Word for the Church: Waking and Sleeping

Now and then, over the years, one of my children has made a not-quite-normal sound in their bedroom in the middle of the night -- a loose cough, or worse, the sound of someone vomiting when they're sick, etc. -- and my husband -- with reflexes that are more tightly wired than a trigger -- rockets off the bed and into the room where they are before he's even awake.

This is such a paradox, because when my man sleeps, he sleeps hard. He's a self-acknowledged night-owl, but when he finally does fall into bed, he sleeps almost immediately, and he doesn't wake up until morning.

But when something is wrong, he rockets out of bed (far faster than I ever do), and he's already in the kids' rooms in the space of a single second. Literally. He's like the cartoon Roadrunner. When this happens, I'll usually turn over and wait for a minute to see what he says is wrong. 

If something really is wrong -- like a child who has just reproduced their supper all over their sheets -- then it's teamwork. I'll get the child up and into the shower while I find fresh clothes, etc, and Tim changes the sheets and cleans up the bed.

If it's a false alarm and he misheard the sound, my husband will wander grumpily back into the bedroom, rubbing his head and frowning. "That was a rude awakening," he'll say, and he'll collapse on the bed and go back to sleep.

Here's my lesson: Neither of us wake up... until something is not right. 

This morning, as I was reading and praying, my place was in 1 Corinthians 14:26-39 -- a passage about orderly worship and how to conduct speaking in tongues and prophesying among other gifts in a worship service -- but out of that passage, the Lord led me to a word for the church.

The church has, by and large, fallen back asleep. We stayed up late, and then we crashed, and it wasn't until the call of something not quite right called us out of bed that we stumbled, hardly awake, to take care of it, and in the process, are dealing with the discomfort of disorientation.

Isaiah 60:1-2 says: "Arise, shine, for your light has come, and the glory of the Lord rises upon you. See, darkness covers the earth, and a thick darkness is over the peoples, but the Lord rises upon you and His glory appears over you."

This struggle we're in as a global church is a battle between darkness and light, between the sleep of night and the rising of the day. Daytime has come, but many of us are still sleeping like it's night, or have fallen back to sleep after the struggle during the night.

Ephesians 5:14-15 says: "But everything exposed by the light becomes visible, for it is light that makes everything visible. This is why it is said: 'Wake up, oh sleeper, rise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you.'"

And then Paul follows up this passage with spectacular "How to" instructions for fighting the darkness with the light of day: "Be very careful, then, how you live -- not as unwise, but as wise, making the most of every opportunity, because the days are evil. Therefore, do not be foolish, but understand what the Lord's will is. Do not get drunk on wine, which leads to debauchery. Instead, be filled with the Spirit. Speak to one another with psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs. Sing and make music in your heart to the Lord, always giving thanks to God the Father for everything, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ" (Ephesians 5:15-20).

Y'all... this pandemic was a cry that something was wrong. Many of our churches experienced a spiritual awakening during this time. Many experienced revival and deeper soul-searching. Leaders like Sean Feucht and others arose out of this time to lead the thirsty to water in new and powerful ways. The show, The Chosen, gained traction like crazy during this time, because people wanted more of Jesus, they wanted to experience Jesus in a new way. People cropped up all over the internet "prophesying, seeing visions, dreaming dreams" (Acts 2:17). Per Paul's and John's instructions in the New Testament, the church needs to exercise Spirit-led judgment as these prophesies, visions, and dreams are given, but we shouldn't throw the baby out with the bathwater. Some words have been given that are deeply needed in the church.

During this pandemic, night was passing, and the day was coming.

But when the panic lessened, when, like frogs in lukewarm water, we the church acclimated to the heating temperature to our own detriment, when we allowed the follies of this world and its "cultures" to infiltrate our ranks until we claimed them as "normal," as "expected," that we the church needed to "get with the times," that we needed to "stay relevant," that "no one would come if we preached exactly what the Word said," that we need to soften it..."

We fell back asleep.

John writes in Revelation 3:1-3 to the church in Sardis: "These are the words of Him Who holds the seven spirits of God, and the seven stars. I know your deeds; you have a reputation of being alive, but you are dead. Wake up! Strengthen what remains and is about to die, for I have not found your deeds complete in the sight of my God. Remember, therefore, what you have received and heard; obey it, and repent. But if you do not wake up, I will come like a thief, and you will not know at what time I will come to you."

Complete your deeds. "Do not merely listen to the Word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says!" (James 1:22).

Church, this was a year to wake us up and shake us up. We are at the mountain of the Lord, where we can choose to move forward into daylight, or we can return to our mattresses and go back to sleep.

Wake up, oh sleeper! Rise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you.

"You have not come to a mountain that can be touched and that is burning with fire, to darkness, gloom, and storm, to a trumpet blast, or to such a voice speaking words that those who heard it begged that no further word be spoken to them, because they could not bear what was commanded... But you have come to Mount Zion, to the heavenly Jerusalem, the city of the living God. You have come to thousands and thousands of angels in joyful assembly, to the church of the firstborn, whose names are written in heaven. You have come to God, the Judge of all men, to the spirits of righteous men made perfect (He's the Author and Perfecter of our faith: Hebrews 12:2), to Jesus the Mediator of a new covenant, and to the sprinkled blood that speaks a better word than the blood of Abel. See to it that you do not refuse Him Who speaks!... At that time His voice shook the earth, but now He has promised, "Once more I will shake not only the earth, but also the heavens. The words 'once more' indicate the removing of what can be shaken -- that is, created things -- so that what cannot be shaken may remain" (Hebrews 12:18-19, 22-25, 26-27).

The day after my youngest daughter was born, I woke up in the middle of an earthquake. I was in my hospital room, having finally fallen asleep after the exhausting night of delivery and following checkups from various nurses and doctors, and I'd flopped completely spent onto my pillow to grab a few much-needed minutes of sleep.

Until something felt off, something shifted in my dreams, and pulled me into the light of day, and the entire room... was shaking. It was the most helpless I've ever felt, because there was nothing stabilizing to hold onto. The bed where I gripped the sheets was quaking, too. My husband braced, panicked, in the middle of the room, and we both waited a tense few seconds until the shaking stopped.

On the scale of mild to severe earthquakes, this one was a more mild one, but it was enough to make me feel absolutely helpless, and to realize that no matter what safety systems I'd set up around myself, no matter what floor or steel stabilizing structures I'd put my trust in on the sixth floor (or whatever floor it was) of the hospital: None of that mattered.

The only unshakeable thing, when rubber met road, was God Himself, the thousands and thousands of angels in joyful assembly, and Jesus, the Mediator of the new covenant Whose blood speaks a better word than the blood of Abel.

Now, y'all, let's apply it fully across the board. Don't just run to the Rock when the earth shakes. Don't just run to the Rock when our circumstances, our health, our jobs, our culture, our way of life feels like they're going off the rails. Wake up, rise up, stand firm on the Way, the Truth, and the Life, on Jesus Himself. 

Don't fall back asleep as the shaking becomes still.