In Isaiah chapter 1, we find the sad
description of a nation who had turned their
back on God.
Ah, a sinful nation, a people laden with
iniquity, a seed of evildoers, children that are
corruptors.
They have forsaken the Lord.
They have provoked the Holy One of Israel
onto anger.
They are gone away backward.
Why should ye be stricken any more?
Ye will revolt more and more.
The whole head is sick and the whole
heart faint.
From the sole of the foot, even unto
the head, there is no soundness in it.
I will stop there, friends.
What a striking picture of a backslidden people
of God.
What a tragedy.
What a startling comparison it is to the
church in America today.
A church full of compromise and conformity.
A compromised church has no power with God.
And a church given to conformity with the
world has no influence upon society.
A compromised church is a powerless church.
A compromised church is an impotent church.
A compromised church is a laughingstock to the
world.
The church in America is like the nation
she resides in, rotten from her head to
her feet.
It's become an institution of self-preservation that
bears little resemblance to the New Testament pattern
found in the book of Acts.
The early church was counter-cultural.
The church went in one direction and a
pagan society went in the other.
And when they met, there was a riot
or a clash.
Now the church is unrecognizable from the corrupt
society she hides in.
The one thing that would separate the chaff
from the wheat is persecution.
Scotland was reborn under the martyrdom of the
covenanters who refused to place a earthly king
above King Jesus.
And they died for their stance.
They were arrested.
They were put in prison.
Their goods were confiscated.
Their families broken up and put in want.
They were hanged and executed, beheaded, and their
skulls were placed on stakes to be bleached
white in the hot sun.
The skull of Covenanter James Guthrie hung on
a pier at Netherboat Port for 27 years
as a stark reminder of the price for
standing for Christ and the gospel under the
reins of tyranny.
But two of Scotland's covenanters' martyrs were women,
Margaret MacLachlan, who was 70 years old, and
Margaret Wilson, who was a mere 18.
They were the Wigtown Martyrs, who in 1685
refused prelacy and the oath of adjuration.
They were tried for treason, for attending of
religious field meetings, and meeting for worship indoors.
They were both sentenced to die by drowning.
First, they took the gray-haired Margaret and
tied her to a stake in the Solway
Sea.
And as the swift running tide came in,
and as wave after wave splashed over her
head, she struggled in the cold water until
at last becoming limp in the swirling flood.
And her cruel persecutors cried out to the
young Margaret, who was tied on a stake
nearer to them.
What do you think of her now?
She answered, I think I see Christ wrestling
there.
Think we are the sufferers?
No, it is Christ in us.
Let me ask us a question, friends.
Is Christ wrestling in the Church of America
today, in a struggle between the forces of
evil?
No, the Church is silent on sin and
useless to society, as she hides in the
shadows of a politically correct society, cowering and
afraid to make her voice known and cry
out against the sins of the land.
I believe there are only two things that
can save the American Church, and thus save
the nation of America.
One is a Holy Ghost revival, and the
other is hot persecution.
One will awaken us out of our spiritual
slumber and revitalize the Church, and the other
will awaken a nation and return her to
the God of the Bible.
Either way, that is our only hope.
Heaven help us all.