Over the last season, God has been whispering to my heart a profound truth. It’s a hard truth, but it is a holy truth.
The Lord has been speaking to me about the Lion of Judah and this roaring season. He is roaring in revival and restoration. We have entered a Nehemiah season where we are building and battling. The church is being rebuilt in His power, purity and compassion.
He says if we want to rebuild in Him, like Nehemiah, we must leave Babylon behind. We must walk out this prophetic promise. We must walk out of a culture of corruption that has crept into every area as we awake and return to rebuild what has been torn down. Like Nehemiah rebuilt the holy city, we need to rebuild our temple with holiness. What is this corruption, this sin, restraining us from realizing revival?
The sin of idolatry is resisting revival. Whenever the nation of Israel entered into idolatry, God always allowed them to enter into slavery. As Nehemiah exited Babylon, he found Sanballat running the city of Jerusalem. Sanballat represents a false church, a false priesthood. He was not a Levite and was self-seeking in his motivations for running God’s house; seeking personal power over purity.
He was the emblem of idolatry. To rebuild the walls, we must purge the problem.
We must begin to tear down the idols that we have elevated above God as we rebuild the walls of revival. These walls will hold the harvest. So, if we don’t take an honest assessment of the gaps in the walls, we will fail to hold the harvest and allow the enemy continued access. Idolatry is a foundational issue. You can’t build a life of intimacy with God when you have idols competing for your worship. The issue with idolatry is it hides in plain sight and, most of the time, we are totally unaware that our worship has been gifted to another.
Here are some areas that have become slippery slopes into idolatry. We live in a time where the churchgoer will stand in the snow to watch their favorite football game but can’t make it to church if the weather calls for rain. Where Christians will pay $20 to have Hollywood entertain them with 90 minutes of fantasy and make-believe but complain when the pastor passes the offering plate to help pay to spread the truth.
When Hollywood’s minimum movie of 90 minutes is the maximum the church can worship, we have slipped into idolatry. We can binge-watch a show on Netflix longer than Jesus’ disciples could pray in the garden. When our nation so celebrates its obsession with idolatry that we name our TV shows after them, American Idol, we don’t even hide it anymore.
When we aim our idolatry at celebrities and have the audacity to call it clean TV, we have lost our way. It grieves me to live in a church culture that shouts louder when a pastor says Trump is coming back than when a pastor says Jesus is coming back. There is a fine line between celebrating talent and success and idolizing it.
Our culture crossed that line long ago. Church leaders are more focused on how many followers we have instead of being followers of Christ. We have shackled ourselves to success rather than the freedom found in sacrifice. We’d rather multiply our homes than multiply His house. We are the temple but we act more like the brothel, giving our time away to the one that pays in passing pleasure. Whoever can keep us entertained has our attention. The Roman poet Juvenal said, “Give them bread and circuses and they will never revolt,” while Rome crumbled down around them. Caesar knew if he had the people idolizing entertainment, then they wouldn’t see what was happening to the nation.
You see, if Satan can give you something shiny to keep your attention on, then you will never see the shackles he is placing on your wrists. Idolatry always leads to slavery. It’s time the church breaks free. We idolize feelings over faith, perception over reality. Your truth is not the truth. Jesus is the truth, and only in Him are we free. Like Nehemiah, God is calling us to exit the idolatry of Babylon and rebuild the walls of faith, hope and love. The walls of worship, the walls of the true church; where Christ is first and God is on the throne; where the church is an identity, not a destination; where love looks like something, not just vacant words.
Never despise correction. Correction is a sign grace is active. Without grace, we would only have condemnation. So this word is birth in the heart of getting God’s people on track.
I truly believe we are entering a breakthrough revival season. It is breaking out everywhere. The enemy wants to stop this. The enemy knows history better than us. He was there. If he can keep us holding onto the idols that we should burn, if he can seduce us into keeping our golden calves, then eventually he can lead us back into exile from God’s promises again.
Let us roar into revival!! Rise up, break down the altars, burn down the idols that don’t belong. Destroy completely those things inside us that are not yours. Pull out every stone set to wall us into a prison. Build us into your temple: holy, powerful and filled with your presence. {eoa}
Pastor Ren Schuffman is the senior pastor of Freedom Fellowship Church in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. He flows in a strong healing and prophetic anointing and is a church planter, musician, international speaker, author and revivalist. Listen to his podcast, DNA of a Dangerous Church, on Charisma Magazine and subscribe. Listen for more equipping at ffc.church/dangerous. {eoa}
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Charisma Media Staff 
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