Stir The Slumbering Saints!
By W. C. Moore
It is our bounden duty, those of us who are ministers of the Gospel, to get a word from the Lord, and then to faithfully give it to the people, regardless of how our message is received – or rejected.
"Do I seek to please men? for if I yet pleased men, I should not be the servant of Christ" (Gal. 1:10).
If we have no word from the Lord for the people, it is our absolute duty to wait upon the Lord, in prayer and fasting and in faith, believing that He will give us His message for the people to whom we minister. See Psalm 27:14; Isaiah 40:29-31.
Do we at all realize the tremendous responsibility that rests upon those of us who are ministers of the Gospel? Every one of us is responsible to God as to the use of the talents that He has entrusted to each of us. Read Matthew 25:1-46.
"We shall all stand before the judgment seat of Christ…Every one of us shall give account of himself to God" (Rom. 14:10, 12). And ministers of the Gospel are especially accountable, "For unto whomsoever much is given, of him shall be much required'' (Luke 12:48).
"The priest's lips should keep knowledge, and they should, seek the law at his mouth: for he is the messenger of the Lord of hosts" (Mal. 2:7).
It Is Time to Seek The Lord Till He Come And Rain Righteousness Upon You (Hosea 10:12)
It is time to seek the Lord UNTIL revival fires burn! Till souls are convicted of sin! Till believers are filled with the Holy Spirit!
"Blow The Trumpet In Zion" (Joel 2:15)
And, in order to get the people to seek the Lord UNTIL revival comes, they first must be awakened! The shrill blast of the trumpet of God must jar them awake! Their sinful slumbers must be rudely broken into for their own good and for the good of the church at large!
So preachers of the glorious Gospel of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ: "Blow the trumpet in Zion, sanctify a fast, call a solemn assembly: gather the people…Let the…ministers of the Lord weep…" (Joel 2:15-17).
"Then will the Lord be jealous for His land, and pity His people. Yea, the Lord will answer and say unto His people, Behold, I will send you corn, and wine, and oil, and ye shall be satisfied therewith: and I will no more make you a reproach among the heathen" (Joel 2:18-19).
"Fear not, O land; be glad and rejoice: for the Lord will do great things…Be glad then, ye children of Zion, and rejoice in the Lord your God: for He hath given you the former rain moderately, and He will cause to come down for you the rain, the former rain and the latter rain in the first month. And the floors shall be full of wheat, and the vats shall overflow with wine and oil.
"And it shall come to pass afterward, that I will pour out My Spirit upon all flesh…And…whosoever shall call on the Name of the Lord shall be delivered" (Joel 2:21, 23-24, 28, 32).
Gather the People (Joel 2:16)
The gathering is to seek the Lord for revival, not to have in mind the building up of our particular denomination – for the whole church needs Revival! All the world needs Christ! He alone is the answer to individual needs and to all the problems that are distressing the nations of the earth!
''Gather My saints together unto Me; those that have made a covenant with Me by sacrifice" (Psa. 50:5).
Jesus, the Son of God, our Lord and Saviour, is "the Lion of the tribe of Judah" (Rev. 5:5), and "unto Him shall the gathering of the people be" (Gen. 49:8-10).
Behold a congregation of people. The pastor stands behind the pulpit. The people sit in the pews, listlessly waiting for the service to start. When suddenly – the pastor puts a trumpet to his mouth – and blows a shrill, penetrating blast!
The whole place is immediately electrified! People start from their seats! They catch their breath! All eyes are open – all ears are attentive – to see what this sudden siren blast means!
No lounging in the pews now! No wandering eyes! No wandering thoughts either any more, but with the startling notes of the trumpet still ringing in awakened ears – all are on the alert – to find out what is coming next!
The Spirit of God inspired the Prophet Joel to write as he did, and the very same Holy Spirit today is calling on pastors, evangelists, the leaders of God's people – to blow the trumpet in Zion, and to sound an alarm in God's own holy church!
Are we doing this! Or are we just waiting for disaster to overtake us while we fool around and talk of trivial, passing things?
The very same Holy Spirit who gave Joel the foreknowledge of coming events – that same Holy Spirit of God is today making His messengers to know that dark, terrible days are already upon us and that now is the time to arouse all Christians everywhere from their slouching sleep of death!
Oh, Pastors, Oh, Evangelists! Blow the Trumpet!
Blow the shrill, penetrating blast of repentance toward God, and faith toward our Lord Jesus Christ (Acts 20:21).
Rouse, jolt, stir the slumbering saints before it is forever too late! Your responsibility, ministers of the Lord, in this hour of dreadful crisis is great!
Rouse the people, even if, in so doing, you must frightfully shock them! Better an aroused, an awakened church on fire for God, seeking His face, gathering in the Gospel harvest before the harvesting season is over – better a church on her feet fighting the good fight of faith (1 Tim. 6:12) even if she gets a bit bruised in the awakening – than a sleeping church, all unaware of the approach of deadly enemies, all unconscious of approaching bondage, torture and unutterable doom!
Fellow ministers of the Gospel! To your knees in prayer! Travailing prayer! And to your feet with God's trumpet in hand!
Because "If the watchman see the sword come, and blow not the trumpet, and the people be not warned; if the sword come, and take any person from among them, he is taken away in his iniquity; but his blood will I require at the watchman's hand" (Ezek. 33:6).
"So thou, O son of man, I have set thee a watchman unto the house of Israel; therefore thou shalt hear the word at My mouth, and warn them from Me" (Ezek. 33:7).
God does not call His preachers to be ostriches and to bury their heads in the sands of idle indifference and criminal unconcern in the midst of today's terrible crisis!
The Word of God tells us to “Awake thou that sleepest, and arise…See then that ye walk circumspectly, not as fools, but as wise, redeeming the time, because the days are evil. Wherefore be ye not unwise, but understanding what the will of the Lord is" (Eph. 5:14-17).
First get thoroughly awakened to present-day dangers yourself. Then, with all your might, and with all the anointing of the Holy Spirit that God will give you – warn the people before it is forever too late!