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| C.L. Culpepper, Shantung Revival |
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| Marie Monsen |
In the safety of the treaty port
Chefoo in 1927, Southern Baptist missionaries gathered for spiritual renewal
while the turmoil in the province subsided. The missionaries spent most of their
time in Chefoo in Bible study and prayer. As they passed the time, missionary
Jane Lide shared the lessons she had learned from a Bible study while on
furlough in Southern California on “Christ our Life.” Marie Monsen, a Norwegian
Evangelical Lutheran missionary with the China Inland Mission, shared with the
Baptists of her experiences in the interior. As they began to pray for revival
among the Chinese, they were convicted of their own need for revival.
Pray
and Read: 1 John 1:8-2:2
Contextual Notes:
John is writing to confirm the saints in
their faith.
Sermon Points:
1- If we admit our sin, Jesus will cleanse us (1 John 1:8-10)
2- Jesus is our Advocate and the atoning Sacrifice (1 John 2:1-2)
1. IF
WE ADMIT OUR SIN, JESUS WILL CLEANSE US (1 John 1:8-10)
a.
Everyone has sinned (1 John 1:8) – This is clearly taught in
Scripture. For example: 1 Kings 8:46
– “there is no one who does not sin.” Psalm 14:2-3: 2 The LORD looks down from heaven upon the
children of men, To see if there are any who understand, who seek
God. 3 They have
all turned aside, They have together become corrupt; There is none
who does good, No, not one. Proverbs 20:9: Who can say, “I have made my heart
clean, I am pure from my sin”? Proverbs 30:12: There is a generation that
is pure in its own eyes, Yet is not washed from its filthiness. Ecclesiastes 7:20: 20 For there is not a
just man on earth who does good And does not sin. Isaiah 53:6: 6 All we like sheep have gone
astray; We have turned, every one, to his own way; And the LORD has laid on Him
the iniquity of us all. Jeremiah 2:35: 35 Yet you say, ‘Because I am innocent,
Surely His anger shall turn from me.’ Behold, I will plead My case against you,
Because you say, ‘I have not sinned.’ Romans 3:23-24: 23 for all have sinned and fall short of the
glory of God, 24 being
justified freely by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus,”
b.
APPLICATION: Some people never admit
a fault, but honesty demands that we all know that we are not what God made us
to be. We all have done wrong. We all are guilty of sin. The good news is that
there is a solution for sin. In Christianity is the only solution.
c.
Confession brings cleansing (1 John 1:9)
d.
ILLUSTRATION: A Worm in an Apple: They say that the only thing worse when eating an
apple and seeing a worm is seeing half a worm. How does that worm get
inside an apple? Does think the worm burrows in from the outside. No,
scientists have discovered that the worm comes from the inside. But, how does
he get in there? Simple. An insect lays an egg in the apple blossom. Sometime
later the worm hatches in the heart of the apple, then eats his way out. Sin,
like the worm, begins in the heart and works out through the person's thoughts,
word and actions. For this reason, David once wrote, "Create in me a clean
heart, O God."
e.
Cleansing is based on His
faithfulness, His justice, His forgiveness. He is the cleanser.
f.
ILLUSTRATION: One of the Southern Baptists, Ola
Culpepper suffered from a degenerative eye disease which was causing her
extreme pain. None of the doctors could treat her disease, but only fill new
prescriptions for glasses. The missionaries had heard of Ms. Monsen’s
experiences with healing and asked her to pray for her. The missionaries met,
read aloud James 5:14-16, being impressed by James’s exhortation to confess
sin, anointed Ola’s head with oil and prayed for her healing. Bertha Smith
shares that as she went to lay hands on Mrs. Culpepper’s head, she could not
because she was convicted of a negative attitude toward fellow missionary Miss
Hartwell. She testifies concerning the occasion, “Had I refused to confess that
sin, and joined in the prayer with it covered, I believe that I would have
hindered the prayer of the others, and the eye could not have been healed.”[1]
At the same moment in an adjacent room, two Chinese cooks whose hatred toward
one another was well known had reconciled. During the prayer, Ola Culpepper put
down her glasses and her eyes never bothered her again. Later they would
realize that the Great Shandong Revival had begun.[2]
The visiting Norwegian missionary Marie Monsen later wrote, “That
[reconciliation] was the first small beginning of a revival which, a few years
later, grew into the largest revival any one mission in China experienced.”[3]
g.
