Watchman Radio Hour

David Schultz: Welcome to the Watchman Radio Hour, coming to you from Portland, Oregon, here in the beautiful Northwest. This is David Schultz, your announcer. The Watchman Radio Hour is a production of Watchman Radio Ministries International, an evangelistic ministry reaching out to the peoples of the world with the gospel of Jesus Christ. And now here's our speaker, Alex Dodson, to bring you this week's message from God's word.

Alex Dodson: For our scripture reading today, let us turn to 1 Thessalonians chapter one, and we'll begin reading in verse four. Let us hear the word of God. Brothers, loved by God, we know that he has chosen you because our gospel came to you not simply with words, but also with power, with the Holy Spirit and with deep conviction. You know how we lived among you for your sake.

You became imitators of us and of the Lord. In spite of severe suffering, you welcomed the message with the joy given by the Holy Spirit. And so you became a model to all the believers in Macedonia and Achaia. The Lord's message rang out from you not only in Macedonia and Achaia—your faith in God has become known everywhere. Therefore, we do not need to say anything about it, for they themselves report what kind of reception you gave us. They tell how you turned to God from idols to serve the living and true God.

Our Father in heaven, we thank you for the Bible that you've given to us. we thank you that it's your infallible word and that we can put our full confidence in everything that it says. And now, O Father, we pray that you will send forth your Holy Spirit in great convicting power. In Christ's name we pray, amen.

Several years ago, I visited a temple in an Asian country where people were coming and going and burning incense in front of idols. In our own country here, I have also seen idols in ethnic restaurants and stores where incense is regularly burned in front of them, and also fruit and food is brought and laid before the idol. These idols are made of wood and metal or plastic, shaped by men's hands. Yet these idols are insignificant to the other idols that are in our society.

Today, people bow down and worship things like sports and automobiles and pleasure and sex, electronic gadgets and houses and clothes and many other things. Anything can become an idol if we give that thing first place in our lives or substitute it for God. We have become a society full of idols. Just look at the ads on television for automobiles and how the automobile being shown is exalted and treated as an object deserving of our desire and even worship.

Our society has exalted sex to such an extent that it often becomes an idol for many. Advertisers use it to sell their products; movies use sexual content to draw people in. We have become a society that seeks pleasure rather than God. Whether it's going on a pleasure cruise or attending sports events, many seek out and serve pleasure rather than God. We have exalted our sports heroes to idolatrous proportions by paying them so much, and we bow down to them on a regular basis as our idols. We have neglected the Christian Sabbath and exalted Super Bowl Sunday instead.

Former generations honored the Lord's day in our nation. Our present generation has forgotten the Lord's day, and we have become a 24/7 society. Sunday means little anymore. Today, idolatry is alive and well in our society. Our text for today is 1 Thessalonians 1 and verse nine, which says, "For they themselves report what kind of reception you gave us. They tell how you turned to God from idols to serve the living and true God."

The gospel calls us to leave our idols and come to God. True repentance involves leaving our idols behind and following the Lord in our lives. Are we ready to give up our idols in this land? Are we ready to forsake them in order to follow the Lord? Are we going to continue to follow our idols and face the wrath of God for it, or will we turn from them back to the God of our forefathers and be blessed? What do we want: God's wrath or God's blessing on this nation?

Now let us see, in the first place, that the Thessalonians had been idol worshipers. Again, our text says, "For they themselves report what kind of reception you gave us. They tell how you turned to God from idols." They had turned from idols. They had formerly worshiped dead idols and false gods. What they worshiped were not living. They worshiped false gods; they were not the true God.

1 Corinthians 12:2 says, "You know that when you were pagans, somehow or other you were influenced and led astray to dumb idols." In Galatians 4:8, it says, "Formerly, when you did not know God, you were slaves to those who by nature are not gods." What about today's idol worshipers? We worship technology. Are electronic gadgets our God? There's the worship of automobiles. Is the latest SUV or sports car our God?

We worship sex. As we look at many of today's advertisements, we would think that sex rules in this society, and in many lives, it does. We worship pleasure. How do we spend our Sundays? Many spend Sundays at sports events. The Christian Sabbath is fading away in our society. Whether it's attending commercial sports events or doing business as usual on Sunday, we have gone far from the view our forefathers had toward the Sabbath. Today, idols cover the land and we don't even realize it.

