186 days until the Greenock, Scotland Revival Conference
By the mercy of God I have been a believer in the Lord Jesus Christ since my early youth. Over the years of my earthly pilgrimage I have known what it is like to climb great spiritual mountains and how it feels to fall into chasms of blackness. I have had long seasons of great Christian joy and intense moments of utter despair. For protracted periods I have enjoyed the knowledge of sins forgiven, yet on occasion have wondered if even the gracious Lord of heaven could or would pardon me.
Over the years I have learned something of the urgent necessity of a steady walk with Christ and of the frightening power of Satan in drawing me away from my deepest commitments. The years have proven how carefully the concerns of the soul must be cultivated and how easily backsliding sets in. One small disagreement with God is sufficient to halt forward spiritual progress and to enable backsliding to gain its toehold.
My observations of the spiritual struggles of the believer have not been restricted to my own experience. Having taught and preached in a great variety of places over the last four decades, I have come to realize disagreement with God is at the root of man’s spiritual problems. It is with great sorrow that I recall some who once seemed to walk with Christ with both joy and enthusiasm who are now much less zealous than earlier. Can any man number the vast multitudes of persons who know all the right words, who even seem to have a form of godliness, and yet denying the power thereof? Where did all their power go? Is not disagreement with God their fundamental difficulty?
The consequence of this large scale disagreement with God is that a watching world is doubtful indeed of the validity of Christianity, for they observe that the impact of the negative witness of millions who profess to be “born-again” Christians, and obviously are either not Christians at all or are not practicing Christianity, is vastly greater than the impact of the positive witness of that minority of professed Christians who have been truly converted to Jesus Christ.
Only a revival of genuine Christianity can turn this tragic situation around and make the Christian Church once more a powerful force for good and for God in today’s world. While the revival which is needed must be a very popular revival, sweeping millions from the kingdom of words into the kingdom of power and other millions from the kingdom of darkness into the kingdom of light, it must have its beginning in small ways and in individual lives. -Richard Owen Roberts
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