2016 Revive Our Hearts Winter Newsletter

Winter 2016 Newsletter

Y

ou don’t have to look far to know our world is in trouble. Just read the

headlines, and you’ll see endless accounts of violence, perversion, breakdown of families, and people mocking things of the Lord.

We can feel helpless and impotent in the face of such overwhelming issues. But I believe there is at least one thing we as women can do that really can make a significant difference.

More than 2,500 years ago, the prophet Jeremiah called for “the mourning women to come” (Jer. 9:17). In that time of darkness, where God’s people had come to justify and embrace evil, Jeremiah begged them to repent of their sin, to mourn, and to cry out to the Lord for mercy.

I believe we’re called to do the same today. That’s why throughout the coming year, Revive Our Hearts is calling women to cry out to the Lord in fervent prayer for our nation and our world. It’s our desire that women, both individually and in groups, will join together in asking God to intervene in our culture for His glory.

As part of this call, we’re asking women to gather together in September to pray at Cry Out! True Woman 2016. It’s our hope that thousands of women will come together in Indianapolis, with hundreds of thousands more joining in via LIVE stream.

We’re so thankful for the many women who already have a heart for their communities—who live out the truth of God’s Word on a daily basis and point others to Christ through their words and example. Jen Johnson is one such woman who is a powerful influence on the lives of the college staff and students she works with. I hope you’ll be encouraged by her example and how God is using her to impact others.

As believers, we’ve been chosen to be God’s instruments in this dark and perverse culture. Would you join Revive Our Hearts this year in crying out to God for mercy—for yourself, your families, your community, and your nation? May God turn the hearts of His people and then turn the heart of the world to Him, for He is our only hope.

Seeking Him with you,

Chocolate BETTER THAN

Equipping Women to Discover Truth

by Leanna Shepard

N “

only by the swishing of pages and the scratching of pens can feel ot many of you should become teachers.”

How’s

that for an opening statement to a room full of teachers

and ministry leaders?

For

the more than

2,300

ladies in

attendance , this might not have been what they came to hear, but they didn’t leave disappointed.

Jen Wilkin, plenary speaker at Revive ’15: Women Teaching Women and author of Women of the Word, didn’t shy away from this caution from James 3. Rather, she embraced it as an encouraging reminder of the powerful influence teachers have through their words.

“Our words matter,” Jen stated in Friday afternoon’s message. “They have the power to create and the power to destroy.

“As those created in the image of God, this is something we share with Him in a removed sort of way. The words of God are

like an eternity. But what could have been an awkward moment was instead a precious sight to behold: women huddled up in groups or on their own pouring over a familiar passage, like eager children in a candy shop.

For Jen, this was sweeter than chocolate. As she said in her opening message, there’s little else she cares about more than equipping women to discover God’s truth for themselves.

Women need women teachers for their example, perspective, and empathetic authority.

If the goal was to leave the women at Revive ’15 with a deep appreciation and hunger for God’s Word, Jen hit this one out of the park!

As Jen states in the final chapter of her book Women of the Word:

miraculous in the way they create life; they are miraculous in the

We become what we behold. . . . So make a faithful

work they do. You and I don’t have miraculous words, but we

study of the One you want to imitate, as a dearly loved

have words of great, great power.”

child. Study everything that makes God wonderful and

On Saturday morning, Jen spoke of how the road to transformation is from the head to the heart. “The heart cannot love what the mind does not know. . . . Know Him, and you will love Him.” Later she shared practical tools for getting better acquainted with God’s Word, walking us through three stages of personal study: Comprehension—“What Does it Say?”

mimic to your heart’s delight, as the joyful expression of your reciprocal love for him. Respond as David did: “My heart says to you, ‘Your face, Lord do I seek’” (Ps. 27:8).

To the one that seeks him, the Lord is pleased to lift up his countenance, both now and forever. Study well the contours of his face. Let gazing on his loveliness touch mind and heart. And be transformed.

Interpretation—“What Does it Mean?”

Application—“How Should it Change Me?” Then it was time to put into practice all these principles and actually dig into Scripture. Now, five minutes of silence broken 2 ReviveOurHearts.com

You can hear more from Jen Wilkin February 15–17 on Revive Our Hearts as she shares “Getting Women Into the Word.”

