what if, this is the beginning of revival ?

i really felt to communicate my heart on the events that are taking place, at this moment in the news. to share my heart on racism and police brutality that is affecting the black community, in the united states, yes, but everywhere else, even here in canada. i am not an activist. i want to make that clear. i am simply a black woman with a broken heart. this week has been very difficult for me, because it has brought a big emotional and mental burden, and a heavy spiritual one. i realized that my heart was carrying a burden, without really understanding the weight of it. yesterday morning, i burst into tears. but i was not crying alone, the Holy Spirit was crying too. we cried together. i was literally in physical pain. my soul was aching. i had no choice but to kneel down on the floor and to let go, because the pain was too intense for me to stand. i repeat, i am not an activist. i am simply a black woman, who has been hurt by a situation that is continually repeated in history and in different forms, of course. i am a black woman, passionate about Jesus and His heart, desperately seeking to be like Him. and i know that the heart of Jesus is dedicated to stop all forms of injustice. as i was writing this blog post, my soul was screaming, but the Holy Spirit asked me to write today, and yet i wanted to write yesterday. but He told me that he didn't want me to write and express myself with a soul that speaks out from a place of frustration, sadness or disappointment. he encouraged me to write tomorrow, so today. because yesterday i was broken. today, the Holy Spirit has transformed me. my heart is lighter and i wrote these words with a heart that fully trust the Lord, despite the heavy burden. what i am about to share with you is something that the Lord has been speaking to me for a long time. and as He shared His heart with me earlier yesterday morning, i knew right away that i couldn’t keep it to myself. please read to the end, only if you decide to undertake this reading, otherwise, God bless you!

i am not here to make things complicated, because Jesus is simple. i am here to share a reality and to lead us to reflect, and to enlarge our human thought, in order to better welcome the divine thought. for it is a reality: we are human and we have the tendency to think or act in a certain way, but the ways of God are not ours (isaiah 55:8). so, most of the time, our thoughts and our ways prevail over the thoughts and the ways of God, not the other way around. but, the important thing is to bring it all back to Jesus, so that he may enlighten us. and even as christians, letting ourselves be guided and led by the Spirit is not easy, and sometimes our "theology" prevents us from moving forward.

so, my question is this: what does it mean to be one, in the body of Christ?

malachi 2:10 - have we not all one Father? has not one God created us? why then are we faithless to one another, profaning the covenant of our fathers?

the word of God is our truth. i am not here to share my opinion, my feelings, but the word and the heart of God for this new season. you and i were beautifully made by God, in his own image. therefore, this means that every nation, people, language, and tribe is a unique and tangible representation of God, the Creator. your neighbor was created in the image of God, the Word says so. we are the work of his hands. as we are born again, we belong to a new family - the divine family. in this divine covenant, we are co-heirs with Christ. this new family shares the same blood, the blood of the Lamb who was slain for the sins of the world (colossians 1:18), and each member of this body is important. do the members of Christ's body all come from the same background? no, they do not. the body is very diverse, with hundreds and hundreds of people with different skin colors, languages, and cultures. that is why only the blood of Jesus allows all these nations and tribes to live under the same roof of a house - the Father’s house. this blood - Jesus’s blood - has freed us forever from all forms of injustice and inequality, so that we may become one. also, it is important to understand that justice is part of God's nature. he cannot separate himself from this. on the contrary, he will make sure that justice will be established. when God sees injustice, it affects who he is, for he is just, and nothing else. he does not tolerate any form of injustice, for that would be against his own nature.

