Originally published in "The Lord's Coming Herald & Wesleyan Bible Prophecy Advocate," Spring Edition 1999
How The Holiness Movement Can Be Reborn
Praise God, we believe the good
old-fashioned Bible Holiness-with-standards movement is now being reborn! Not
that "holiness" itself is anything different than it ever was, for holiness is
grounded in the nature of God himself, and he never changes. We are rather
witnessing the rebirth if the Bible Holiness movement, with emphasis is on the
word "movement."
What is a "movement" anyway?
A movement is an alignment of people that is "on the move." A
movement is going somewhere, is on the stretch to accomplish a stated mission,
purpose, or goal. Inherent in the nature of a movement is the element of
dynamism, which is the exact opposite of experiencing ham-strungness,
debilitation, disintegration, or demise.
None can deny the fact that God intended Christianity to be a
world-wide movement. "Go and make disciples of all nations," Jesus said,
and based his great commission on the express declaration that God will have all
men to be saved, and to come to the knowledge of the truth.
Clearly, the Lord is not willing that any should perish, but
that all should come to repentance! This can only mean that God is working to
save the entire world now, in this present dispensation, through the power of
the Cross. John Wesley believed God that will work to save the world, just as he
works to save each individual soul, "not by forcing men, but by assisting
them through grace to choose the better part."
Wesley continually insisted on the truth that salvation was
for all men, as opposed to Calvin's teaching that God's purpose for this age was
to save only the elect. Yes, Wesley's plan was to save the ship, and not simply
to take off a few individuals from a doomed vessel, as premillennialism
suggests.
Francis T. Glasson, His Appearing and His Kingdom (p. 159) makes the following salient comment in support of the Wesleyan
challenge:
"Men's actions spring from their beliefs. If we believe
that ... the present age will end in apostasy, that the victory of Christianity
is no part of the divine purpose, we shall be satisfied ' with things as they
are. But if we believe that the Church is the organ of the divine plan to
reconcile all things to God, that a time is coming when through the power of the
Cross, the knowledge of God shall cover the earth as the waters cover the sea,
the whole spirit of our approach and our expectancy will be different. In any
case, it is a fact that the roots of the modern missionary movement—a movement
which has led to the emergence of the world church, 'the great new fact of our
time'—were connected with a profound faith in the Latter-day Glory of the
Church, as it was called."
Compare this optimistic expectation of salvation within
history with the theological dilemma of a contemporary writer, who looks for
real moral redemption only beyond history:
"The present mission of the Church is not to save the world and thus
establish the kingdom of God but to evangelize the world by the proclamation of
the Gospel. . . . The Church is not to save the world; it is not to Christianize
the world; it is not to transform the world so that it becomes the kingdom of
God. This will be accomplished only by the glorious second coming of Christ" (George Elden Ladd, The Blessed Hope, pp. 7, 148).
Friends, the fatal flaw in popular dispensational
premillennialism lies in its application of the Calvinistic dogma of the
unconditional election of individuals to the broad context of salvation history.
Where this theory is accepted in Wesleyanism the Arminian synthesis is lost, and
without the Arminian element in Christianity universalism or antinomianism must
be the inevitable result.
None can successfully deny that the purpose of the redemption
offered in the Christian religion is indeed to "make men holy." And heart
purity being the central idea of Christianity that it is, are not the
"Christian" movement and the "Holiness" movement, in strict biblical parlance,
inseparability synonyms?
Yet, how many today believe in the cause of spreading
scriptural holiness over these lands? How many of us are absolutely passionate
about the prospects of world-wide redemption in this present age through the
power of the Cross?
The rebirth of the Holiness movement of which we speak,
then, is nothing more or less than the recapturing of faith in the
world-redeeming vision of Jesus Christ, and a willingness to lay our lives on
the line to make it happen.
Friends, it never will, until we give up our pessimistic
predestinarian fatalism and start believing in the cause. If the foundations be
destroyed what can the righteous do?
They can begin at once to rebuild foundations! Amen?
Related Article Links
How Repentance Is Still Relevant Today
Where John Wesley's Understanding Of Eschatology Will Take Us
Christ's Day Of Power