FROM EARBUDS TO THE HEART How Podcasts Are Impacting College Students

s. I e Our Heart try of Reviv is in m e th r kful fo y charac“I am so than s to grow m st ca d o p e to God use th my desire have seen h God, and it w lk a w y l sona ministr of ter, my per has used the od G . w ro anwomen g biblical wom help other stand what er d n u er tt s p me be opinion on ROH to hel as different h e n yo er ev time where hood is in a an.” s to be a wom what it mean ncoln

Li l, of Nebraska—Sarah Snel e University th at r to ec ir all D Residence H

“Becoming a Woman of Dis cretion has be impactful stud en one of the ies I’ve done. most A s I re vi ew th adding a list e co nt en t da ily, I’m of verses from the Bible abou of a wise vs. fo t characterist olish woman. ics I could go on series and ho an d on ab out this w it has helped develop me du to-last semes ring this seco ter of college!” nd—Taylor Mye

rs, Senior at Ka

nsas State Uni

versity

om Nancy and ife examples fr -l al re d an s, storie about “I use quotes, college women ll te to s rt ea ive Our H st knowing others on Rev with God. Ju ng ki al w e ar who g their other women o are givin h w e er th t omen ou iring to them there are w is very insp es os rp u p is H an some lives away to type of wom at th e b to ges them r women who and encoura amples of olde ex ve ha e w eful er than day! I’m grat od’s will rath in living for G us r fo ce pa help set the our own.” nsas State

r, on staff at Ka

by Jen Johnson with Paula Marsteller

—Chyla Coope

H

“I’ve shared Lies Women Believe with several friends on campus who struggled with love addiction, depression, anxiety, negative body image, and eating disorders. A lot of these struggles in my friends’ lives tied back to a lie they believed about God or themselves.

aving worked with college women for almost two

decades with

Student Mobilization, I am more grateful for

the ministry of the years

Revive Our Hearts today than ever. Over

I have invested in any resource from ROH that I

could get my hands on and then exposed staff and students to them.

I was especially excited when I found out about the podcast a couple years ago. I encouraged all our staff women to get it on their phones. I listen to it almost daily, and it’s not unusual for our staff

I encouraged these girls to mem orize the verses and truths in this book. Now when these thin gs come up, we are able to bring it back to what is true. It has allowed us to identify the root of a lot of struggles in our lives.”

—Anna Ewing, on staff at the Univ

ersity of Missouri

to text or email one another and say, “You’ve got to listen to this new series!” We continually utilize the podcast as we invest in the lives of college women.

Here’s how just a few of the staff members and students have been impacted by Revive Our Hearts:

How I thank God for Nancy Leigh and the ministry of Revive Our Hearts that helps provide resources I can utilize on a regular basis to build these convictions and worldview into women!

Winter 2016 3

a Message

from the Prophets for

Troubling Times

by Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth

T As I

hese are days we desperately need to hear from

• Transgenderism is celebrated.

heaven , and

• 37 million people signed onto the Ashley Madison adultery

read

Isaiah

I

and

God

has a word for our day .

Jeremiah, I

see a four - fold message

believe

from these prophets that is just as relevant today as it was when it was first given to

God’s

people more than

2,500

years ago.

website.

Abroad: • We’re facing the threat of a nuclear-armed Iran.

• ISIS is claiming victory after victory in the Middle East and gaining a foothold in Europe.

1. WAKE UP. First, there is a cry to wake up, to move from complacency to concern. Isaiah cries with intensity, desperation, and urgency:

• The Kremlin is becoming more aggressive.

We are hurtling toward judgment.

Author Joel Rosenberg says it well:

Rise up, you women who are at ease, hear my voice; you

Warning signs are flashing everywhere. Alarm bells are

complacent daughters, give ear to my speech (32:9).

ringing everywhere. Far too many self-professed Chris-

Under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, the prophet is saying, “We need to wake up to our current condition, to see that we’re in trouble.”

Are we not in trouble today, as well? Serious trouble.

In the United States: • There’s an explosion of violence in cities, streets, schools, and churches.

tians are groggy or asleep, and we need a wake-up call.

But our natural attitude isn’t to be really concerned about these things—unless it’s our kids who are getting shot at.

We’ve been deceived. The world has always scoffed at the threat of impending judgment. It did in Noah’s day, and it does in our day.

The world just keeps on partying, oblivious to the danger that

• Racism is tearing neighborhoods and communities apart.

is at hand. But what grieves me is not so much that the world is

• There’s an erosion and redefining of (or attempt to redefine)

partying but that the church is partying, unaware of the impending

marriage.

danger and threat of God’s judgment. Somehow, we don’t see the

• 57 million babies have been murdered since 1973.

connection between our sinful choices and the consequences we

• Planned Parenthood aborts hundreds of thousands of babies

will surely reap.

each year, and has sold their body parts for money.