Now let us see, in the second place, that they turned from idols to God. Again, our text says they tell how you turned to God from idols to serve the living and true God. They turned from false and dead gods. William Hendriksen writes, "And how you turned—a very significant verb is used, to turn, often to return. But here, obviously not the latter, but the former. The readers, many of whom must have been Gentiles for they had been worshiping idols, had experienced a real inner change which had become outwardly manifest. Their whole active life was now moving in the opposite direction, away from idols to God."

And then he goes on to write, "It was from the idols, both the images themselves and the deities whom they represented, that the Thessalonians had turned away. The Apostle and his companions had observed this idol worship and knew all about it. These idols were merely vain things. They were dead, hence totally unable to render any assistance to anyone in time of need."

Leon Morris writes, "No matter how greatly their habitual practices had to be changed, the Christians of the first century saw that there could be no place for an idol alongside Christ." And Matthew Henry writes, "The readiness of their faith was famed abroad. These Thessalonians embraced the gospel as soon as it was preached to them so that everybody took notice what manner of entering in among them the apostles had, that there were no such delays as at Philippi where it was a great while before much good was done. The effects of their faith were famous."

And then Matthew Henry writes, "They quitted their idolatry. They turned from their idols and abandoned all false worship they had been educated in. They gave themselves up to God, to the living and true God, and devoted themselves to His service." The so-called gods they worshiped were dead. They were false; they were not gods at all. These gods could not save them or help them; they were lifeless and useless. But they had turned now to the true and living God.

From these false and lifeless gods, they turned to the true and the living God that was offered to them in the gospel. There is only one God, and He is the only true and living God. William Hendriksen writes, "When God converts a man, He changes the entire person, not only the emotions so that one regards his former manner of life, but also the mind and will with respect to which he experiences a complete changeover, and all of this becomes apparent in his outward conduct."

And then he goes on to say, "Nevertheless, as a result of the operation of God's grace whereby the message was applied to the hearts, the eyes of the Thessalonians had been opened so that they saw that their idols were vanities. They had turned from them to a God living and real. Here the true God is not so much pointed out as described. All the emphasis is on His character, which is the very opposite of the idols. They are dead, but He is living. They are unreal, but He is real and genuine. They are unable to help, but He is almighty and eager to help. To this God the Thessalonians have turned to serve Him continually, submitting themselves to Him as completely as does a slave to his master, nay, far more completely and far more willingly."

Leon Morris writes, "The converts had come to serve one whose nature it is to be God and living and true. 'Living' means not only alive but active, as we see from Acts 14:15. It contrasts sharply with dead idols, gods who can do nothing. The living God orders all things both in heaven and on earth."

And then he goes on to write, "There is more than one word in Greek for 'true' and that used here has a meaning like genuine. Its opposite is not so much false as unreal. Moffatt says it is real as opposed to false in the sense of counterfeit. Paul is affirming that the converts had begun to worship a real God in contrast to the shadowy and unreal beings which had previously claimed their allegiance. There is a real and true God, and there is a God who is alive and not dead. It is to this genuine and living God that the Thessalonians had turned."

Now let us see, in the third place, that there is a call to repentance to us today. We need conviction of sin. To turn from our idols, we need conviction of sin. We need to know that we are idol worshipers. We will not turn from something that we don't know about. Many worship idols in ignorance; they don't know what they're doing. Even Christians will bow down to idols ignorantly, following the crowd. Yet idolatry is a great sin. Whether we do it knowingly or ignorantly, it is sinful to bow down and worship idols.

True conviction will show us our sin and bring sorrow to us for those sins. In John 16:8 it says, "When he comes," talking about the Holy Spirit, "he will convict the world of guilt in regard to sin and righteousness and judgment." One of the greatest needs in our society today is conviction of sin. People follow after idols and don't realize the enormity of their sin. Preachers don't expose people's sins as they once did. Everything is not all right. There is something wrong in this society. We need to be convicted of our sins so that we will know our great danger and our miserable condition.