as i read the Bible, we see a God establishing his own justice in every story that goes through the old testament to the new testament. it is this God of Justice who delivered the people of Israel from more than 400 years of slavery. it is this God of Justice who has appointed more than ten judges to deliver his people from various enemies. it is this God of Justice who raised men and women like joseph, david, esther and daniel (and many others) to positions of leadership and excellence to help his people who were wounded and threatened with death. it is this God of Justice who became flesh and died on the cross to save mankind from sin and the power of death. this last act of pure love was the establishment of the ultimate and final justice. Jesus is our justice. we were made righteous in the eyes of the Father because of Jesus’s sacrifice. let’s not forget that when Jesus came to earth, his mission was to bring this good news: there is a justice for all; he is. Jesus was the voice for all those who had no voice. he was the voice for everyone who lived by injustice. he was the voice for the oppressed, the slave, the widow, the orphan, the poor, and so on. Jesus came to raise the dignity and strengthen the identity of all. he thought about everyone. his life on earth was not a restful one, for he bore the burden of a multitude, the burden of injustice. that is why the word declares that Jesus is our advocate, our defender before the Father, he who is perfectly righteous, he who offered himself as a sacrifice, for our sins but also for the sins of the whole world (1 john 2:1-2). moreover, the Bible is very clear and states that if anyone decides to remain “united with God”, he must live as Jesus Christ lived (1 john 2:6). what does it mean to live as Jesus lived? the answer is in isaiah 61:1-2.

the Spirit of the Sovereign Lord is on me
because the Lord has anointed me
to proclaim good news to the poor
he has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted
to proclaim freedom for the captives
and release from darkness for the prisoners
to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor
and the day of vengeance of our God
to comfort all who mourn
and provide for those who grieve in Zion

i don't know about you, but when i read these few lines, i clearly visualize a God of justice. he did not come for the rich and the ambitious, but he came to free the captives, to heal the sick and the heartbroken, to deliver his people from all types of prisons (fear, anxiety, laziness, depression and many more), to bring justice in all kinds of injustices. too often, i have heard christian movements or churches promote the fact that we must walk in unity and live the kingdom, and welcome all people from all nations. but today, with what is happening, i find it hard to believe that the same that are claiming unity are the same that are remaining in silent in front of the face of injustice.

this is the revelation the Lord gave me when i woke up yesterday morning:

there are 2 types of perfume that please God: that of worship and that of sacrifice. what does this mean? we cannot say that we love God, if we do not dedicate our lives to him, entirely. to love God is to love his commandments and to apply them. to love God is to offer him the throne of our heart, to let him enlarge the space of our tent to welcome his heart, in spite of our human understanding or belief systems that can be mixed with worldly thinking. the heart of God is for all those who live in injustice. the heart of God is to see a diversified Body rising up to be the voice in this world and to address hard and complicated realities, such as racism. if the Church does not rise up, who will? how can Jesus, the head of the Church, will be downloading his plans and strategies to us so we can intervene in this matter, if his body is sick, divided and propagates injustice by keeping silent? how can we hope to see revival if it does not begin first in our hearts? how can we hope for a better world, a united one, if we, as the body of Christ, do not live in unity, neither in spirit nor in flesh? how can we want to see a world reconciled with Christ, if we do not live this reconciliation among our Christian family? i refuse to walk in hypocrisy, to pray to see the glory of God in our world, when i don’t even live it with the members of my godly family!

if i come back to the image of perfumes, it is very easy for us to worship God, but we forget about the sacrifice portion. Jesus perfectly pleased God by his worship and his sacrifice. it is easy to come together under one roof, to gather all the nations and praise God in every language, but what about carrying each other's burdens? what about sacrificing our ways of thinking, our mentalities that sometimes condemn, judge, rationalize and minimize the suffering of others, to walk together as one? what about sacrificing our "me" to serve a "him" or a "her"? the perfume of sacrifice is a fragrance that pleases God. when our Father sees one of his child sacrificing himself or herself for another through service or by carrying his or her burden, He is pleased in this attitude of humility. what I mean is that we should not fall into this trap where we choose either worship or sacrifice. it's both. if we wholeheartedly desire to be like Christ and walk together, in unity of spirit, i encourage us to grasp God's heart for this season. 

