Regaining Lost Ground

Shane Idleman: There was a sense of revival, a sense of fasting, of starving the flesh to be filled with the spirit. Here is what's happening, truth is being minimized, mocked, and removed. Prayer, we are too busy. America is too busy. Prayer is out of schools, it's out of our home life, we are all too busy. Fasting, you're going to kill yourself if you fast, you're going to die. I've heard that so many times. That's why you don't tell people you're fasting all the time. That's stupid. All these truths, these great truths of the Bible are being minimized.

Guest (Male): Thank you for joining us here at Westside Christian Fellowship, located in Leona Valley, California, one hour north of Los Angeles. Today's message on regaining lost ground is titled, When the Church Had Power. In this message, Pastor Shane urges all Christians to reflect on the history of the true church and seek God with a greater hunger and thirst for more of his presence in our life.

A powerful call to return to our first love, our beautiful Savior, Jesus Christ, King of kings and Lord of lords. You can hear the whole message at Pastor Shane's YouTube and Rumble channels. Make sure to subscribe today. For more information, visit us online at westsidechristianfellowship.org. We also encourage you to hear more truth from Pastor Shane with the Idleman Unplugged weekly podcast. And now from Westside Christian Fellowship in Leona Valley, California, here is Pastor Shane Idleman.

Shane Idleman: My passion right now is for revival for our nation. To me, that's our only hope. Our only hope is in God renewing and re-igniting his church because his church is his hands and feet. His church is the spiritual power here on earth. Without that, we are nothing. Our nation is nothing, the churches are nothing without the mighty moving of God's spirit.

The title today is When the Church Had Power. What I mean by that is there was a time in our history when the church was not known for decadence and decay and closing its doors. The church is actually known for spiritual power starting on the day of Pentecost two thousand years ago, which by the way is coming up again May 31st, when the Holy Spirit fell upon his church.

We do find ourselves in interesting times here in our nation. There's so much information out there and you can say amen even though I can't hear you if you think we're getting too much information from too many different sources. We all know though that America is ripe for judgment. I often get emails, not a lot, but people saying, Shane, what are you talking about? Don't you know that the tribulation is coming? Don't you know things are going to get difficult? Don't you know that God's judgment is going to fall?

My question to them is always this: how do you know? How do you know that God isn't calling his church for that third great awakening? How do you know that God is not going to spark revival and renewal? In the midst of judgment, here's the thing you have to remember: God's judgment falls upon a disobedient people and a rebellious people, but he will discipline his children.

The judgment of God often does not fall upon his children. For example, Lot, the story of Sodom and Gomorrah, and Abraham said, "Would you spare the city for a certain amount of righteous?" We see that God keeps his remnant safe. When you have tens of thousands of serious Christians calling out to God on behalf of our nation and interceding on behalf of our nation, I have to believe that somehow you can stop that judgment hand of God if there is a revival and a renewal of repentance.

You just have to look no further than the Assyrian capital of Nineveh. Nineveh was called to prayer and to fasting and to repentance and God withdrew his judgment from that. So I look at a church as a fighting church, as a church that says, "God, we're contending, would you stay your hand? Would you hold your hand of judgment? Would you bless our children and our grandchildren?" So I'm not one to run right underneath the bed and hide because the judgment of God is falling. God says, "Stand and be that light, be that example, do business until I return." So I see great hope in the midst of adversity.

Duncan Campbell in his book that I highly recommend, The Price and Power of Revival, said this: "How is it that while we make such great claims for the power of the gospel, we see so little of the supernatural in operation?" Is there any reason why the church today cannot everywhere equal the church at Pentecost?

I will tell you by the authority of God's word, no, there is no reason why the church today can't resemble the church at Pentecost. Why? Because it's the same Holy Spirit, it's the same empty vessel, it's the same principles of humility and dependence upon God and brokenness and counting the cost and having a desperation for the things of God. That's what's missing. Our apathy and our pride is our downfall.

