Are You A Revolutionary Part 4

Are you a Revolutionary?

Are you transforming your entire life to emulate that of Jesus Christ’s?

Are you transforming your entire perspective to emulate that of Jesus Christ’s?

Your spiritual practices?

Your attitude?

Your character?

Your faith?

Your relationships?

Your behavior?

God wants to do a sudden, radical, and complete change in each of us. He wants us to be like Christ.

Is that possible? Without God nothing is possible, but with God all things are possible.

In this series we have been looking at the different definitions of Revolution.

The movement of a body in an orbit or circle.

The overthrow of a government or social system, with another taking its place.

A complete or radical change of any kind.

Revolutionaries have been with us throughout history.

Noah built an ark and put animals on it.

Abraham pulled up his roots and followed God.

Joseph said no to sexual temptation.

Moses led the people out of slavery.

Isaiah preached naked in Isaiah 20:1-6.

John the Baptist preached of repentance and ate locust and honey.

Jesus was the transforming agent sent to the earth by God.

The Disciples of Christ turned the world upside down and inside out after Jesus ascended to heaven.

The Apostle Paul ruffled the feathers of the Pharisees because he was completely and radically changed by a personal encounter with Christ.

History records the great Revolutionaries of the church, people like George Whitefield, John Wesley, and Martin Luther.

Then you have the Revolutionaries of the 1900’s. People like Charles Parham and William Seymore who were instrumental in the Pentecostal movement in the early 1900’s.

Kathryn Kuhlman, Billy Graham, Oral Roberts, Pat Robertson were the Revolutionaries in the 1930’s through the 1980’s.

And then you have the modern day Revolutionaries. People like John Arnott, Steve Hill, Tommy Barnett, John Maxwell, and George Barna.

And we cannot forget the Revolutionaries in our own church movement, President Jeff Farmer, Superintendent Ken Groen. Pastors like Brett Black who is opening churches for Gen X and Gen Y.

Others are Joel & Linda Budd in Tulsa Oklahoma, Jim Brewer in the Des Moines area, Les Funderburg in Rock Falls, Illinois who has a professional go-cart track on the church grounds, Michael Craft who changed the name of his church to Desperation Church.

Ted Gillum who has opened a coffee shop outreach center.

I identified Pastor Groen as a Revolutionary the other day as we were talking on the phone and he was so excited to be identified as such. Pastor Groen has identified all of these other people in our own church movement as agents of change.

And then Pastor Ken identified me as a Revolutionary stating I was someone who is teaching on change and opening up new ideas to a congregation that is hungry for the things of God. A person who is growing his hair out to prove the fact that transformation is important and needed. He reminded me that I will do whatever it takes to get the Good News to the people.

All of these are people who persist in thinking outside the box and have endured the scoffs and abuse of the spiritual faction within the church.

As a matter of historical record, whenever the church of Christ has begun to experience significant growth and radical transformation it has been accompanied with the persecution of God’s people. The Revolutionaries of God have been slandered, ridiculed, abused and even murdered.

Revolutionaries often meet with resistance, sometimes even to the point of violence.

Today millions of Christians are desiring to live their lives in such a way that they are centered on knowing, loving, and serving God and they are even willing to step away from the institution of the church because the church is failing to bring them closer to God or they are seeking out churches like ours that will bring them new life in Christ and they are being criticized about it.

Even those pastors that I named a few moments ago are criticized by people because they are seeking innovative ways of reaching the lost and bring all closer to God.

Revolutionaries are passionate about getting closer to God and they are passionate about bringing others closer to God.

Today as we conclude I want to look at the seven passions of a Revolutionary as they are outlined in the book of Acts.

PRAY

Father we ask for Your anointing on us today. Place Your anointing on me as Your messenger today. Make each of us revolutionist.

Open our eyes so that we may see Your Word. Open our ears so that we may hear Your Word. Open our minds so that we may understand Your Word. Open our hearts so that we may receive Your Word today.

AMEN

The seven passions of a Revolutionary are defined for us in the book of Acts. These Scriptures are important to us because they describe the very nature of the life of the early church as it began to form immediately after Jesus returned to heaven.