“Does this teaching not make people careless and wicked?” – our Heidelberg Catechism has for centuries already been asking this question of catechumens and church people in general (Question 64). Freely translated: doesn’t the Reformed doctrine of God’s free grace invite people to live as they wish? It was the question of the sixteenth century – the question of those who considered “good works” to be essential if one wished to be saved.

Since then the Reformed doctrine has given rise to other questions. A while ago someone asked: Don’t these teachings lead to depression? That is a typical question of our own century – the century in which we talk a lot about the psychological problems from which people – also Christians – suffer. For does not this Reformed teaching, with its confession of our great misery before God, take from us all our self-confidence and self-respect? Does it not push us into the deep well of despair, self-contempt, and depression?

You know the answer to both these questions. That answer is absolutely negative. The Reformed teaching cannot make people careless and wicked. For the doctrine of redemption speaks of our communion with Christ, and that communion simply has to bring forth fruits of thankfulness. And in view of our communion with Christ it is equally impossible that the knowledge of our human misery should be able to deprive us of our zest and joy of life. What we cannot find in ourselves we receive from Christ, the radiant King of the church, and from his Holy Spirit, the Spirit of the new birth. Knowledge of our misery is necessary for the comfort and joy of the Christian life.

On the present occasion I want to ask your attention for a third objection to the Reformed doctrine: does this doctrine not make drowsy people? Or, to say it differently, does it really make people awake, buoyant?

This question is being asked throughout history. We hear it also from the side of the so-called revival movements.

You have of course already understood that we are using a biblical metaphor here. The Bible more than once uses the image of waking up when referring to our life before God. There is nobody who does not understand this.

“Awake, O sleeper, and arise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you” (Eph. 5:14).

“You know that the hour has come for you to wake from sleep. The night is far gone; the day is at hand. So then let us put on the armor of light! Let us walk properly as in the daytime” (Rom. 13:11-14; cf. 1 Thessalonians 5:5ff.).

Christians are not allowed to keep sleeping when the sun arises over their lives. Christians, therefore, may certainly not fall asleep when the sun stands high in the sky.

When we study the history of Christ’s church we nevertheless see that strange phenomenon: Christians falling asleep in the middle of the day.

It cannot be argued that, ever since the gospel of Christ was first proclaimed in this country, God’s children have continually been awake, attentive to God’s will, busy with God’s promises, looking out with great expectation to the great day. This certainly has not been the case. How often don’t we have to speak of periods of decline, slackening, drowsiness, lassitude and deadness in the history of the church! Those are the periods when, so to speak, a great drought comes over the church, as a result of which everything becomes barren, colourless, and motionless. It seems then that life has stopped and the power of death prevails.

The miracle of church history is not that there have never been such periods.

The miracle is much greater: while those periods indeed existed, God in his goodness has always again been willing to give revival to his church. God did not give up, also not in times when his children fell asleep. God gave men who shook the dreamers awake and re-activated the congregation. Such a revival is called reformation – continuing reformation. That is a well-known and well-accepted word for us: after all, for centuries already it has established our name: Reformed churches.

“Reformation,” then – that is for us the miracle of history.

But there are also many Christians around us who, instead of “reformation,” prefer another word. They prefer the word “revival.”

“Revival” refers to awaking, being awakened, getting up and starting again. And so, in one sense, there seems to be little difference whether someone speaks of “reformation” or “revival.”

Nevertheless, the word “revival” has in the course of history received a special meaning. The word reminds us of the “revival movements” of the period between the sixteenth and twentieth centuries. It also reminds us of massive evangelism campaigns in England and the United States, where enthusiastic preachers in a suggestive manner bring the message of conversion – at meetings which certainly can’t be characterized by formal solemnity. There is too much enthusiasm for that, and the rhythm of the revival songs is too stirring and moving. Who would not be affected by the clapping of hands, the calls of “hallelujah,” the sensation of wholesale public conversions?

At that moment we, Reformed people, feel that we are suddenly in a very different atmosphere than we are used to and desire.

So the question arises: What is really happening when we meet with these forms of “revival”? If we consider the words that are spoken, then there is much we have in common. They speak about the sin and guilt of people before God, about the need for conversion to God, about salvation in Christ, the Son of God. They call upon people to break with the sins of the time: sexual degeneration, desire for wealth, disregard of life, and they point to the necessity of the sanctified life before God, the Judge of all. They very clearly speak the words of the Bible and they don’t for a moment doubt the authority of Holy Scripture. And who can object when these movements strongly emphasize the need for rebirth and conversion? They certainly are different from the Mormons or Jehovah’s Witnesses who sometimes stand at our door and try to estrange us from our God, the Triune God.

You meet these people of the revival movement among the many evangelical Christians who in various ways exert themselves in this country for the name and sake of Christ. You meet them in your own congregation, when especially the younger generation responds positively to the message, the enthusiasm, and the activities of the evangelical movement.

All this makes the question urgent: why do these words “(continuing) reformation” and “revival” nevertheless – and in spite of all the affinities – often represent two different worlds? What causes the difference in climate between the two?