The Word of God is the standard
(1:10):
h.
APPLICATION: The Word of God is authoritative
because it is inerrant. It has no error. Therefore, the Word of God is our
standard, and not just our standard as Christians alone with other religions
and people having their own standard. God is the Creator of the entire
universe, and His Word is the standard for the entire universe. Manufacturers
often produce manuals to go along with what they have created and produced. God
has a manual which goes along with the Creation He has produced. We live in a world without standards.
Like the first century when this was written, the standard today is public
opinion and not a code of conduct.[4]
But we still see in people around us an awareness of what is right and wrong,
an awareness of sin. Watch the news every day and you will see how even the
most pagan among us have an awareness of sin.
i.
ILLUSTRATION: Legendary Southern Baptist
missionary Bertha Smith tells of her struggle to overcome the sin within her.
She had experienced fillings of the Spirit before coming to China, but it would
been in those days in Chefoo that she would learn to allow “the Holy Spirit a
chance to so control the old self that it was ineffective over [her].” Missionary Mary Crawford would confess that
she had never been a “saved” Christian: “I was in the big house alone. I knelt
by the bed and prayed, ‘Lord, I don’t know whether I’m saved or not but you
know; I want to be right with you and with man, please show me what is wrong.’
My sins came before me like darkness, and I cried, ‘What can I do?’ Just then
the burden rolled away and the Light of Salvation shone in my soul. I saw my
sins and I saw the cross. Such joy flooded my being but it was only a moment
before the temptation, ‘It cannot last, such joy as this,’ but then came the
blessed assurance in Rom. 8 that ‘neither death nor life, nor angels nor
principalities nor-height nor depth nor any other creature should be able to
separate me from the Love of God which is in Christ Jesus, our Lord.’”[5]
2.
JESUS IS OUR ADVOCATE AND ATONING
SACRIFICE FOR THE WORLD (1 John 2:1-2)
a.
Jesus is our Advocate (1 John 2:1) -
Intercessor, Defending attorney. Jesus Christ the
Righteous: His name
Jesus identifies him as a human being, a man like us. His title Christ refers
to his anointing as the Messiah and acceptable to God as the Advocate. The
Righteous means that he has no need of an advocate for himself and is therefore
able to represent someone else.[6]
b.
APPLICATION: Sin is the problem, and He is the
solution. No other religious system offers such sure hope, such clear and
present assurance.
c.
Jesus is our Atoning Sacrifice (1
John 2:2) The hilasmos (also 4:10) and kapher (Hebrew) (112x in OT), in some
contexts mean “to remove or wipe away.” But its central meaning is one victim’s
dies as a sacrifice of himself to satisfy the guilt before God of another
victim – i.e., atonement.
d.
Thus
a hilasmos is a replacement or
propitiation. Christ bore God’s wrath toward sin so that the sinner can escape.[7]
e.
2 Corinthians 5:21: 21 For He made Him who knew no sin to
be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him. Romans 3:25-26 (hilasterion):25
whom God set forth as a propitiation by His blood, through faith, to
demonstrate His righteousness, because in His forbearance God had passed over
the sins that were previously committed, 26 to demonstrate at the present time His
righteousness, that He might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith
in Jesus.
f.
ILLUSTRATION: In Hwanghsien, Missionary leader
C.L. Culpepper gathered with forty Christians to pray for revival and he fell
under conviction of the “sin of not being filled with the Holy Spirit” and he
confessed before the people of his sin of accepting praise as a good missionary
but being far from God. The prayer meeting lasted for four days and four nights
with people coming under conviction and confessing their sins.[8] Toward the
end of that meeting, the Chinese said, “We thought you considered yourselves
above us. Now we are all one.” They knew that they were no longer Chinese and
Americans, but only God’s children. Wiley Glass was at the same meeting in
Hwanghsien. He saw the face of a man, whom he hated, come before him, who years
before had insulted his first wife. After gradually coming to confess the full
sin, he wept and felt the fullness of forgiveness: “When repentance washed the
guilt away and the peace of forgiveness filled my soul, I knew an ecstacy [sic]
of joy beyond description.”[8]
g.
APPLICATION: This teaching is unique about
Christianity. We’re not all going up the same mountain. In every other
religious path, people do things to make themselves acceptable to God. In every
other religion, it is the person’s responsibility to be good enough. Not Christianity.
