A Better Way: Reformation and Revival -- By: Thomas J. Nettles

Journal: Reformation and Revival
Volume: RAR 01:2 (Spring 1992)
Article: A Better Way: Reformation and Revival
Author: Thomas J. Nettles


A Better Way: Reformation and Revival

Thomas J. Nettles

“This I tell you, brother, you can’t have one, you can’t have none, you can’t have one without the other.” That is what a popular song of the 1950s taught us about love and marriage. Such was the consensus of public morality before a generation arose that feared marriage without love so much that it pursued love without marriage. Marriage was characterized merely as “ink stains dried upon some lines.” Clearly, the biblical pattern is that sexual expressions of love appropriately reflect God’s design and character only in the marriage relationship; just as clearly, marriage should not be dull, uninteresting, and similar to endentured servanthood, but should be filled with self-sacrifice, commitment, personal development, passion, and unity. In man-woman relationships, sexual love and marriage necessarily involve each other; neither is defined totally in terms of the other, but the essence of neither is complete without the other.

So it is with revival and reformation; when individuals pursue one without proper appreciation for and attention to the other, the results can be very ugly. Though these two must go together, we must, in my opinion, define them separately and be able to discern their distinctive characteristics. A clear grasp of the tendencies of each when separated from the other can be a great aid in seeing clearly just what kind of illness has invaded the body. With care we can help assure a prescription which does not underdose the thing most needed. The relation of reformation and revival to the growth of the church must also concern us.

A Definition of Reformation

Reformation is the recovery of biblical truth which leads to the purifying of one’s theology. It involves a rediscovery of the Bible as the judge and guide of all thought and action, corrects errors in interpretation, gives precision, coherence, and courage to doctrinal confession, and gives form

and energy to the corporate worship of the Triune God. Though it should be an ongoing enterprise in all churches and in the body of Christ throughout the world, the most poignant displays of reformation come at times of great theological, moral, spiritual, and ecclesiological declension in the church.

A Biblical Paradigm of Reformation

The recovery of the ark from the Philistines gave great joy to David and the house of Israel. Their first effort to restore it, however, ended in the disastrous death of Ussah (2 Sam. 6:7). The ark had been moved improperly and the warning of death for such action was carried out (Num. 4:15

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