One of the marks of the great revivals of the past was conviction of sin. People were convicted of their sins and saw their need of a Savior. They saw that they needed to turn from their sins and turn back to the Lord. And so we need a turning to God. True repentance involves a turning from sin to God. It means to turn from our sin to know and serve the Lord.

The Geneva Bible, in its note on 1 Thessalonians 1:9, said, "It is no true conversion to forsake idols unless a man therewithal worship the true and living God in Christ, the only Redeemer." John Calvin writes, "In ascribing the epithets living and true to God, the apostle is making an indirect reference also to idols. For these are lifeless, worthless fabrications, and are erroneously called gods. Paul states that the purpose of conversion is, as I have mentioned, that they might serve God. Hence the purpose of the doctrine of the gospel is to lead us to worship and obey God. As long as we are the servants of sin, we are free in regard to righteousness, for we go as our passions lead us, free from any constraining yoke. Only the man who has turned to put himself wholly in subjection to God is truly converted to Him."

Morris says, "Becoming a Christian involves a very definite break with non-Christian habits. Whatever our previous background has been, there must be a turning from our idols. The act of conversion involves a change of direction of the will. There is a decisive happening, a reorientation of the whole of life."

And then he goes on to write, "First they had turned away from idols, which must have been a very important part of the evidence for their conversion. In every age such action is a mark of the true Christian. Secondly, they had come to serve the living and true God. A negative attitude is not sufficient. The word rendered 'serve' really means 'serve as a slave' and reminds us of the way in which Paul delighted to call himself a slave of Jesus Christ. It underlines the wholehearted nature of Christian service. Notice that God is spoken of as living, which contrasts with dead idols, and true, which means genuine, over against the shadowy and unreal. The conjunction of these two terms gives emphatic expression to Paul's essential monotheism."

Today, we need a turning to God in this nation as never before. Our society is saturated with idolatry, and we as a society have turned away from the God of our forefathers. We need a national spiritual revival, another great awakening. Great revivals have come to America in the past when men turned from their idols and turned to God, and this can happen again.

It happened in the Great Revival of 1858. David B. Calhoun writes in his book, Our Southern Zion, "The revival of 1858 touched churches on both sides of the Atlantic. Revival came to New York City following prayer meetings organized by members of J.W. Alexander's 19th Street Presbyterian Church. Similarly, revival came to Charleston after a long season of congregational prayer in the Anson Street Presbyterian Church under the leadership of John Girardeau. Following this extended time of prayer, Girardeau preached solid doctrinal sermons to large crowds. He later wrote, 'The most glorious work of grace I have ever felt or witnessed was one which occurred in 1858 in Charleston. It began with a remarkable exhibition of the Spirit's supernatural power. For eight weeks, night after night, save Saturday nights, I preached to dense and deeply moved congregations.'"

For several weeks in the spring of 1858, there was preaching every night except Sunday in Columbia's First Presbyterian Church, in consequences of the awakened interest in religion which seemed to pervade the whole community. Reverend Noah Porter, pastor of a Congregational church in Farmington, Connecticut, wrote in 1832 about the beginnings of the Second Great Awakening in America.

He wrote, "The era of modern revivals in this country is reckoned, I believe, from the year 1792." In speaking of his own church, he writes in 1795, "The influence of grace came down as the rain upon the tender herb and as the showers upon the grass." He continues in the year 1799, "There was a revival in at least 50 adjoining congregations in this state, the character of which in them all was remarkably similar and I think I might say remarkably happy. Persons of both sexes in almost every age, and many from a distance of four and five miles, were seen pressing through storms and making their way over heavy roads to hear the word of God, and the house of the pastor was almost a daily resort of the anxious."

He goes on to write of later revivals. "The year 1821 was eminently in Connecticut a year of revivals. Between 80 and 100 congregations were signally blessed. From the commencement of the year, a new state of feeling began to appear in this town. On the first Sabbath in February, I stated to the assembly the tokens of the gracious presence of God in several places of the vicinity and urged the duties peculiarly incumbent on us at such a season. This I had often done before, but not with the same effect. Professors of religion now began evidently to awake. They had an anxiety for themselves and for the people that would allow them no rest, and in their communications with each other and with the world, they were led spontaneously to confess their unfaithfulness. And a few without the church about the same time were pungently convicted. In this state of things, Reverend Mr. Nettleton made his first visit. His preaching on the evening of a Lord's day in this month from Acts 2:37 was set home by the power of the Spirit upon the hearts of many, and his discourse on the Wednesday evening following from Genesis 6:3 was blessed to the conviction of a still greater number."