John teaches us that Jesus Death is the basis for forgiveness and salvation,
not human merit.
h.
ILLUSTRATION: These reports from the North China
Mission garnered suspicion from the board leadership in Richmond that the
missionaries had indulged in Pentecostal excess. So, in 1935, the Executive
Secretary of the Foreign Mission Board, Charles E. Maddry, visited the North
China Mission and came back with glowing reports. His report defended the
validity of the work by the missionaries. Our missionaries have their feet on
the solid rock of Christ Jesus and they are building gloriously on the
foundation laid so deep and strong by those heroes and martyrs who preceded
them.” And then Maddry concluded, “A glorious revival is sweeping Northern and
Interior China, such as we have not seen in America in a hundred years. We have
seen it and felt its power. It is a revival of fire and burning. Sin is being
burned out of broken lives and men and women are being absolutely made over.
The power of Christ has come to grips with the power of Satan and it is a
fearful conflict. Satan has held sway and dominion over China for unnumbered
and weary centuries. His kingdom is suddenly being challenged and broken by the
power of a risen and enthroned Christ.”[9]
i.
Jesus died for the whole world
(Missions) (1 John 2:2) - John
plainly teaches that not everyone will go to heaven, but Christ’s saving death
has opened the blessing of eternal life to all persons. Most religions are
woven into the people group they come from (ie., Islam and Arabic/Arab
culture). The Jews had the Day of Atonement just for Jews, but John says that
this atonement is for the whole world.
j.
Christ’s
gospel is for every culture. Its message can work in every tribe, tongue,
language, and people. We are called to take that message to the ends of the
earth.
k.
ILLUSTRATION: In China, “the missionaries and
the mission board recognized that the revival in Shantung was of a different
sort of Christianity than they had ever experienced. The missionaries reported new experiences of
the filling of the Spirit. Missionary
Martha Franks remarked: “I have come into the midst of revival fires in
China-marvelous, wonderful, deep is the work of the Holy Spirit here. Oh, that
the fire might fall amongst Southern Baptists of America! I came up to
Hwanghsien from Tsining for a few days and I have never seen a place so
transformed. The first delightful thing I noticed was the warmth and
genuineness of the cordial welcome of the Chinese. They seem to have had a
baptism of love that flows out of their very countenances. The spirit of
worship and praise and reverence in the church service Sunday surpassed
anything I saw or felt in America.”[10]
Then the Executive Secretary visited, already suspicious of the excesses, and
came out impressively in favor of the movement. Following his trip to the
Orient, Maddry pledged to send seventy new missionaries to China to fill in the
gaps left from years of retrenchment,[18] but succeeded in sending only
fourteen by 1937. Nonetheless, his enthusiasm for China in light of other
burgeoning fields worldwide demonstrated his affection for the revival.”[11]
Invitation:
Have you
confessed your sin? Have you followed Bertha Smith’s example? Have you given Christ
your life? Have you turned it over to Him, submitted it to His governance, to
lead you? Will you commit to take the message of His sacrifice from here in
this community to the ends of the earth?
[1] Bertha Smith, Go Home and Tell, 39.
[3] Marie Monsen, The Awakening: Revival in China 1927-1937, trans. by Joy Guinness
(London: China Inland Mission, 1961), 55.
[4] Clinton
Arnold, Zondervan Illustrated Bible Backgrounds
Commentary, vol. 4, 185.
[5] Bertha Smith, How the Spirit Filled My Life, 32; Mary Crawford, The Shantung Revival, 6.
[6] Samuel N. Ngewa, Africa Bible Commentary, 1530.
[7] The KJV, NASB uses propitiation, meaning atonement, that
Jesus appeases God’s wrath, alluding to the OT sacrifices (Yom Kippur, the Day
of Atonement). The RSV uses expiation meaning he removes our sin. The NIV uses
atoning sacrifice to allow for both ideas. ABC,
1530.
[8] Cauthen, Higher Ground, 152.
[9] Charles E. Maddry, “A Day of Good
Tidings,” Home and Foreign Fields 19,
no. 10 (Oct 1935): 1, 6. Found at http://www.sermonindex.net/modules/newbb/viewtopic.php?topic_id=38098&forum=40&9
[10] Martha Linda Franks, “Revival
Fires,” Home and Foreign Fields 16,
no. 7 (July 1932): 31.
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