The following sermon introduction by Dr. Phineas F. Bresee, founder of the Church of the Nazarene, a world-denomination now numbering over 2 million adherents, was reprinted 80 years ago in Sermons on Isaiah by the Nazarene Publishing House of Kansas City, MO, in 1926.
His slightly edited call for an activated church could have been pointed to the day in which we now live.
by Phineas F. Bresee
Text: Isaiah 41:14-16. "(Paraphrased by John C. Oster). . .Do you feel like a worm, or a tiny bug in a culture dominated by evil? Don’t worry. God is on our side because we are on His side. The holy one of Israel will provide the strength and wisdom that we need to win this victory and we will be more effective than we ever dreamed that we could be. We can all be confident in this one thing--God is with us and the future belongs to Him.".
I am somewhat impressed with the conflicts which have been going on between the nations, and especially in studying what men call decisive battles. The most of what men call history is made up of crucial conflicts. But I have come gradually to realize that all of these battles are of small importance compared to that colossal conflict which is going on in the world right now between holiness and sin. The sound and the fury of this battle never die .
All the conflicts that arrest our attention for a while soon cease to be of interest except as they touch upon the great conflict between holiness and sin. Take the great conflict which raged so fiercely for four years in our own country. (Editor’s note: he refers to the Civil War.) We have almost ceased to care for that struggle except for two points and they in their highest sense are moral and Christian in nature. (1) The government was maintained, and for what purpose–to protect virtue and to punish sin. (2) The question of slavery was settled in harmony with Christian purpose. In this struggle, lives were lost, but virtue was gained against the onslaught of principalities and powers.
To live an active Christian life means warfare. Every Christian lives where the battle rages and he fights not only as one of an army engaging the enemy but as an individual person engulfed in the culture.
Every one must conquer or be trampled under foot by the powers of darkness. There is no release to man born of woman–the alternatives are conquer or perish.
Let us make no mistake here. Let us not say that God’s way is to take a worm and thrash a mountain with it. He might do that, but that is not what our text says.
Let us not evade the responsibility of our own agency. It was a fortunate fact that God placed the finely veined marble at Pentelicus, only 10 miles from Athens, but that does not account for the Parthenon. It was a man, or men, who fashioned the great marble buildings of antiquity. Nor does this conquering Word alone account for the planting within a few years of churches from Jerusalem to Rome. It was done by men who used and lived the Word. The Word alone does not account for the Reformation, but the Word as acted out by Luther and Wycliffe does account for the advances of the Reformation. Let us act upon this Word and we too shall conquer.
The (Activating) Word