As I said last week, revival cannot be worked up. What I mean by that is so many people have revival meetings and this is revival because people are acting a little bit weird and there's people at the altar and these things. There must be revival. No, you can't work revival up. It has to come from heaven, but it can be fueled.

Revival can be fueled as men and women seek the heart of God. You can fuel it, you can throw gasoline on the fire. I just did that last week with just a little cup and I almost burned my hand. I just fueled that fire. God is looking for those empty vessels saying, "I want to fuel that fire. Just give me a man and a woman on their face before me seeking my heart and I will pour into them."

I want to remind you again this week as I did last week that you are as revived as you want to be. You are awakened spiritually as much as you want to be. You are as close to God as you want to be. So we have to stop blaming God and we have to start looking at our own hearts. God, would you rend the heavens? Would you come down and baptize me in a spirit of anguish and brokenness and humility, God, so I can go out in the power of the spirit? Why can't we pray for the sick? Why can't we pray for those who are demon possessed? It's the same church, it's the same Holy Spirit.

I want to just give you a little taste of what I might give you a fuller taste next week. I want to talk about the atmosphere of revival, hopefully next week God willing. But here's just a small example of power from the book The Price and Power of Revival. This is from Duncan Campbell. He said, "I think again of those people in the Hebrides." Duncan Campbell was a minister that was called to the islands of New Hebrides off of Scotland and he went there and experienced a mighty move of God's spirit.

What I mean by that is bars are closed down, churches are going until two in the morning, there's another service the next day, doors are packed, people are waiting in line. God's spirit is falling in homes and taverns. People are walking to church and just feeling the power of God. That's revival. That's our hope.

He said how they longed, how the people of New Hebrides longed for God, how they prayed and how they waited and how they cried, "Oh God, rend the heavens and come down." In all that time, be patient church. Westside Christian Fellowship, if you're listening, be patient because it doesn't happen overnight. It's not a quick formula. It's a travailing and a waiting.

All the time God was dealing with them and in and through the process of cleansing. What he means by that is there's a process of cleansing where that hard heart has to be broken, where that unrepentant sin has to be repented of, where these things that are holding us back from God have to be removed from our lives and there's a process of cleansing.

It went on until that moment came when the angels and the archangels looking down over the battlements of glory, looking down at a ready people, they cried out, "God, the vessels are clean! The vessels are clean! The miracle can now happen!" I believe with all my heart, it is the deep conviction of my soul that they are ever gazing over the battlements of glory and waiting for a prepared people.

Duncan Campbell goes on to say it is one thing to shout it, it's one thing to sing it, it's one thing to talk about revival. But give me a people on their face seeking rightly to be related to God. When that happened, you will see the spirit of God fall upon a broken and humble people that are receptive and open to the move and the power of the Holy Spirit.

I don't know if you've seen some of the news headlines and I just chuckle. Some of them read like this: "The church is in trouble. The church is in trouble." I want to tell some of you out there, don't view our waiting as passivity. Don't view our waiting on God as passivity. Many armies do not rush ahead in battle, they prepare. They wait patiently. Jesus said, "I will build my church and the gates of hell will not prevail."

I think it was one news commentator on Fox News and he said, "Churches, pastors in California, where are you? Look at what the governor is doing." I want to shout through the television, "Hold on! Hold on, we're waiting. We're waiting." There's a power rising up. When you wait on God, then the spirit of rebellion must leave and then you go out in the power of the spirit and you can pull down strongholds. You can accomplish mighty things for God because you can do the right thing at the wrong time and it becomes the wrong thing.

Waiting is strengthening. You ever hear athletes say, "We're waiting for the big game"? Olympic athletes, "We're waiting for the Olympics in four years." We're waiting for that big event. Are they sitting at home eating donuts watching Netflix? No. In the waiting time, they're strengthening, they're building, they're preparing so then when they go out to battle they are prepared.

Leonard Ravenhill in his very compelling book, Revival Praying, and don't read that unless you want to be convicted by the way, he said this: "Since something is obviously stopping the spirit's inflow into us Christians, the same thing is stopping his outflow. With the spirit's help, we need to search for this hindrance." I did a little searching for you, I'll tell you what it is right now. Two things: the hindrance of pride or the hindrance of spiritual apathy.

