Sound the Alarm!
Sound the Alarm!
To turn a nation, you must take the next generation.
Politicians and other religions know this. Many stop the gospel from spreading to under 25 year olds because they know the potential to impact the nation. They give their best leaders, often the men, to equip and train the emerging generation, giving them something to live and even die for.
• Hitler – took the emerging generation
• Communist Russia – took the emerging generation
• Islam – is taking the emerging generation
• The media – is taking the emerging generation
Yet in the Church worldwide the emerging generation generally has the least senior leadership attention, finances, and committed leaders. I was in India looking down from the Himalayas at a city of a million where I was told that every home had a Hindu altar and a mask on the door to ward off evil spirits. I have traveled to over 40 nations and ask, “Where is the city of a million, or even half a million, where Jesus can say, ‘Every home belongs to ME?’”. To date, no one has been able name one city.
Surely one of the big reasons is that to turn a nation you must take the next generation. “I will declare your Name to all generations and THEREFORE the nations will praise You” (Psalm 45:17). David was a King and a Warrior yet knew He was commissioned to pass on generationally. As an old man He prayed, “Oh Lord, from my youth I have known You. Even now when I am old and grey, don’t let me die until I tell the next generation the wonderful works of God, Your power to all who are to come.” He was so desperate to pass on to the generations to come that He asked for His life to be preserved for this very reason.
Wake up Church. Wake up!
“His plans are from Generation to generation” (Psalm 33:11). God plans generationally. He had plans for Abraham, Isaac, Jacob … David’s generations until the Son of David was born to be Savior of the world. He is still planning generationally towards His Son coming, not to a manger but in clouds of great glory. One day there will be a generation who shout, “Come, Lord Jesus!”
We are to raise and train a generation “for such a time as this” and therefore need to know what His plans are in “such a time as this”. If we don’t, we will not be preparing them to be like David and, “serve the purpose of God in their generation” (Acts 13:35). It is time for men of Issachar who “know the signs of the times and also what to do” (1 Chronicles 12:32) to rise up so they can prepare the emerging generation according to God’s plans and purposes, not according to traditions, curriculum, or as dictated by manmade structures.
It is a whole other article to address this more fully, but one of the “signs of the times” is that this emerging generation can complete the great commission as stated by heads of Mission Organizations and people who really know. Even this one fact presents us with challenges:
We must equip, envision, and send them out to finish the task that Jesus gave us – even to go to the hardest place on earth and cry, “Repent, make way, Jesus the Messiah is coming”.
They could see His return so they need to know they are the Bride and their Bridegroom is coming! We must know what to expect leading up to that event, prepare them for it, and to understand what God will be doing during that time so they can run with His power, His leadership, and His heart.
There is a cry for the hearts of the fathers to be “turned to the children” in the spirit of Elijah (Malachi 4:5-6). I pray for a great awakening to take back relational responsibility for this generation of young people and children who could walk through the most terrible (2 Timothy 3:1) and yet the most glorious days of this earth when the end time harvest will be gathered and the bride of Christ refined (Revelation 14:15).
How many take this as the DNA of all they do from childhood, through teenage years, and into their adult life? The world is changing and will continue to do so at an increasing rate. No longer can leaders prepare for tomorrow as if the next year will be as this. No longer can the children and young people be confined to a department seen as the training ground for greater things. They are a major part of a move of God, being brought to center stage, to bring in the end time harvest.
It will soon be evident why the enemy has tried to destroy this generation.
Who is Responsible for the Emerging Generation?
As far as we can see there are only two categories of people responsible:
1. We are all responsible.
“One generation shall tell the next generation” (Psalm 145:4). Repeatedly, all of Israel was commanded to pass on to the children (e.g. Deuteronomy 6:4-9; 32:6).
Every member of the Body of Christ is responsible for passing on to the next generation, even the older men to the younger men and the older women to the younger women (1 Timothy 5).
The command is not designated solely to a specific department or office. When we do it God’s way, “even the generations not yet born” (Psalm 78:1-8) will be impacted.
When we resort to our own strategies, we see Judges 2:10: “After that whole generation had been gathered to their ancestors, another generation grew up who knew neither the Lord nor what he had done for Israel.” We cannot assume that because one generation knows their God the next generation automatically will, or that our manmade systems can supersede the ways of God.
2. Parents are responsible
“The revealed things belong to you and your children,” Deuteronomy 29:29. No one can take the place of parents. They, above everyone else, are uniquely and strategically positioned for this. Discipleship is a lifestyle on a day-to-day basis. Only parents can disciple in this way through their own lives as well as through words (like Jesus with His disciples).
I dream of a church where parents no longer come asking what the church can do for their child or teenager, but instead ask what the church can do to better equip them as parents and where the church proactively empowers parents. Jesus commanded us to make disciples of all nations – it starts at home and goes to the nations.
I have a dream that parents disciple their children and bring them to the Body of Christ, which forms them into “an army” to win the lost.
The future of generations is in our hands!
We cannot focus on adults anymore as if they are the only ones who truly matter, as if the future is in their hands. God is saying something quite different. In many nations, young people are paying the price, standing for the sake of the gospel, speaking out, prepared to be counted. They are praying where they are told they can’t pray, speaking of Jesus where they are told to be silent. It is time to raise a generation of Daniels.
David said in Psalm 45:17, "I will perpetuate your name through all generations THEREFORE the nations will praise you, and rolling on through history, future generations will be told about the Lord. They will proclaim His righteousness to a people yet unborn."
The nations will praise Jesus when we pass the Name of Jesus through the generations as He asked us to. Surely it is our goal that one day every generation and nation will praise Him.
This is all about Jesus!