We have to keep a long story short. Therefore, I will draw your attention to three points.

• The revival movements have often surpassed the established churches in watchfulness. While the churches slumbered and fell asleep as a result of the cadence of their own routines, the people of the revival movement were alert and pointed to the threatened arrival of hostile forces. They have rightly pointed to the shortcomings of a proclamation where the sermons remained stuck in an arid dogmatist scheme that was of no relevance for the hearers. For one can keep the church teachings in the deep-freeze, but meanwhile the church falls asleep.

Revivalists have argued rightly that, on the contrary, the relationship with God must touch a person’ s heart, that faith is not just something one “knows,” but that it involves “experience.” They have rightly proclaimed the life-transforming power of God’s law and demanded the sanctification of life. They have rightly noticed the rise of secularization in Europe and urged the churches not to forget about their missional calling. The people of the revival movement were, earlier than the churches, aware of the increasing social abuses in the world. I am thinking here of the fight against slavery and against the labour of women and children in the nineteenth century, and the fight against hunger in the world of that time.

In all these things the established churches were often unwieldy, slow; there was little evidence of flexibility and inventiveness. The church indeed had her doctrine; for zeal one had to go somewhere else.

• While the revival movement is to be complimented on the fact that its alarm system worked better than that of the church, we must at the same time add another comment.

It appears that the revival movement, vigilant though it is, has given little attention to the building of Christ’s congregation by means of the living proclamation of the doctrine of Christ. Salvation takes place between God and the individual person, between God’s Spirit and the heart of the human being. And the important thing is that that heart allows this love of God to enter. The rest of the Bible’s teachings is in fact of only secondary importance.

The fact that God has a people in this world and that he builds up this people–the believers and their children – in the way of the covenant and in the community of the church under the guidance of the Holy Spirit is certainly not denied, but neither is it honoured. The religious individualism forms the obstruction here. Therefore, differences of opinion on the form of the church and of the church offices, and also on the matter of infant baptism, are ultimately only marginal disagreements. The message is: our heart must love God and we must choose God.

That God first loved us, even with an everlasting love – the truth that is basic to the doctrine of the church! – is hardly mentioned. Deep down there is a continuous conflict between the revival movement and the Canons of Dort! Therefore, the evangelical movement is such a vulnerable movement. All kind of fashionable theology can easily enter. The doctrine “that wards off and protects” often functions too little. People do pay attention to actual, concrete needs but do not develop a feeling for the city’s need of permanent protection. Fire brigades and ambulances abound, but there is no protection of the boundaries and there are no anti-aircraft guns.

• The revival movement does not lead to a real reformation of the church – that should have become clear. But the question for us remains: does reformation lead us to revival? Does the Reformed teaching also make people “awake”? That was our question.

Then I think of the enthusiasm for the gospel of Christ, of the concern for the neighbour in the work of mission and evangelism, of the courage to fight the ethical wilderness in this country, of the readiness and inventiveness to bring sacrifices in our own lives for the sake of Christ. For none of us should disregard the diligence of the revivalists. Only it cannot be true that the churches should have the doctrine – the frigid doctrine, the sleep-inducing doctrine – while the revival movement is characterized by its diligence. That simply can’t be true. For the Reformed doctrine will keep us in communion with Christ, the radiant Prince of life.

And when Christ is proclaimed and believed, we live in his communion. We have been “grafted” into Christ,” says the Catechism (Answer 64). And must not that communion lead to life, joy, expectation, radiating love, help in need? This has to be true, as surely as Christ lives.

No, this “being awake” is not a kind of characteristic of church members that they can either ignore or apply, just as it pleases them. One can do that with one’s savings account, but it is not how it should be in the community of Christ.

“Being awake” is a gift of the Spirit of Christ. We receive that gift in answer to prayer and as a result of the proclamation of the Word of Christ and in our communal song of praise to God. That is what we read in the revival chapter: Ephesians 5. We must continually “be filled” with the Holy Spirit (Eph. 5:18) in a life of love, in a community that is characterized by mutual help and communal song of praise. That is where the preaching must lead us – that is what we must pray for.

In the congregation we pray together, and always again, for a life of gratitude, amazement, and a living faith. We pray for a community that lives under Christ’s teaching, expects the appearance of Christ, and is animated by the Spirit of Christ. Then all sorts of obstacles and obstructions rapidly fall away: short-sightedness, timidity, love of ease, complacency, prejudice, and formalism. Such things spoil the atmosphere in the congregation. Worse: they quench the Spirit. But these sickening and atmosphere-spoiling occurrences do not survive under the living preaching of Christ, the authority of the faithful teachings.

Does the Reformed teaching also make people “awake”? we asked.

The answer can be clear: Yes, for “it is impossible that those grafted into Christ by true faith should not bring forth fruits of thankfulness.”

We wish to preach the sound doctrine diligently (Titus 2:7, 10-14), for that will be a cause of joy to the Spirit.