If you are not experiencing the mighty power of the Holy Spirit, love, joy, peace, contentment, and powerful worship and obedience to God's word and just this spiritual life that's on fire for God, you either have the hindrance of spiritual pride or you have the hindrance of spiritual apathy. I talked about this last week. I'm not going to go into it but if you think you might have a problem with spiritual pride, listen to last week's message.

The bottom line is you can have the letter of the law but not the heart of Christ. I've never seen arrogant Pharisees experience revival. Hearts are so calloused and cold. And then we also have spiritual apathy. The lukewarm church and lukewarm Christians disdain the heat of conviction, thus it remains lukewarm. Lukewarm as we know is not hot or cold, it's just nothing. It's blah. And that spiritual apathy has to be revived.

I want to read a quick poem by Wilbur Reese I've read to our congregation a few times before in regard to spiritual apathy. He said this: "I would like to buy just three dollars worth of God, please. Not enough to explode my soul or disturb my sleep. I just want enough to equal a cup of warm milk or a snooze in the sunshine."

"I want ecstasy, not transformation. I want the warmth of the womb, not the new birth. I want a pound of the eternal in a paper sack. I would like to buy just three pounds of God, please."

What's been happening the last few weeks? God has been planting seeds in these messages and in my heart the last few weeks. Why is that? Because he's preparing the soil of many hearts. You wouldn't believe the emails we receive from Florida, Texas, Massachusetts, New York, New Jersey, Washington, of people being radically broken and revived by the spirit of God.

He's preparing the soils of hundreds if not thousands of Americans. We have to remember this, revival is like farming. The farmer can't make the seed grow. He can create an environment for growth. When I was a little kid, we loved to eat watermelons out on the concrete and there's tons of seeds and guess what? No watermelon ever grew in the concrete.

My dad would wash those seeds off out into the dirt and next year we would have a beautiful line of watermelons all up and down our driveway. Same seed, different environment. So although we cannot create revival and make it happen, we can create an environment. God looks and the Bible talks about that there's sins that have reached the stench in the nostrils of a righteous holy God.

He also says, "I smell the sweet-smelling aroma of a sacrifice on the altar that is broken and humble before me. Is that the cry of my children crying out for me to move? I will beckon that call, I will answer that call, I will hear that call." Why? Because his name is at stake. He said, "If you seek me, if you cry out, I will answer." So we're creating an atmosphere and an environment for the Holy Spirit who is bound by his word to move.

But we do have to be careful. Don't get me wrong. We can't say things like, and I've heard this before, "Fasting, if you just fast, revival will come." Or we always use our favorite verse for these times. Second Chronicles 7:14 is not the cure-all for everything. I just had a person this week say you can't use that verse and I said, "Why is that?" Well, that was for Old Testament Israel. I know the context of Solomon.

I know that he said when I bring locusts, when I bring famine, when I bring pestilence, if my people who are called by my name do these things, I will heal their land. The land that was given to Israel. I got it, but that principle still applies today. So are you telling me that if people across America, if they humble themselves and they pray and they seek his face, not his hand, his face, and they cry out and they turn from their sin that God will say, "Well, that doesn't apply today, that was two thousand years ago"?

No, Paul actually said that the Old Testament was given to us that we might not lust after evil things that they lusted. So we have to learn from their disobedience but we also can be encouraged by their obedience. Certain principles, certain truths, do not end just because there's a gap between the Old and New Testament. The same Jesus, the same yesterday, today, and forevermore. The principle of humility started in Genesis and it will finish in Revelation.

If we humble ourselves, here's the point I'm getting at. When the church has power is when it's revived. Revival and spiritual power go together. What revival is, is awakening someone who is dead spiritually. This can be a Christian. This is not salvation. Salvation is evangelism and because of revival, evangelism happens. But I'm not talking about right now salvation, unbelievers coming from darkness to light.

