A reprint from The Pentecostal Evangel, originally titled: IT’S
TIME FOR REVEILLE
By Ada
Brownell
Last night I became freshly
aware of how difficult it is to fight off sleep. My 10-year-old daughter was
ill. After praying for her and giving her medicine, I needed to stay away until
she was better.
But it was cold, so I crawled
in bed. Beneath the covers it was warm, and I had tremendous struggle to keep
from dozing off. Every muscle wanted to relax, but I kept thinking, I’ve got to stay awake!”
The struggle reminded me of
how difficult it is for Christians to stay spiritually awake. The cares of this
life make us weary. WE feel a need to relax, and before long our spiritual
senses grow dull and drowsy.
But the Lord commanded us to
watch! We are to keep alert. We are on duty! WE are to be watchful and ready at
all times for the Lord’s return.
Last spring where I live the
media asked if anyone had protested the teaching of evolution in the local
school district. In our city of over 100,000, no one had. I made a mental of
it, intending to them hear from me.
In the fall I was suddenly
reminded of my procrastination when my son came home from school and told me
wat his teacher said about the Bible. According to the teacher, the Bible says
the earth is flat, covered with a dome with stars painted on it, and the devil
in underneath in the flames of hell.
I told my son he should have
asked for chapter and verse, because no such things are taught in the Bible.
The next day I wrote the superintendent of schools and told him I had a
complaint about a teacher. I added, ‘While I am writing, I want to be on record
as opposing the teaching of evolution in our schools.’ Then I cited some
reasons why I don’t believe in evolution (based on extensive research) and
concluded by pointing out evolution is based on faith as much as belief in a
Creator is based on faith.
I received a letter from the
superintendent and later phone calls from both the superintendent and the
school principal. They apologized for the teacher. After I had a lengthy
discussion with the superintendent, he told me he agreed that taking courses in
evolution or creationism should be a choice for each pupil—or evolution should
not be taught.
Fifteen years ago when sex education was
introduced into the schools, the church stirred and grunted a little, but gave
up when the educated spokesmen embarrassed us publicly for our narrow-minded
morals. Sex education, they said, would eliminate venereal diseases, teen
pregnancy, and sexual hang-ups.
The tragic decline in morals
in this country since that time may be blamed on the media, as much as on
public schools, but publishers and broadcasters never would have dared spread
such filth had it not been for the silence of parents. The door to immorality
by parents allowing teachers to discuss sex without discussing morality and the
consequences of sinning our bodies as well as God.
But all hope is not lost. God
is still on the throne, and the gates of hell will not prevail against His
church. If we will open our ears to the sound of reveille, we can drive the
enemy back. We can put on the whole armor of God, take the sword of the Spirit
which is the Word of God and be triumphant.
“Awake thou that sleepest!”
Paul told the Ephesians. The Living Bible
has an interesting paraphrase of this passage: “Take no part in the worthless
pleasures of evil and darkness, but instead, rebuke and expose them… When you
expose them, the light shines in upon their sin and shows it up and when they
see how wrong they really are, some of them may even become children of the
light! That is why God says in Scriptures, “Awake. O Sleeper, and rise up from
the dead; and Christ shall give you light’” (Ephesians 5:11-14).
The alarm is sounding. It’s
time to wake up.
When I was a child, there was
fire at our house one morning. Daddy had left for work, and we were still in
bed when my mother shouted, “Fire!”
My brother Joe slept upstairs.
Even before I emerged from my downstairs bedroom, I heard him bound down the
stairs and dart out the back door. By the time I got outside that frosty
morning, Joe had carried the garden hose into the basement and was shooting
water on the flames above the furnace. When the fire department arrived, the
fire was out, and damage was minimal, due to Joe’s quick action.
The earth many not be on
fire—not yet—but sin is raging out of control, destroying many lives. It’s time
for action.
If the church will stir itself
from slumber, it can shake the world. Again and again it has happened in the
past. God uses people who will respond to His Spirit and give the sound of
reveille.
Reveille is not the most
welcome sound. The jangle of an alarm clock is on the worst noises in the
world.
Evangelists who sound the
alarm may not be popular, I once interviewed an elderly lady who heard D.L.
Moody preach in Leadville, Colo., when she was young.
The old woman curses as she
recalled the occasion: “The place was packed. I could hardly get into the
building. Moody started yelling and carrying on about sin, and I didn’t like
it. I got up and walked out.”
Even though we don’t like to
be disturbed, there are times we must be. “Now it is high time to awake out of
sleep,” Paul wrote, “for now is our salvation nearer than when we believed”
(Romans 13:11).
--PENTECOSTAL
EVANGEL, April 11, 1982.
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