Reverend Porter goes on to write of the effects of this revival upon the town. "The state of feeling which at this time pervaded the town was interesting beyond description. There was no commotion, but a stillness in our very streets, a serenity in the aspect of the pious, and a solemnity apart in almost all which forcibly impressed us with the conviction that, in very deed, God was in this place. Public meetings, however, were not very frequent. They were so appointed as to afford the opportunity for the same individuals to hear preaching twice a week besides on the Sabbath. Occasionally there were also meetings of an hour in the morning or at noon at private dwellings at which the serious in the neighborhood were convened on a short notice for prayer and conference. The members of the church also met weekly in convenient sections for prayer, and commonly on the evening selected for the meetings of the anxious. From these various meetings, the people accustomed to retire directly and with little communication together to their respective homes. They were disposed to be much alone and were spontaneously led to take the word of God for their guide. The Bible was preferred to all other books and was searched daily with eager inquiry."

Also writing in 1832 concerning the revivals of the Second Great Awakening, Reverend Joel Hawes, pastor of the First Congregational Church in Hartford, Connecticut, wrote, "The church of which I am pastor, like most of the early churches of New England, was planted in the spirit of revivals. When the present series of revivals commenced in this part of our country about 40 years ago, this church shared richly in the blessing. During the time I have been connected with the church, about 550 have been added to its communion, not less than four-fifths of whom are to be regarded as the fruits of revivals."

Reverend Hawes went on to write, "I have often said in addresses from my pulpit that the church is what it is very much from the influence of revivals of religion. It appeared that a very large proportion of all who are now members of the Congregational churches in this state became such in consequence of revivals, that the relative proportion of such as revivals have been multiplying has been continually increasing, that the most active and devoted Christians are among those who came into the church as fruits of revival, that those churches in which revivals have been most frequent and powerful are the most numerous and flourishing, and that in all the churches thus visited with divine influence, there has been a great increase of Christian enterprise and benevolent action."

And so we get a glimpse of what it was like in much of the United States 200 years ago in the time of the Second Great Awakening. It was a great period of revival that lasted up to 50 years. Revival after revival came and multitudes were converted and Christians revived in communities all over the nation.

Is such a revival possible today? Will God send another great awakening to turn us from our idols back to Him? This we don't know. Yet this is what we should pray for. Revivals don't come automatically if we pray, but God is able to answer our prayers and send revivals if He sees fit, and this is what we must believe. We must believe that He will.

Do you have idols in your life? Are you putting other things in the place of God? Then you must repent at once and turn from your idols and turn to the living God. Turn to Jesus Christ and follow Him as Lord. Jesus said, "I am the way, the truth and the life; no man comes to the Father but by me."

Our Father in heaven, we know that we are a land of idols. We know that there are idols all over this society, in every place, all kinds of idols, and that our people are continually bowing down to those idols. But we pray, O Lord, that you in the midst of your wrath would have mercy and that you would send another great awakening like you did in the past. We pray that you will pour out your Spirit in great convicting power and that people all over this nation will come under great conviction of sin. And then we pray that multitudes will turn from their idols and turn back to the living God, will turn back to you. And we ask these things in Christ's name, amen.

David Schultz: We hope this week's broadcast has been a blessing to you. If you have any questions about Mr. Dodson's message, please write us. You may email us at info@watchmanradio.org. Our mailing address is Watchman Radio Ministries International, Post Office Box 13251, Portland, Oregon, 97213. That's Watchman Radio Ministries International, Post Office Box 13251, Portland, Oregon, 97213. You may listen to this broadcast at any time on the internet at www.oneplace.com. In the list of ministries, just select the Watchman Radio Hour. This week's program and previous programs are always available there for listening. Our web address is www.watchmanradio.org. That's W-A-T-C-H-M-A-N-radio.org. www.watchmanradio.org.