I'm talking about the dead apathy of the church coming to life and God re-igniting that hunger. Like he told the church in Ephesus, "Oh, you're really good at pointing out sin, but you've left your first love, come back to me." Or the other churches he rebuked and he said, "You're lukewarm, you don't care about doctrine, you've drifted, come back to me." When the church is revived, it has its power.

My biggest concern right now is not the fake news and the governmental oversight and overreach, although it is a concern. My big concern right now is the apathy of Christians toward spiritual things. Many people hear prayer and fasting, yeah, I got that, I know. There's a danger in familiar words. So let me give you two other words, phrases. Instead of prayer and fasting, how about communicating with God and starving the flesh? That's what needs to take place.

Fasting basically is this: when I am full of fleshly appetites, it leaves little room for the spirit. A little secret for preaching, I'll just tell those pastors out there, you've got to come to the pulpit hungry. You've got to come to the pulpit hungry. What I mean is natural appetites are suppressed so spiritual appetites can be increased. When you're full of pride, you lack humility. When you're full of covetousness, you lack generosity. When you're full of anger, you lack love.

When you're full of food, that often outweighs the fullness of the spirit. Listen, I don't like it any more than you do. I love a big dinner, I love a big steak and potatoes and Mexican food, and I even like Chinese food. I like food. But if I'm always full and I'm always consuming those fleshly appetites, it will leave little room for God. Fasting is a period of starving the flesh so I can be filled with the spirit of God.

All throughout the Bible, in dire situations, fasting with the right heart is always prescribed. Always prescribed. In dire situations, let me just thank God for sustaining us so far. Do you have any idea how much worse this could have been? I know it's not over yet but do you have any idea what could have happened? Massive riding, food shortage, death, decay, suicide, martial law. We need to thank almighty God for only giving us one spanking so far. His loving hand of mercy.

I wrote this in a book and I want to just tell you about fasting in case many of you don't know this. Some of you who attend Westside know this, but many of you don't. Moses actually received the word of God when he fasted. King Jehoshaphat experienced victory after he fasted. Esther received protection after she fasted. Elijah was restored and renewed because of fasting. Daniel experienced the supernatural because of fasting. Ezra received direction and safe passage because of fasting. Nehemiah was strengthened. Joel offered the cure for judgment by fasting. And Jesus was empowered by fasting.

On and on and on it goes. I can take you to early church fathers, I can take you to revivalists. There was a sense of revival, a sense of fasting, of starving the flesh to be filled with the spirit. Here is what's happening. Truth is being minimized, mocked, and removed. Prayer, we're too busy. America's too busy. Prayer's out of schools, prayer's out of our home life, we're all too busy. Fasting, you're going to kill yourself if you fast, you're going to die. I've heard that so many times. That's why you don't tell people you're fasting all the time. That's stupid. All these truths, these great truths of the Bible are being minimized.

Here's the people's response in the book of Joel I just quoted. Basically, when all hope was gone, the grasshopper, the locust, just consumed all their food, not unlike what's happening in parts of Africa. So what was the answer? What did Joel say? "People, hide! Hide from the wrath that is to come! People, run to your house, hide from God, go as far away from here as you can." Is that what Joel said? Of course not.

What did he say? Consecrate a fast, which means set apart a fast. Show God that you are serious. Then he said in addition to that, call a sacred assembly, call men and women and young adults, call the elders, call the leaders, call the rich, call the poor because God's power does not look for the rich and the powerful, he looks for the broken and the humble. He said, "Call all those people into my house, my house that is a house of prayer, it is a sanctuary." He said, "When you get here, cry out to God almighty, cry out to the Lord that he would stay his hand of judgment."

Guest (Male): You've been listening to Regaining Lost Ground with Pastor Shane Idleman. You can find more information at westsidechristianfellowship.org. That's westsidechristianfellowship.org. For all the latest on what God is doing with his ministry here, please be sure to follow us on most social media platforms. Westside Christian Fellowship is located sixty miles north of Los Angeles in Leona Valley, California. Thank you again for listening to today's message of regaining lost ground where we are reminded daily, times change, truth does not.