4 ReviveOurHearts.com

We need to wake up.

2. WAIL. Jeremiah also instructs us to wail: Consider, and call for the mourning women to come;

As we warn others by our tears, we become a means of influence over the hearts of others. It takes courage, because ours isn’t a popular message. We may not be believed. But we have to say it anyway.

send for the skillful women to come; let them make haste

We’ve been chosen by God to be His instruments in this

and raise a wailing over us, that our eyes may run down

prodigal culture, and the influence of one woman for evil or for good

with tears and our eyelids flow with water (9:17–18).

is so powerful. We see that illustrated in the distinction between

This is not a time for playing games. This is a time to wail, to

two women: Eve in the Old Testament and Mary of Nazareth in

mourn, to grieve over what is happening in our land, our homes, and our churches. This is not someone else’s problem; this is our problem.

the New. Eve said, “I want to have it my way,” but Mary said, “I want to have it God’s way.”

The prophet Hosea reminds us that there are two different

The result? Eve led her husband and the human race into sin

kinds of weeping. God says these people “do not cry to me from the

and darkness. But Mary, through the power of her surrendered life,

heart.” Instead they “wail upon their beds” Hosea 7:14.

became the instrument of bringing the Savior into the world.

What’s the difference? Those who merely wail upon their beds

Our lives are a powerful influence on those around us. Oh, that

are remorseful about the consequences of their sin; but they’re un-

we would use that influence to show others the critical condition we

willing to move or to change; whereas, those who cry out to God

are in so they will be motivated to join us in weeping, repenting, and

from their hearts are genuinely repentant over their sin.

crying out to God for mercy.

What should we weep and wail about? Not just the consequences of our sin, but our sin itself.

We need to weep over: • our bitterness and unforgiveness • our temporal values • our love of sin and sinning • our lack of love for God and others • our broken homes and fractured relationships • our self-absorption • our hardness of heart We can’t manufacture weeping and wailing. But when we get in the presence of God and look around, the Spirit will cause a groaning, a compulsion to well up in our hearts. We’ll no longer be able to be complacent.

4. WAIT ON THE LORD. Finally, we are to wait on the Lord. As we do, we will move from fear to faith. Isaiah speaks of the power of God to transform the most hopeless situation. He says it will all begin when “the Spirit is poured upon us from on high” (32:15). Then: • We will find justice and righteousness, peace, quietness, and confidence forever (vv. 16–17).

• We will live in peaceful dwelling places, in secure homes, in undisturbed places of rest (v. 18).

He continues in the next chapter with this prayer: O Lord, be gracious to us; we wait for you. Be our arm every morning, our salvation in the time of trouble. . . .

3. WARN OTHERS. Not only are we to wake up and wail, we are to warn others. We are to move from isolation to influence.

Jeremiah realized what powerful influence women have. That’s why he said, “Let [the women] make haste and raise a wailing over us” (9:18).

Then he says, “Hear, O women, the word of the Lord, and

The Lord is exalted, for he dwells on high . . . he will be the stability of your times, abundance of salvation, wisdom, and knowledge (Isa. 33:2, 5–6).

Yes, there is hope, but the Lord is our only hope. We must pray for an outpouring of the Spirit of God in our day.

Will you join me, the Revive Our Hearts team, and other women of God around the world, as we do just that in the months ahead?

let your ear receive the word of his mouth” (v. 20a). We need to become women who know God’s Word and know how to apply it to real-life situations in our time.

Jeremiah continues, “Teach to your daughters a lament, and

True Woman 2016 National Women’s Conference September 22–24

each to her neighbor a dirge” (v. 20b).

When the righteous cry for help, the Lord hears.

—Psalm 34:17 TrueWoman16.com

5

The Gr

by Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth

or over thirty years ,

Solomon (or The Song

I

have found

of

sweetest, richest passages in all of short chapters;

Songs)

T he S ong

of

to be one of the

God’s Word. Just eight

117 verses. But such a huge treasure.

As theologian C. I. Scofield observed: “For those who know and love Christ, this book is a source of great joy, great blessing, and great delight.”

And Charles Spurgeon thought no less of it: This sacred [song] is almost the central book of the Bible.

It seems to stand like the Tree of Life in the midst of the Garden of Eden in the very center of the Paradise of God. In recent years, some Christian speakers have taught that the primary, if not the sole, interpretation of the Song of Songs has to do with love and sex within the marriage relationship. That perspective is also seen in many excellent study Bibles.

It’s tough to disagree with these teachers and scholars. But after many years of meditation and study of this book, I am more convinced than ever that the Song of Songs is about far more than human love and marriage.

