The Calvary Road
The Calvary Road
Introduction:
Roy Hession wrote the initial release of The Calvary Road in 1950. It has become a Christian classic and revised editions have since been released in several languages. With the passage of time, Hession is more sure now that the truths expressed in the pages of this book lie at the heart of all those movements of revival by which God has restored His Church to new life in the hours of her dryness and need.
The outward forms of such revivals do, of course, differ considerably, but the inward and permanent content of them all is the same: A new experience of conviction of sin among the saints; a new vision of the cross of Jesus and redemption; a new willingness on man's part for brokenness, repentance, confession, and restitution; a joyful experience of the power of the blood of Jesus to cleanse fully from sin and restore and heal all that sin has lost and broken; a new entering into the fullness of the Holy spirit and of His power to do His ownwork through His people; and a new gathering in of the lost ones to Jesus.
Our only hope is for the revival of His Church and that is not going to happen until His people who are called by His name humble themselves and pray, seek His face, and turn from their wicked ways, then He will hear us in heaven, forgive us of our sin, and heal our sick land (2 Chronicles 7:14)
Brokenness:
Revival is very personal: It is not something that God will do apart from the availability of His people being dead to their sinful natures. Revival always has and always will come when God's family humbles themselves, die to their selfishness, and reverently seek transforming revival in their own hearts.
I must become dissatisfied with church life as usual. I must be willing to forsake the traditions of my forefathers if those traditions are not Biblically based.
I must not be like a hypocritical Pharisee but as one broken as a result of comparing of my life with that of Christ.
I must believe that God will accept my expression of humility.
I must not expect God to send revival to "them" but to revive me.
An egg is useless until it becomes broken. That is exactly the way we are in His Kingdom. The urgency of the matter is intensified if I have spiritual influence over others.
Unconfessed sin always interferes with our fellowship with our Heavenly Father though we remain related to Him. He has provided the way by which we can have our fellowship restored by confessing our sin (1 John 1:9). Only then will we see His power demonstrated in our lives. The overflow of His power through His people is revival in its essence.
We must sincerely pray daily that His will absorb our will. Though this is against everything we have been taught by the world system, it is the only way; it is being "Not I but Christ!" We must become radical about our call for true revival.
Try to imagine living with the Heavenly Father in paradise as royalty served by countless angles and purposely leaving to come to live among us. That is radical.
Try to imagine having the power to create the universe but choosing not to use it though the people you love lie about you, spit on you, abuse, torture and even execute you as if you were a common criminal. That is radical!
God accepted the sacrifice of unblemished lambs for the forgiveness of men's sins during the Old Covenant era. They had to have faith enough to believe that their sins were transferred to the lamb if they placed their hands on its head.
Jesus took the role of Lamb of God during the New Covenant age in which we live. We are assured that though He was without sin, He took upon Himself our sins so that we might be free: We, however, must have faith to believe that Jesus' sacrifice has been accepted by our Heavenly Father for our sins. Now that is Radical! We must never lose sight of how radical Jesus allowed Himself to be broken for us.
Cups Running Over:
Revival in our lives is demonstrated to a lost and desperate world only when we are filled with His Holy Spirit. Just like light and darkness cannot coexist, God's Spirit and sin cannot coexist.
We not only turn lost people away from salvation in Christ but fail to encourage new Christians to grow in Christ when we are not overflowing with His Spirit.
God will not fill us with His Spirit when we are already full of ourselves!
Think of our heart as being a water glass or cup and Jesus is in our area with a water pot filled with the Water of Life. We can hold out our container to Him but He first looks to see if our container is clean. If it is, He will fill it to overflowing but if it is contaminated with sin, He passes us by.
Fellowship with God:
A question most often asked by new Christians is, "What happens if I sin after I have become a Christian?"
We are promised in 1 John 1:9 that we will be cleansed of our sins if we will confess them. Pride (self) doesn't want to admit a mistake!
Self is the root cause of all sin!
All of our sins have been placed into one cup which Jesus was told to drink. He momentarily shrank from that cup in Gethsemane the night before facing His cross. The reason He dreaded the cross was not due to the pain He faced but the shame of having to drink all of the dregs of the cup filled with our sins. Yet He agree that there was no other way so He obeyed the Father and proceeded to the cross so that we might be free from the penalty of our sins and the power of sin.
Many church prayer meetings are consumed by prayers for physical sicknesses. Such sicknesses will certainly hinder a Christian's ability to serve Christ but too often the prayers are more for personal convenience and free of bother than for the ability to serve Him.
A much more important item for prayer is for the souls of men and for purity of hearts. Whereas physical illnesses shorten the life span in the body, sin will result in eternal separation from God.
Light and Darkness and the Highway of Holiness:
We are instructed in 1 John 1:7, "If we walk in the light as He is in the light, we have fellowship one with another and the blood of Jesus cleanseth us from all sin."
Light reveals and darkness hides. The first effect of sin in our lives is always to make us try to hide what we are. A glaring example is given by the first thing Adam and Eve did in the garden following their sin. They tried to hide from God.
The only basis for real fellowship with God and man is to live out in the open with both.
