Gabe started this new series to help raise our faith through the roof and give us a new perspective to overcome the barriers in reaching others for Christ. The backdrop to his message is in Mark 2, where Jesus had returned home, and a full house had gathered to welcome him back. Seeing the crowd, ‘some’ ordinary men pushed through the challenges and obstacles to bring their paralysed friend through the roof to encounter the healing power of Jesus. These unnamed friends had met the obstacle of the crowds to get their friend to Jesus, yet, they did not go home disappointed or allowed excuses to stop them. They dug through the clay tiles, hardened with manure, to break through the roof to lower their friend to the feet of Jesus, so he would encounter the healing touch of Jesus.
Revival starts with those nobody, somebody and anybody who have an expectant faith and a willingness to carry the name of Jesus and push through the barriers. We are all just a nobody, trying to tell everybody about somebody, who can save anybody.
Gabe gave us these 3 barriers we need to get over, to live a life of revival. This will give us a new perspective to see the miracles God wants to do in and through us.
1) Get over Crowds
The greatest challenge is not that we are on the inside looking in, focusing on our circle, but rather that we are on the inside, refusing to look out for the needs of others. God’s power is linked to His heart, and those in need, not in our abilities. We need to stop following the crowd and being so busy doing the work of the ministry and start slowing down to see what is the real work He is wanting us to do right now. God gives us so many opportunities every day to bring the lost to Jesus, yet we lose these moments by being too busy to see it from His perspective.
2) Get over Ceilings
When we consider the story of getting the paralysed man to Jesus, others saw the ceiling as just a perimeter, but his friends saw the potential. We need to stop disqualifying those who God can reach, by limiting our perspective to see the supernatural ways of God and who He can use to reach them. It does not need to be a pipe dream or wishful thinking to see our unsaved loved ones worshipping next to us in Church. We need to envision them thanking us for not giving up on them to be saved. It is time to break the sanitised ceilings over our lives, those cages that keep us from being used by God and start being prepared to get our hands dirty to see others encounter the saving grace of Jesus.
The Church is not a zoo, full of visitors, spectators and commentators, but a Church in the wild with people wildly after Jesus who are prepared to partner with Him and get dirty. God is not afraid of our sin, addiction, relational chaos or sexual mess – He will keep digging to get to us, and we need to be doing the same for others. It is time to join the Church’s mission to plunder Hell and populate Heaven.
Jesus did not die for us to come to Church, but to become the Church!
3) Get over Critics
When God is on the move in the supernatural, there will always be those lemon-sucking critics who choose to hate, argue and debate. Even in the story in Mark 2, we see how the religious teachers criticised Jesus’s words, questioning the law, His motives and His decision to eat with Matthew, the Tax-collector and other notorious sinners. God wants us to be known for our
love for others, the uncompromising truth and fullness of His grace. We need to stop caring what others are doing and missing the miracles God is wanting to do through us to the grace opportunities right next door to us. We need to get over our bitterness, our offences of the Church, our prejudices, and our preferences of Church style and people, to start seeing dead people come alive.
It was the faith of the friends of the paralysed man that Jesus saw that activated Him to heal. Our faith activates God’s miracles in other people’s lives that will change their narratives and reminds us not to give up on those who have given up on God.
To get over these 3 things, we need to push through to see people and circumstances with a new Godly perspective. The story in Mark contains no heroes’ names, except for Jesus, because the story highlights what Jesus did for us. He tore open the heavens, the veil that separated us from God, to rip open the way for God’s grace to flow to us, which makes us the paralysed man. It is time for us to stand up, pick up our mats and get over it so we can see the miracles God is waiting to do! God is tearing roofs and making a way where we can see no way.