Yes, the Song of Songs is a song of human love; it includes many wonderful, helpful insights about marriage; and it provides a needed correction to modern views of love, sex, and marriage. But first and foremost this is a song of divine love—a song of Christ and His love.

You see, Scripture teaches that human marriage is a parable of a cosmic, eternal reality; its very reason for existing is to magnify God and put His glory on display. Marriage is temporary. God’s glory is eternal. For those of us who are married, our marriage is intended to reflect to the world a reality that is far greater than our marriage.

6 ReviveOurHearts.com

reatest Love Story Ever Told

Historically, both Jewish and Christian believers and commentators have understood the Song of Songs to point to a spiritual relationship of which marriage is an earthly picture.

belong to Him. The love of Christ is the pattern and source that enables all human love, including marriage.

When we come to that amazing treatise on marriage in

Old Testament Jewish believers saw in the Song of Songs a

Ephesians 5, it’s all tied in to Christ’s relationship with His Church.

description of God’s relationship with Israel. In the Old Testament

The teaching on husbands loving their wives and wives reverencing

God was seen as a Bridegroom and Israel as His chosen bride. And

and submitting to their husbands is all grounded in the love of

God’s covenant with Israel was pictured as a marriage:

Christ and His relationship with His Church and the goal to put

For your maker is your husband, the Lord of Hosts is his

that on display.

name (Isa. 54:5).

In Ephesians 5, we read of human marriage:

As the bridegroom rejoices over the bride, so shall your

Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and

God rejoice over you (Isa. 62:5).

hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh

I remember the devotion of your youth, your love as a bride (Jer. 2:2).

In fact, it’s traditional for Jews to read the Song of Songs during the Passover season as a reminder of God’s covenant relationship with the Israelites.

After the New Testament was written, believers throughout the history of the church understood the Song of Songs to be a picture of the relationship between Christ and His bride, the Church, and between Christ and the individual believer.

Where did they get that? Well, Christ Himself claimed to be the subject of the Old Testament. Speaking of the Old Testament Scriptures—including the Song of Songs—He said, “They bear witness about me” (John 5:39). It’s about Him. All Scripture unfolds the story of redemption and points to Christ.

The Old and New Testament is one grand story of how He came to rescue and redeem unworthy, unlovable people and to take them to Himself as a bride. It’s a story of how He cherishes and loves

(v. 31).

And then the very next verse explains: This mystery is profound, and I am saying that it refers to Christ and the church (vv. 32–33).

That’s the point of marriage. And that’s the point of the Song of Songs.

I hope you’ll join me on Revive Our Hearts February 22– March 25 for “How to Fall and Stay in Love with Jesus,” an in-depth study of the Song of Songs.

When a friend asked what I was hoping to accomplish in this series, I responded, “I want women to really experience and believe that God loves them—to feel secure in Christ’s love, and then having experienced it, to have a whole new capacity to love Him, their spouse, and others with that same love.”

I hope you’ll join me as we open this priceless gem of a book and behold the amazing love of Jesus with fresh eyes!

His bride dearly and wants an intimate relationship with those who Winter 2016 7

Spring cleaning

just got a lot more exciting!

Getting multiple things done at once . . . that’s what women do, right?

Well, we’d like to help!

This spring, invest eternally in women’s hearts and lives as you’re whipping your attic, garage, closets, and office into shape.

How? Money isn’t the only way you can give to Revive Our Hearts. Donate your stuff to us anytime. Give anything from that used car to a baseball collection to jewelry to electronics to . . . the sky’s the limit!

Just visit

www.reviveourhearts.com/spring-cleaning/ We’ll then convert your gift into cash and put that money toward getting the truth of freedom, fullness, and fruitfulness in Christ into as many women’s lives as possible.

Ready, set . . . let’s clean up!

TM

Revive Our Hearts is an outreach of Life Action Ministries PO Box 2000 • Niles, MI 49120 • ReviveOurHearts.com • 800.569.5959

Looking for bite-sized, daily encouragement right where you are? Follow us on: facebook.com/ReviveOurHearts twitter.com: @ReviveOurHearts pinterest.com/ReviveOurHearts instagram: @reviveourhearts

Unless otherwise noted, all Scripture is taken from the Holy Bible, English Standard Version, Copyright © 2001, Crossway Bibles, esv.org. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.

Editorial: Paula Marsteller, Mindy Kroesche, Stacey Battenburg Art Direction: Benjamin Hannah Design: Brittany Wong Photographers: Brittany Wong, Lightstock, Kaboom Pics