back by fraud, cry out, and the cries of the harvesters have reached the ears of the Lord of hosts. You have lived on the earth in luxury and in pleasure; you have fattened your hearts in a day of slaughter.” But Nineveh believed God, and God repented of the judgment about the calamity He said He would bring upon them. And He refrained from doing so. Judgment does not yet have to come. The Church can repent on behalf of the dying believers and confess their partaking in the sins of those outside the Church. Seek the welfare of the city where I have sent you into exile, and pray to the LORD on its behalf, for in its welfare you will find your welfare. “Is not this the fast that I choose: to loose the bonds of injustice. Is it not to share your bread with the hungry, and bring the homeless poor into your house; when you see the naked, to cover them, and not to hide yourself from your own kin?” But if you do not hide, then your light shall break forth like the dawn. Then you shall enjoy the wealth of the nations, and in their riches you shall glory. For the Lord loves justice, hates robbery and wrongdoing. Then you shall be called the repairer of the breach, and the restorer of streets to live in. Justice will roll down like waters. Righteousness like an ever flowing stream. You will drink from the brook beside the way, and you will lift up your head.
Posted on: Sun, 10 Aug 2014 21:27:03 +0000
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