An overall picture of the life of victory which has come to many is that of the Highway in Isaiah 35: "And an highway shall be there, and a way, and it shall be called The Way of Holiness
The Highway is narrow and uphill, it is not beyond any of us to walk it. Though there are many danger if we get off the road, while we keep to the Highway there is safety. Only one kind of person is barred from walking there and that is the unclean one. This includes not only the sinner who does not know Christ as his Saviour, but the Christian who does and yet walking in unconfessed and uncleansed sin.
The only way onto the Highway is up a small dark, forbidding hill -- the Hill of Calvary, it is the sort of hill we have to climb on our hands and knees -- especially our knees.
At the top of the hill, guarding the way to the Highway, stands so gaunt and grim -- the cross. At the foot of the cross is a low door, so low that to get through it one has to stoop and crawl through. It is the only entrance to the Highway. This door is called the Door of the Broken Ones. Only the broken can enter the Highway. In order to break our wills to His, God brings us to the foot of the cross and there shows us what real brokenness is We see those wounded hands and feet, that face of love crowned with thorns, and we see the complete brokenness of the One who said, "Not my will, but Thine be done," as He drank the bitter cup of our sin to its dregs. So to be broken is to look on Him and to realize it was our sin which nailed Him there!
Over the Door of the Broken Ones is sprinkled the precious blood of the Lord Jesus. As we bend to crawl through, the blood cleanses from all sin.
The embankment on either side slopes away into thick darkness. In fact the darkness creeps right to the very edges of the Highway, but on the Highway itself all is light.
But we may, and sometimes do, slip off the Highway, for it is narrow. One little step aside and we are off the path and in darkness. It is always because of a failure in obedience somewhere or a failure to be weak enough to let God do all. Satan is always beside the road, shouting at us, but he cannot touch us.
The Dove and the Lamb:
Jesus is portrayed to us as a simple Lamb. John the Baptist saw Jesus coming to him and said of him, "behold the Lamb of God, which takes away the sin of the world." Then as he baptized Him, he saw the heavens opened and the Spirit of God descending like a Dove and lighting upon Him.
What a suggestive picture this makes; The Dove descending upon the Lamb and resting herself upon Him! The Lamb and Dove are surely the gentlest of all God's creatures. The Lamb speaks of meekness and submissiveness and the Dove speaks of peace
Had Jesus had any other disposition than that of the Lamb; humility, submissiveness, and self-surrender, the Dove could never have rested on Him. Being herself so gentle, she would have been frightened away had He not been meek and lowly in heart. Here we have pictured for us the condition upon which the same Holy Spirit can come and abide in us.
The Lamb is the simplest of God's creatures. It has no schemes or plans for helping itself; it exists in helplessness and simplicity.
Jesus was also the shorn Lamb, willing to be shorn of His rights, His reputation, and every human liberty that was due to Him, just as a lamb is shorn of its wool. He never resisted.
Further, Jesus was the silent Lamb. "As a sheep before her shearers is dumb, so he opened not his mouth." Facing the inquiries of evil men, He answered nothing. If he had, the Dove would have had to take His flight.
To continuously enjoy the benefits of the Holy Spirit in us, we must exhibit the same disposition as did Jesus.
Like the sacrificial lamb (best quality, healthy and spotless choice of the flock) of the Old Covenant, Jesus is our spotless substitute Lamb now. Men placed their hands of the head of the animal and, with faith, believed their sins were being transferred to the animal before the animal paid their death penalty for them, so must we place our faith in the Spotless Substitute Lamb of God for taking our sins upon Himself.
The Dove is the emblem of peace, which suggests that if the blood of Jesus has cleansed us and we are walking with the Lamb in humility, the sign of the Spirit's presence and fullness will be peace, love, joy, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and He will apply self control.
If our peace is broken, then it can only be because of sin. In some matter, we have departed from the humility of the Lamb. We must ask God to show us what it is, and be quick to repent of it and bring the sin to the cross. Then the Dove will be once again in His rightful place in our hearts and peace with God will be ours.
Revival Begins at Home
God created the home before He created His Church. It was into the home that sin first came. It is in the home that revival first needs to return.
Revival means a new life in hearts where the spiritual life has ebbed; but not a new life of self effort or self initiated activity. It is not man's life, but God's life, the life of Jesus filling us and flowing through us. That life is manifested in fellowship and oneness with those with whom we live; nothing between us and God and nothing between us and others
The most loving thing a father can do for his children is to let them see his love for their mother.
Love in longsuffering [patient] and is kind. Love vaunteth not itself [does not boast], is not puffed up [is not conceited]. Love does not behave itself unseemly [is not rude], seeketh not her own [is not selfish], is not easily provoked [does not get irritated], thinketh no evil [does not entertain unkind thoughts of another(1 Corinthians 13.)
We will never experience revival in our churches until we first experience revival in the homes that make up our churches. Revived church with unrevived homes is sheer hypocrisy!
Conclusion:
Though the Calvary Road is narrow and few there are that tavel it, it is the only path to revival (Matthew 7:14.)
There is only one thing in the world that can hinder the Christian's walking in victorious fellowship with God and his being filled with the Holy Spirit and that is sin in one form or another. There is only one thing in the world that can cleanse from sin and that is the power of the blood of the Lord Jesus.
Join us as we seek His face forRevival.
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