Where do I even begin? Each service has been building in intensity since Sunday morning. Tonight was the most intense service thus far. I preached from II Chronicles 29 about King Hezekiah reopening and consecrating the temple after his pagan father had shut the doors and defiled it.
We need more courageous men like Hezekiah. He was only 25 years old and took this stand in the first year of his reign. The scripture says he made a covenant with God and sent the priest to take out every defiled thing from the Temple.
Think of the implications of having the Temple shut for sixteen years while King Ahaz reigned. No atonement for sin was available to the people. How many died in their sins guilty before a just God? Hezekiah changed all that. The priest offered sin offerings and then they did something else.
They worshipped. They sang praises to God with joy and gladness. The challenge at the end of the service tonight was to give God the ultimate worship based on [Rom 12:1] “Therefore I urge you brethren, by the mercies of God to present your bodies a living and holy sacrifice, acceptable to God which is your spiritual service of worship.” Laying our lives down before Lord in full surrender and consecration is the ultimate form of worship.
The invitation was simple. Remove every unclean thing from your life. Offer your life as a sacrificial offering to the Lord. Lastly I challenged the church to sing and worship the Lord from glad hearts.
Sean first led us in a song about consecrating our lives to God. The altar filled up all the way across. The first person to respond was a seventy-year old senior adult lady. I cannot tell you how much this blessed my heart. In fact her response inspires me to keep laying my life down as an offering to Him until my last breath. Grown men, women, students, and dads with their children came up to the front to lay their lives down. Sean then moved into the song “I Will Never Be the Same”. People began to applaud and shout as they sang. This song was the theme song of the revival back in August. We concluded the night by singing “It Is Well With My Soul”. At the end as we sang the last verse about Jesus coming back people again shouted and clapped. This is not typical in this First Baptist Church.
I am struck by the scene of a single young lady kneeling at the altar singing with her hands extended in worship. It was a very intense night. As I have done many times before I went to the altar and laid my life and family before the Lord. Whether that means staying in Seminole for decades or following God elsewhere once again I fully surrendered. That is what brought me to Seminole in the first place. I knelt at the same exact spot tonight I knelt in April of 2009 telling God if He willed for my family to come to Seminole we would follow. Life on the altar is something I want to live out all my days.
When the service eventually ended I felt uplifted and closer to God. People did not leave right away. Some continued to commune with the Lord. Others embraced with giddy smiles.
The crowds have been great every service. Many people had baseball games to attend with their children tonight but I could not tell much drop off in the attendance. Students have the TAKS test this week but their hunger for God supersedes the TAKS test. One man has two exit tests from school but could not stay away from what the Lord is doing.
We just finished day three and revival fire is burning hotter and God is moving stronger. I cannot wait to see what He does on day four.
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