many speak of the outpouring of the Holy Spirit and a great harvest that will come as never before. i believe in this 100%. but it will come in a different form from what we have known or experienced before. and now, we must be really attentive and, above all, listen to the voice of God. for the revival will not come as we think it will. the jews were waiting for the Messiah, and had presented him in the image of a soldier who would come to deliver them from the bondage of the romans. Jesus came in another form. we should not try to form the plan of God or to give to revival an image fabricated by our own desires. what we need to do is to follow the Spirit of God. but one thing i do know is that it is time for the church to rise. and as the Church rises, the revival will come. what if what we are experiencing today, with racism, is in fact God’s plan to start the revival? what if, this is the beginning of revival, for humanity? what if the Lord was actively waiting for his Bride to rise up for this injustice? what if the Lord was actively waiting to see the members of his Body take a stand, united in spirit, by supporting one another in this affliction and recognizing the suffering of the black people? i find it very intriguing that these events took place just before Pentecost and that on the day of Pentecost yesterday, several pastors and leaders took a stand on this issue. i believe that we must all seize the opportunity to stand up as the body of Christ to address injustice. God has a plan for his body, and all members need to be on the same page. deliverance is approaching, the God of Israel is the same today, yesterday and forever. 

i will end with this: God has revealed this to me: there is no reconciliation without sacrifice. 

there is no glory without suffering, no resurrection without crucifixion. paul encourages us to know the power of the resurrection, but also to be able to participate in the sufferings of Christ (philippians 3:10). the two go together, as does worship and consecration (sacrificing our lives on the altar to serve God and others). we cannot love God and not live a life of sacrifice, especially if we call ourselves christians and desire to be like Jesus. why is that? without Jesus' sacrifice on the cross, no reconciliation with God the Father would have been possible. in other words, the work of reconciliation was manifested through Jesus' sacrifice, and nothing else. concretely, if we wish to see a reconciliation in the body of Christ and in the world, we must live a life of sacrifice. this means that when my brother or sister in Christ experiences suffering, i decide to participate with them in that suffering. i would like to mention that a suffering is a suffering. i do not need to ask my brother or sister to prove me that he or she is suffering. he or she suffers, then i suffer too. if we say that we are ‘‘one’’, then it means that we are “one” in suffering as “one” in rejoicing. we are “one” in injustice situation as we are when justice is established. if we say “yes” to a Jesus-World reconciliation, then we say “yes” to a racial reconciliation in all its forms. but racial reconciliation involves the participation of each one of us, of every member of the body of Christ, in denouncing injustice and being a voice for all those who do not have one. racial reconciliation involves every Christian mobilizing and sacrificing themselves for the other: and this can be expressed simply by recognizing that systemic racism against black and people of colour exist. if the church cannot discern why it must stand up, it will miss out! this is an opportunity for the church of Jesus, united by the seal of his blood, to stand up for racial injustice. there is no room for indifference and insensitivity.

this is an opportunity to serve others, to sacrifice ourselves for others; to set aside our own thinking or any other type of justification to sincerely commune with the sufferings of others. God gives us this opportunity to grieve with those who grieve (romans 12:5), to suffer with those who suffer (1 corinthians 12:26), and to bear the painful burden of racial injustice, together. please, we need to let the Holy Spirit convince us on how to stand up for this cause. his ways are different than ours. for some it is to acknowledge the existence of racism, for others it is to go to a peaceful march in organized events, for others it is to denounce injustice on their platform of influence, for others it is to open a conversation around a table, for others it is to go to educate themselves on the subject, for others it is to pray and intercede. so, let the Spirit lead you in the action to be taken, for all are important. 

the heart of God is to see his Church rise up to be his voice, to be an example and to demonstrate a unity that transcends suffering. each member of the body of Christ is important for the advancement of God's kingdom on earth. and God will take upon himself to do justice. let’s guard our hearts and let the light of Jesus shine in the midst of darkness.

do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.
romans 12:21

| arielle nkambou |